In whatever manner and by whatever means a mode of knowledge may relate to objects, intuition is that through which it is in immediate relation to them, and to which all thought as a means is directed.
--Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, A19/B33.
In whatever manner and to whatever ends a mode of power may position subjects, institution is that through which it positions them immediately, and to which all feeling as an end is directed.
--The Critique of Pure Passion.
There's something very peculiar about Kant's sentence, contained in the phrase, "that through which it is in immediate relation". My Concise Oxford Dictionary defines "medium", in one sense, as "the intervening substance through which impressions are conveyed to the senses". That gives either (a) "that through which something is devoid of an intervening substance through which to be related" or (b) "the medium of its immediate relation".
More later.
No comments:
Post a Comment