Papers by Noam Hoffer
Synthese, 2025
Kant maintains that particular laws of nature are discovered empirically yet are taken to be nece... more Kant maintains that particular laws of nature are discovered empirically yet are taken to be necessary. This raises the question of how to account for their necessity. Two leading interpretations emerged: the best system account (BSA) and the necessitation account (NA). BSA provides a methodological-epistemological account for the regularities that can be justifiably considered as laws of nature. On the other hand, NA provides an account of what it is to be a law of nature in terms of metaphysical explanatory grounds. While the interpretations are different in nature, there is textual evidence in Kant for both. In this paper, I aim to explain the duality of the interpretations and reconcile them. I present how they are intertwined in Kant's works, first by pointing out the metaphysical content of the idea of God which grounds the unity and necessity of the laws of nature. Secondly, I argue that both accounts share an epistemic status as regulative ideas which I interpret as expressing rational norms of scientific inquiry. Thus, Kant maintains that scientific inquiry encompasses a single norm of explanation in which the systematicity and necessity of the laws of nature are interdependent. This norm is expressed in metaphysical concepts such as essences, powers, and most importantly the regulative idea of God. Finally, I consider the relevance of this unified account to contemporary debates about the laws of nature by suggesting that the Kantian regulative framework could explain and deflate questionable ontological commitments by identifying metaphysical terms as expressions of norms. Keywords Kant • Laws of nature • Essences • Best-system • God The lawfulness of nature is a central theme in Kant's critical philosophy. Kant distinguishes between a general lawfulness entailed by a priori conditions of possible expe
Il Pensiero : rivista di filosofia, 2024
Both in the appendix to the dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason and in the introduction of t... more Both in the appendix to the dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason and in the introduction of the Critique of Judgment, Kant maintains that scientific knowledge requires a principle of systematicity. In the first case, the principle of systematicity is anchored in faculty the of reason with its regulative principles. In the second, it is the power of judgment in its reflective use. Yet Kant does not give an account of the duplicity of explanations or the relation between them. What is the meaning of transferring the principle from reason to the power of judgment? Most of the literature deals with the different arguments establishing the necessity of the principle. In this paper, however, I give attention to the change in the faculty responsible for the principle. I argue that the third critique supplements the doctrine of the regulative ideas of reason of the first critique in that it expresses the same principle of systematicity in the form of the act of reflective judgment. Thus, the principle of systematicity is a subjectively necessary demand of finding the world amenable to our cognitive ends. It is expressed both in reason's idea of maximal systematicity and the act or reflective judgment.
Edgar Valdez (ed.). Rethinking Kant Volume 7, 2024
Should we take seriously Kant's claim that his critical philosophy is the 'true apology for Leibn... more Should we take seriously Kant's claim that his critical philosophy is the 'true apology for Leibniz'? By exploring Kant's attitude towards Leibniz's doctrine of pre-established harmony, I argue that we should take it seriously because it sheds light on the development of Kant's view about the role of teleology in science in general and in the life sciences in particular. I first present the general framework through which Kant appropriates Leibnizian doctrines as regulative ideals. I then address Kant's pre-critical engagement with pre-established harmony. While he rejected it as an account of relations between states of substances, he made extensive references to harmony between the laws of nature. I argue that the critical development of this type of harmony allows Kant to appreciate one of Leibniz's motivations in arguing for pre-established harmony, the compatibility of mechanistic and teleological causal laws. Finally, I show how this affinity becomes explicit in the Critique of the Power of Judgment in Kant's novel position on the legitimacy of teleological explanations of organisms. I demonstrate this by pointing to Kant's complex attitude towards 18 th-century theories of epigenesis.
European Journal of Philosophy, 2023
In his lectures on Logic and Metaphysics Kant distinguishes between logical and real essences. Wh... more In his lectures on Logic and Metaphysics Kant distinguishes between logical and real essences. While the former are related to concepts and are knowable, the latter are related to things and are unknowable. In this paper, I argue that the unknowability is explained by the modal characteristic of real essences as a necessitating ground of which a priori knowledge is impossible. I also show how this claim is related to the unknowable necessity of particular laws of nature. Since laws of nature are conceived as grounded in real essences, the unknowability of the latter is equivalent to Kant’s other claim that there can be no knowledge of the necessity of particular laws of nature. Necessity can only be known a priori, and therefore, the necessity of particular laws is only assumed and conceived as grounded in something unknowable, a real essence. This conclusion will allow me to attribute to Kant a position I label as ‘regulative essentialism’, meaning that real essences have an indispensable role of in accordance with the rational interest to explain nature as a system of laws and natural kinds, combined with an epistemic humility about the correspondence of our empirical concepts to real essences.
Journal of the History of Philosophy, 2023
In his 1785 book Morning hours, Moses Mendelssohn presents a proof for the existence of God from ... more In his 1785 book Morning hours, Moses Mendelssohn presents a proof for the existence of God from the grounding of possibility. Although Mendelssohn claims that this proof is original, it has not received much attention in the secondary literature. In this paper, I will analyze this proof and present its historical context. I will show that although it resembles Leibniz’s proof from eternal truths and Kant’s pre-critical possibility proof, it has unique characteristics which can be regarded as responses to deficiencies Mendelssohn identified in these earlier proofs. I argue that by analyzing the semantics of judgments about dispositions, Mendelssohn provides a novel explanation for the basic premise shared by these proofs, namely that possibility is grounded in actuality. Additionally, this analysis simplifies the inference to a unique infinite mind grounding all possibility. Thus, the proof is worth studying both for historical reasons and for its original account of modal concepts.
Kantian Review, 2020
The nature of Kant’s criticism of his pre-Critical ‘possibility proof’ for the existence of God, ... more The nature of Kant’s criticism of his pre-Critical ‘possibility proof’ for the existence of God, implicit in the account of the Transcendental Ideal in the Critique of Pure Reason, is still under dispute. Two issues are at stake: the error in the proof and diagnosis of the reason for committing it. I offer a new way to connect these issues. In contrast with accounts that locate the motivation for the error in reason’s interest in an unconditioned causal ground of all contingent existence, I argue that it lies in reason’s interest in another kind of unconditioned ground, collective unity. Unlike the conception of the former, that of the latter directly explains the problematic ontological assumption of the possibility proof, the existence of intelligible objects as the ground of possibility. I argue that such Platonic entities are assumed because they are amenable to the kind of unity prescribed by reason. However, since the interest in collective unity has a legitimate regulative use when applied to the systematic unity of nature, the conception of God entailed by the possibility proof is retained as a regulative idea of reason.
The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 2019
In the 'Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic' of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant contends t... more In the 'Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic' of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant contends that the idea of God has a positive regulative role in the systematization of empirical knowledge. But why is this regulative role assigned to this specific idea? Kant's account is rather opaque and this question has also not received much attention in the literature. In this paper I argue that an adequate understanding of the regulative role of the idea of God depends on the specific metaphysical content Kant attributes to it in the Critique and other writings. I show that neither a heuristic principle of conceptual systematicity, nor conceiving God as a hypothesis of an intelligent designer, can satisfy the demands of reason to make the unity and necessity of the laws of nature intelligible. Regarding the positive account about the metaphysical content of the idea of God, I support my argument by referring to Kant's pre-critical discussion of the usefulness of the conception of God for the project of science, and by expounding Kant's critical account of the necessity of the laws of nature. Thus my account sheds light on the continuity of Kant's conception of God and his appropriation of his own rationalistic metaphysics.
Kantian Review, Jul 2016
It has been recently argued that Kant’s pre-critical proof for the existence of God entails a Spi... more It has been recently argued that Kant’s pre-critical proof for the existence of God entails a Spinozistic conception of God and hence substance monism. The basis for this reading is the assumption common in the literature that God grounds possibilities by exemplifying them. In this paper I take issue with this assumption and argue for an alternative Leibnizian reading, according to which possibilities are grounded in essences united in God’s mind (later also described as platonic ideas intuited by God). I show that this view about the distinction between God’s cognition of essences as the ground of possibility and the actual world is not only explicitly stated by Kant, but is also consistent with his metaphysical picture of teleology in nature and causality during the pre-critical period. Finally, I suggest that the distinction between the conceptual order of essences embodied in the idea of God and the order of the objects of experience plays a role in the transition into the critical system where it is transformed into the distinction between the intelligible and the sensible worlds.
Kant’s Religion and the Reflective Judgment
Akten des XI. Kant-Kongresses 2010, 2013
Talks by Noam Hoffer
"Limiting Concepts in Kant and German Idealism”, workshop, University of Potsdam (Speaker and Org... more "Limiting Concepts in Kant and German Idealism”, workshop, University of Potsdam (Speaker and Organizer together with Johannes Haag)
Book Reviews by Noam Hoffer
Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 2024
The Transcendental Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason contains Kant's negative assessment o... more The Transcendental Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason contains Kant's negative assessment of many doctrines of traditional metaphysics. Yet despite being the lengthiest part of the book, it has in the past received less attention than Kant's positive arguments justifying his transcendental idealism in the Transcendental Aesthetic and Analytic. This attitude has changed in recent decades and at least a couple of influential monographs have been devoted to it (Grier 2001; Willaschek 2018). Unlike previous anglophone works, the more recent literature takes seriously Kant's aim of providing a unifying analysis of the faculty of reason that explicates the motivation behind metaphysical thought, in addition to Kant's criticism of major arguments about the soul, the worldwhole and God. Proops' book does an excellent job on both fronts, providing not only extremely detailed reconstructions of the arguments in the Dialectic, but also a convincing case for what unifies them. Additionally, Proops also presents the historical-intellectual context of Kant's arguments, showing an erudite command of diverse historical sources, including obscure notes and treatises of now-forgotten figures. Proops' interpretation is propelled by a novel picture of the overall strategy of the Dialectic. The main theme, expressed in the title of the book, is the metaphor of the critique of pure reason as a 'fiery test': a metallurgical procedure of melting a sample of metal in order to discover nuggets of precious metals in it (p.10). The emphasis on this metaphor means that the Dialectic is not an entirely negative assessment of traditional metaphysics. The Dialectic instead operates on the assumption that there are things of value to salvage from the tradition. This yields an unorthodox
Dissertation by Noam Hoffer
My dissertation argues for the conceptual unity and historical continuity of Kant’s theoretical ... more My dissertation argues for the conceptual unity and historical continuity of Kant’s theoretical conception of God. It shows both the importance of the conception of God for understanding the development of Kant’s thought from the pre-critical onto the critical philosophy, and its significant role in the Kantian account of theoretical rationality. I maintain that there is a single idea that guided Kant in construing the metaphysical conception of God traceable early on from the pre-critical philosophy, that of grounding the unity and necessity of the laws of nature. I examine how Kant’s critical adaptation of this prevalent early modern rationalistic position enables him to transform the conception of God from an object of metaphysical inquiry into a regulative idea of reason. My interpretation thus explains the connection, mostly ignored in the literature, between the rationalist metaphysical conception of God and the regulative role it affords in the critical system.
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Papers by Noam Hoffer
Talks by Noam Hoffer
Book Reviews by Noam Hoffer
Dissertation by Noam Hoffer