𝔎𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔦𝔨 𝔡𝔢𝔯 𝔘𝔯𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔦𝔩𝔰𝔨𝔯𝔞𝔣𝔱 #27 - The Purpose of Nature

FYI TO PEOPLE NEW TO THE GROUP

This group is conducting an in-depth analysis of Immanuel Kant's Critique of Judgment and most of the discussion is centered around interpreting the text. We welcome any one who wants to learn more about Kant but ask that you confine your questions to, "What is Kant saying " or "What does Kant mean?"

I do reserve thirty minutes near the end for broader discussion for more general comments and questions so save these for the end OR join me early before the meeting starts for more general questions.

IN OUR LAST MEETING

Wow, that was a really great discussion about purpose and nature and a good opening as we begin the Anaytic of Teleology p, which I hope that we will eventually get to. Do items in nature have a purpose?

Let me start with an object that is obviously not natural, e.g. the tires of my car. The tires of my car have a function--to roll smoothly along paved surfaces. Can I say that that the tire's function is its purpose? If so, wherein lies the purpose? The purpose can't come from the car itself because the car is an inanimate object and cannot intend any purpose. Obviously, in this case, the purpose comes from the person who designed the car, the person who decided that the car would run much better with round wheels instead of square wheels. The purpose does not come from the object itself but is imbued from outside the object.

What about the wings of a bird? Its function is to enable flight, so can we then say the purpose of wings are to fly? If so, where does that purpose come from? It can't come from the bird because the bird can't decide one day that it would like to have wings and and then fashion them for itself. So if there's any purpose, it would have to come from outside the bird, e.g., from God or nature. We might say that God or nature created wings so that birds could fly. Of course, talking about God or nature in this sense is to talk about them as transcendent objects, and I'm hoping that by now, most of us know how Kant feels about this. So if purpose doesn't come from the bird and if it doesn't come from nature, where does this purpose come from which we attribute to the birds' wings?

Here's what else:

§15 - Taste is not a matter of perfection

• By perfect, Kant does not man perfect according to some determinate concept, as this would be external utility.
• Qualitative perfection refers to how well the object matches its concept and quantitative refers to whether anything is lacking.
• Logic enables cognition of the object, while aesthetic judgment relates how we are subjectively affected by the object.

§58 - The Idealism of the Purpose of Nature and Art

• Morality and understanding are the domain of reason and experience, respectively.
• The end is either objectively determined or subjectively necessary.
• The beautiful snowflake isn't there for us.
• Beauty is grounded in ideas, not in determinate concepts.

FOR NEXT TIME

We will continue our five-year mission to finish the first division of COJ and start the second division, to boldly go. . . Read for next time.

§59 - On Beauty as a Symbol of Morality
§60 - Appendix to the first half of the book on taste
§61 - On the objective purposiveness of nature
§62 - Objective purpose
§63 - Nature's purpose vs internal purpose

07/13;25 - Session 27 - Finish the section on taste
07/27/25 - Session 28 - Start the Analytic of Teleology
08/10/25 - Session 29 - Finish the Analytic of Teleology

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

My slides. They are a work in progress. And far from complete.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xUHfISzIjpPxF9Zf_fkVniM3Q6xr3ROG/view?usp=share_link

My blog, with essays about Critique of Judgment:

COJ #1.5 - There's practical and then there's practical

https://open.substack.com/pub/geraldpriddle/p/15-kants-critique-of-judgment?r=2rot22&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

COJ #2 - Abstracting from Philosophies to Cognitions

https://geraldpriddle.substack.com/p/2-critique-of-judgment?r=2rot22

COJ #3 - Abstracting from Cognitions to Faculties

https://geraldpriddle.substack.com/p/3-developing-a-transcendental-philosophy?r=2rot22

FOR THOSE WHO CAN'T GET ENOUGH OF IMMANUEL KANT

In addition to this meetup about Critique of Judgment, I am hosting another meetup about the Critique of Pure Reason on alternating Sundays. Here's the next meeting to that for anyone interested.

https://www.meetup.com/the-toronto-philosophy-meetup/events/308410108/

Groundwork Essay on the relevance of Kantian architectonics to practical philosophy -

https://open.substack.com/pub/geraldpriddle/p/1-kants-groundwork-to-a-metaphysics?r=2rot22&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

COPR #1.5 - more on the synthetic a priori.

https://geraldpriddle.substack.com/p/15-critique-of-pure-reason?r=2rot22