Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant (; ; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher who is a central figure in modern philosophy. In his doctrine of transcendental idealism, he argued that space, time and causation are mere sensibilities; "things-in-themselves" exist, but their nature is unknowable. In his view, the mind shapes and structures experience, with all human experience sharing certain structural features. He drew a parallel to the Copernican revolution in his proposition that worldly objects can be intuited "a priori" ("beforehand"), and that intuition is therefore independent from objective reality. Kant believed that reason is the source of morality, and that aesthetics arise from a faculty of disinterested judgment. Kant's views continue to have a major influence on contemporary philosophy, especially the fields of epistemology, ethics, political theory, and post-modern aesthetics.
Immanuel Kant
From then on, Kant turned increasingly to philosophical issues, although he continued to write on the sciences throughout his life. In the early 1760s, Kant produced a series of important works in philosophy. "The False Subtlety of the Four Syllogistic Figures", a work in logic, was published in 1762. Two more works appeared the following year: "Attempt to Introduce the Concept of Negative Magnitudes into Philosophy" and "The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God". In 1764, Kant wrote "Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime" and then was second to Moses Mendelssohn in a Berlin Academy prize competition with his "Inquiry Concerning the Distinctness of the Principles of Natural Theology and Morality" (often referred to as "The Prize Essay"). In 1766 Kant wrote "Dreams of a Spirit-Seer" which dealt with the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg. The exact influence of Swedenborg on Kant, as well as the extent of Kant's belief in mysticism according to "Dreams of a Spirit-Seer", remain controversial. On 31 March 1770, aged 45, Kant was finally appointed Full Professor of Logic and Metaphysics ("Professor Ordinarius der Logic und Metaphysic") at the University of Königsberg. In defense of this appointment, Kant wrote his inaugural dissertation ("Inaugural-Dissertation") "De Mundi Sensibilis atque Intelligibilis Forma et Principiis" ("On the Form and Principles of the Sensible and the Intelligible World)". This work saw the emergence of several central themes of his mature work, including the distinction between the faculties of intellectual thought and sensible receptivity. To miss this distinction would mean to commit the error of subreption, and, as he says in the last chapter of the dissertation, only in avoiding this error does metaphysics flourish.