Debates, Controversies, and Prizes by Tinca Prunea-Bretonnet;Christian Leduc;

Author:Tinca Prunea-Bretonnet;Christian Leduc;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury UK

4. Reinhold

In stark contrast to Kant’s description of metaphysics as a battlefield, Karl Leonhard Reinhold (1757–1823) refers to the period between the waning of the Leibniz-Wolffian philosophy and the publication of the first Critique as one of “peace” (PF, 176). Nevertheless, according to Reinhold, this was not a peace built on the overcoming of old disagreements or on a consensus regarding the truth of one particular metaphysical system. Instead, this peace resulted from a confusion of metaphysical principles, which meant that fundamental disagreements were not overcome but instead covered over and lost from view (176). Although he does not specify when precisely this period began, he associates Lambert’s Architektonik (1765/1771) and its popularity with the end of the dominance of the Leibniz-Wolffian school. Presumably because critics like Lambert had weakened its rational basis, the “heterogenous material” that fell under the name of “metaphysics” came to take on “every possible dress” (PF, 175). This eclectic metaphysics, Reinhold continues, was spread across German universities by Feder’s and Plattner’s “rhapsodic” and “aphoristic” lectures (PF, 175). Differences between schools were treated merely “historically rather than philosophically” and were thus “suppressed rather than illuminated” (PF, 175), leading to all sorts of “coalitions” between ostensibly opposed camps, such as empiricists and rationalists, or dogmatists and skeptics (PF, 174). Hence, Reinhold calls this the “eclectic” or “syncretic” period (PF, 174).14 This period, according to Reinhold, closes with the publication of the Critique of Pure Reason in 1781. The innocent “peace” that characterized the proceeding period came to an abrupt end because Kant “declared war” against all existing parties (PF, 176). In order to defend themselves against Kant’s bellicose intervention, these parties had to wake from the “slumber” (Schlummer) into which they had fallen. Kant’s new “mode of attack” necessitated a “new mode of defense,” so they attempted to strengthen their existing systems, turning to examine “the true” (das Wahre) (PF, 176). But the more “astute, well-judged, and thorough” their defenses of their systems were, the more the residual differences and contradictions between these various systems became apparent (PF, 176–7).

Not only did the differences between competing metaphysical positions become clearer after Kant, but the old “cantankerousness” (Unverträglichkeit) toward one another also resurfaced. Consequently, Reinhold characterizes the period between 1781 and the publication of the prize question as one in which the diversity in the conceptions within metaphysics and about metaphysics was more pronounced than at any previous point in history. This, in turn, makes the prize academy question about the progress of metaphysics both timely and difficult to answer (PF, 173). The diversity of conceptions and lack of consensus mean that every party to the conflict would frame the question differently, making it difficult to find a common standard against which any progress can be measured (PF, 177). Consequently, the strategy Reinhold adopts is to allow each party to speak in their own voice and give an account of what they have accomplished in metaphysics. Reinhold himself assumes the role of an unbiased observer, who, in the final section of his essay, comments on the alleged progress achieved in these attempts.

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