Article ID: CBB900285348

Kant, organisms, and representation (2020)

unapi

Some interpreters claim Kant distinguishes between organisms and living things. I argue this claim is underdetermined by the textual evidence. Once this is recognized, it becomes a real possibility that Kant's various remarks about the essential properties of living things generalize to organisms as such. This, in turn, generates a puzzle. Kant repeatedly claims that the capacity for representation is essential to the nature of a living thing. If he does not distinguish between living things and organisms, then how might the capacity for representation be essential to the latter? Drawing on the writings of Kant and his contemporaries, I reconstruct a framework within which representational capacities might conceivably be thought to play this role. On this view, what distinguishes an organism from mechanically explicable products of nature is its capacity for endogenous behavior that is instinctual and representationally mediated.

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Authors & Contributors
Nassar, Dalia
Janiak, Andrew
Kabeshkin, Anton
Martinson, T. J.
Brogan, Walter
Feigenbaum, Ryan William
Concepts
History of philosophy of science
Biology
Senses and sensation; perception
Philosophy
Physics
Mathematics
Time Periods
18th century
19th century
20th century
Enlightenment
Places
Germany
Russia
Great Britain
Institutions
Rossiiskaia Akademiia Nauk
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