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Chapter 6 - Finitism in the Metaphysical Foundations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 October 2022

By
Lydia Patton
Edited by
Michael Bennett McNulty
Michael Bennett McNulty
Affiliation:
University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
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Summary

Recent readings of Kant’s Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science begin with the claim that Kant presents a theory of matter, and of the interactions between material substances, in that work. Emphasizing this point raises a question that comes up in interpretations of the Metaphysical Foundations more generally: What is more fundamental to Kant’s account of matter? A description of how law-governed interactions are explained as arising from the essential properties and powers of objects (the Necessitation Account)? Or an account of how we come to know universal laws of nature via formal inferences regarding the a priori foundations of particular empirical laws (the Derivation Account)? Or a Best System Interpretation (BSI), on which “the particular laws of nature are those empirical generalizations that would figure in the best systematization of the empirical data at the ideal end of inquiry” (Breitenbach 2018, 111)?

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Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science
A Critical Guide
 , pp. 119 - 137
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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