𝔎𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔦𝔨 𝔡𝔢𝔯 𝔘𝔯𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔦𝔩𝔰𝔨𝔯𝔞𝔣𝔱 40 - Efficient and Final Cause

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Paragraphs 5:422 - 5:442
Pages 290 - 308 in the Guyer/Wood translation

§81 - Association of mechanism with teleology
§82 - Teleogy and the relation of external organisms
§83 - Nature's ultimate end
§84 - Final end of creation
§85 - Physicotheology

01/11/26 - Session 40: Still subordinating mechanism
01/25/26 - Session 41: Not yet the final, but definitely the ultimate, end
0208/26: Pharmacotheology

THE PUZZLE OF THE DAY

This is probably just a problem for me. We know as we continue forward, that the notion of teleology is going to go beyond organisms to the question of whether nature itself has purpose. Earlier, however, Kant had stated that teleology is not absolutely necessary for the question of nature's purpose but absolutely so for explaining biological organisms. if, however, if we want to understand the laws of physics as part of an organized system, then teleology won't be optional at all for that field, and this problem of two legislations, a necessary one for biology and an optional one for physics , might be an error.

THIS IS WHAT WE JUST COVERED

§79 - Where does teleology belong in science?

Teleology belongs to neither natural science, nor to theology, but is part of a critique. It is not part of theology because its object is natural productions and their causes, not divine purpose. It is also not part of natural science because science requires determining principles for explaining phenomena, whereas teleology deals only with reflective principles that guide judgment. Teleology as a science, therefore, does not belong to any doctrine of nature but to the critique of the power of judgment itself. Its a priori principles provide a method for judging nature according to final causes, influencing the way nature is understood without supplying objective explanatory knowledge.

§80 - Subordinating Mechanism to Purpose

1. Mechanical explanations cannot fully account for organized beings. Judgments about organized nature must include teleological principles.

2. Use of original organization as a heuristic. Investigators must assume an original organization that uses mechanical processes to produce or modify organized forms in accordance with ends. Comparative anatomy suggests recurring patterns and common schemas among species, hinting at underlying unity.
3. Generation scenario. Kant imagines a “maternal womb of the earth” producing less organized forms first, which then generate more complex ones. Heritable variations in species are incidental developments within existing predispositions. Generation from unorganized matter is excluded; known generation is homogeneous.
4. Hume’s objection and the simple substance. Hume questions how an architectonic understanding could exist. Kant replies that the initial generation of purposive systems is only intelligible if one assumes a simple, intelligent substance as the ground of organization; mere material aggregates cannot account for purposive unity.
5. Inadequacy of Pantheism and Spinozism. Reducing all phenomena to a single substance satisfies unity of ground but does not explain the purposive relations among natural forms. The full question remains unanswerable without an intelligent simple substance.

RESOURCES

Kant's concept of beauty as a disinterested pleasure.

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