Abstract
The concept of inner sense plays a prominent role in Kant’s attempts to define the character and scope of anthropology. Moreover, Kant denounces the terminological confusion between inner sense and apperception as a source of paralogisms. Who were his targets? In recent years, scholars have pointed to the existence of a German tradition on inner sense (perhaps independent of Locke) as a plausible source for Kant’s elaboration. However, some specific aspects of the German treatment of inner sense have been so far completely overlooked. This paper focuses on Jungius, Leibniz, Wolff, and Lambert, to show that they all referred to inner sense or inner experience as a privileged source of knowledge, immune to error and free from the ontological limits of the external senses. In this tradition, inner sense was ascribed with the epistemological function of providing a foundation not only for psychology but also for logic and metaphysics. Such a radical empowerment of the role of inner sense, which culminated in Lambert’s work, is the most plausible target of Kant’s criticism. Relegating the contribution of inner sense to the fields of anthropology and empirical psychology was part of Kant’s effort to purify logic and metaphysics from any reference to inner experience or sensation.
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Notes
- 1.
Consider, for instance, this passage from Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, §24: “Its perceptions [sc. of inner sense] and the inner experience (true or illusory) composed by means of their connections are not merely anthropological, where we abstract from the question of whether the human being has a soul or not (as a special incorporeal substance); but psychological, where we believe we perceive such a thing within ourselves, and the mind, which is represented as a mere faculty of feeling and thinking, is regarded as a special substance dwelling in the human being” (Anth, AA 07: 161; 2007: 272).
- 2.
- 3.
The German and Latin translations of the Monadologie appeared in 1720 and 1721, respectively. Although the Principes appeared in 1718, they were largely ignored, and Wolff probably never read them (cf. Lamarra 2001). Moreover, Poggi (2015: 259) points out that the text of the 1718 edition reads ‘perception’ instead of ‘apperception.’
- 4.
Wolff also maintains that apperception is the sole mental act that cannot be represented in the brain and thus has no physical correlate (cf. Favaretti Camposampiero 2009: 590–603).
- 5.
Cf. Wolff (1732: §26n): “In every thought, the perception or representation of a thing in the mind must be properly distinguished from apperception, by virtue of which we are conscious of the object [vi cujus nobis conscii sumus objecti].” This passage disproves Thiel’s claim that, in Wolff’s use, the term “apperception” is narrower than “consciousness” in that the former “always denotes a relation to our own perceptions,” whereas the latter “can denote a relation to external objects as well” (Thiel 2011: 305, 2014: 967; cf. Wunderlich 2007: 370).
- 6.
In the note, Wolff denies that self-perception entails full consciousness of all that happens in the mind; he leaves the question open of whether some mental events are not conscious (Wolff 1728: §31n).
- 7.
The latter term appears in the index: “Apperceptio sui ipsius quatenus in animam cadit” (Wolff 1734: Index rerum et verborum), with reference to §12.
- 8.
“… accidit, ut uterque mentis status ipso sensus interni judicio diversus deprehendatur” (Wolff 1732: §854).
- 9.
By contrast, we may assume that consciousness in the broad sense includes consciousness of one’s own body and the outside world. Cf. Baumgarten (1739: §660): “I am more conscious, i.e. more truly, clearly, and certainly conscious, of myself, my body, and the state of both, than of many other things” (trans. 2013, modified).
- 10.
“Nun kann bei den Begriffen und Sätzen der Vernunftlehre, sofern darin nur die Gesetze des Denkens betrachtet werden, die innere Empfindung allezeit mit dabei sein, wenn wir behörig darauf Achtung haben wollen. Da aber diese Empfindung nur ein denkendes Wesen voraussetzt, so hindert dieses nicht, daß wir nicht auch die Vernunftlehre in so fern sollten unter die Wissenschaften rechnen, die im engsten Verstande a priori sind.”
- 11.
Cf. Anth AA 07: 134n; 2007: 246n: “If we consciously represent two acts: inner activity (spontaneity), by means of which a concept (a thought) becomes possible, or reflection; and receptiveness (receptivity), by means of which a perception (perceptio), i.e., empirical intuition, becomes possible, or apprehension; then consciousness of oneself (apperceptio) can be divided into that of reflection and that of apprehension. The first is a consciousness of understanding, pure apperception; the second a consciousness of inner sense, empirical apperception. In this case, the former is falsely named inner sense”.
- 12.
Joachim Jungius, Epistola de Cartesii philosophia, 23 March 1655: “Nosti logicam fundari in experientia interna, de qua logica Hamburgensis lib. IV. c. 4. §9, quam etiam Cartesius magni facit, dum initium spei a dubitationibus emergendi collocat in hac propositione: Ego cogito” (Jungius 1977: 217).
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Favaretti Camposampiero, M. (2018). Anthropology from a Logical Point of View: The Role of Inner Sense from Jungius to Kant. In: Lorini, G., Louden, R. (eds) Knowledge, Morals and Practice in Kant’s Anthropology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98726-2_4
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