Kant's Concept of Genius by Bruno Paul W.;

Author:Bruno, Paul W.;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781441194824
Publisher: Bloomsbury UK
Published: 2019-11-22T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Three

Nature

Perhaps nothing more sublime has ever been said, or a thought ever been expressed more sublimely, than in that inscription above the temple of Isis (Mother Nature): “I am all that is, that was, and that will be, and no mortal has lifted my veil.”

Gerard 1966, 185 n.

What for many of the philosophers we have studied (Gerard, Young and Herder) is a trope relating to plants and animals (verdant fields, blazing sun, shining stars, leaves awash in color, the appetancy of a ravaged tiger, etc.), is for Kant something different. Though there are times when he conceives of nature on the model of plants and animals—he writes of “Flowers, free designs, lines aimlessly intertwined and called foliage” (§4)—but, for the most part, he stays with an explicit distinction between two kinds of nature, neither one of which can be conceived of simply as a world of plants and animals. The two kinds of nature are mechanical and technical.

Kant’s depiction of nature is indeed one that suggests “all that is, and all that will be,” and further, his somewhat tepid introduction of the idea of the supersensible (übersinnlich) suggests that there is an insuperable veil that will forever conceal the fullness of nature. Yet nature is an irreplaceable concept in Kant’s critique. We realize this not only because Kant says that “nature gives the rule to art,” but also because his examination of nature is the means by which Kant brings together the realm of laws (Gesetze) as determinate concepts and the realm of teleology and beauty as accessed by judgment.

Establishing a normative understanding of Kant’s concept of nature is no easy task. Nevertheless, it is necessary to establish such an understanding if we are going to explore Kant’s concept of genius, for genius is so inextricably linked to nature that it cannot possibly be understood exclusive of genius. A study of the role genius plays in the third Critique inevitably leads us to consider nature as it relates to Kant’s first Critique because nature is depicted so differently in each work. As Desmond makes clear in his essay, Kant’s depiction of nature has some conflicting elements that are most evident in its relationship to the cognitive subject. Desmond writes, “In the earlier picture of nature in Critique of Pure Reason, the self gives the rule to nature. Now, in a reversal, it seems that nature is giving the rule, and through genius” (Desmond 1998, 598). The seeds of this conflict appear in the first Critique when Kant asserts that nature is unified by the subject. It is clear that the subject plays a large role in constituting nature; the self is in Desmond’s words an “active source of intelligibility.” The reversal of which Desmond speaks is apparent in the third Critique where we learn that nature works through genius, as opposed to the first Critique where the subject is constitutive of nature. Let us consider the two viewpoints in turn.

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