Qantian Epistemology

Making the Epistemology of Immanuel Kant Safe for Quantum Physics

Shaun Kenney

PHILOSOPHY 302 Dr. David Ambuel

Mary Washington College

Abstract

In today’s modern understanding of physics, Kantian epistemology is seemingly dealt a crushing death blow. Immutable concepts of space and time have been shown by Einstein’s relativity theory to be influenced by gravity and movement, rocking the foundations of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. But just as Newtonian physics is not delivered to the wastebasket of science, Kantian epistemology equally cannot be disregarded as incompatible with either relativity theory or quantum theory. Furthermore, as Kripke’s evidence for analytic a posteriori knowledge has shown, Kant’s once “absurd” classification of judgment is an amazing fit to chaos theory’s non-linear determinism, and deserves better consideration. This paper will explore the foundations of Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason in classical Newtonian physics, and will further explore the deficiencies of the implied determinism therein. This paper will also discuss the impact relativity theory and the current advances in quantum theory have upon Kantian epistemology. Furthermore, this paper will examine which – if any - concepts of Kantian epistemology will have to be re-analyzed in order to conform to quantum theory.

Table of Contents

Introduction..................................................................................................4

Space and Time Before Kant..........................................................................6

The Kantian Universe ....................................................................................9

Kant and Relativity Theory ..........................................................................15

Quantum Physics, Space, and Time .............................................................18

Philosophy vs. Science ................................................................................22

A Qantian Epistemology? ............................................................................24

Conclusions .................................................................................................32

Introduction

Kantian epistemology rests on the position that a deterministic superstructure

supports the universe, namely it is a philosophical extension of classical Newtonian

physics. This basic assumption of Immanuel Kant is well taken. In Kant’s Kritik der

Reinen Vernuft (Critique of Pure Reason) he specifically points out a dimensional

structure that all classical physics assumes as true; the concepts of space and time.1

Under this, Kant details his epistemological concepts in a proper marriage of

determinism and the Enlightenment. Thus the Age of Reason has its inauspicious

birth, marking Kant as the “Thomas Aquinas of the Enlightenment” and setting the

new standard of Western thought for the next two hundred years.

Since that time, our knowledge of the universe has expanded well beyond our

deterministic adolescence. New concepts such as relativity theory and quantum

theory have cropped up on the horizon, casting doubt on what were previously

guaranteed physical truths. The old classical method, while technically correct for

the four dimensional universe of space and time, was now shown to be not only

impacted but fundamentally guided by multi-dimensional forces beyond human

understanding. Gaining a glimpse of this multi-dimensional world’s effects on our

own, modern physics is now beginning to make such applications as faster-than-light

communications – once thought to be impossible – a distinct reality.

In this new understanding of modern physics, Kantian epistemology is seemingly

dealt a crushing death blow. Once immutable concepts of space and time are now

shown by Einstein’s relativity theory to be influenced by gravity and movement,

rocking Kantian concepts of these dimensional aspects by showing them as existing

objects rather than a pre-existing superstructure. Perceptions of how Kant describes

the human person observing the world is now thrown into chaos, for the once

1 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (New York, NY: Cambridge University Press), 156, 173.

deterministic ordering of the world is no longer guaranteed. If these once

guaranteed premises of this world are now uncertain, synthetic a priori knowledge,

the crown jewel of Kantian epistemology, is now emphasized by its subjective

quantities rather than its universal a priori quality. Surely the epistemology of

Immanuel Kant is wounded if not dead, and perhaps fatally so.

But this is not the end of Kantian epistemology, for indeed his philosophy is

based upon a strictly four-dimensional existence. Kant does not dispute this,2 as the

purpose of the Critique is to demonstrate the human ability to understand the world

around him, and not the world’s ability to understand the human person.3 To further

emphasize the strength of Kantian epistemology, classical Newtonian physics

typically works in its four-dimensional realm despite quantum criticism to the

contrary. Only when the four-dimensional world begins to ask multi-dimensional

questions does relativity theory and quantum theory begin to play a role, and in

doing so affecting the foundations of Kantian epistemology.

It is proper to assert that the epistemology claims a fundamental four-

dimensional superstructure of space and time that Kant is not qualified to explain.

Nevertheless, just as Newtonian physics is not delivered to the wastebasket of

science, Kant’s basis for metaphysical knowledge is not responsibly considered

incompatible with either relativity theory or quantum theory. If Kantian

epistemology works with the deterministic world of Newton, it is not unreasonable to

claim that it should have applications in the world of the quantum.

How then does Immanuel Kant’s epistemology become safe for relativity theory

and quantum physics? Which concepts will Kantian epistemology be forced to re-

examine in order to synchronize itself with modern scientific findings? Finally, with

2 ibid, 157, 173. 3 ibid, 340-1, 356.

this new understanding applied to Kant’s philosophy, how is the Critique of Pure

Reason affected by this reformation?

This paper will explore the foundations of Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure

Reason in classical Newtonian physics, and will further explore the deficiencies of the

implied determinism therein. This paper will also discuss the impact relativity theory

and the current advances in quantum theory have upon Kantian epistemology.

Furthermore, this paper will examine which – if any - concepts of Kantian

epistemology will have to be re-analyzed in order to conform to quantum theory.

Space and Time Before Kant

It is important for the purposes of this paper to define how influential the writings

of Sir Isaac Newton were on Kant. Having expanded on the Copernican revolution

that Kant so ardently admired, Newton composed his Principia Naturalis Principia

Mathematica in 1687, laying forth his now famous laws of gravity.4 By mid-1680,

Newton had managed to produce “not only a theory of gravity, but the laws of

motion on which modern physics was built”.5 By 1704, Newton was able to publish

his theory on light, defining light as a “stream of tiny particles”.6

The real coup in Newtonian physics was not these laws in themselves, but that

Newton “showed that the laws of physics are universal”.7 The birth of Newtonian

physics ushered in a new era of science based on empirically-based scientific

evidence8 that had been demonstrably proven and unquestioned until the late 19th

century.9

Newton was not alone in his scientific inquiry during the 17th century, for just as

Newton was discovering calculus, so his contemporary Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was

4 John Gribbin, Q is for Quantum. (New York, NY: Touchstone), 251. 5 ibid, 257. 6 ibid, 258. 7 ibid, 258. 8 ibid, 258. 9 J.P. McEvoy, Oscar Zarate, Introducing Quantum Theory. (St. Leonards, AUS: Allen & Unwin Pty. Ltd.), 3.

simultaneously pondering the same issues, both men actually discovering the new

mathematical method in 1676.10 While their sharp disagreement over who made the

discovery first is the more famous of their differences, Kant would be more

concerned with their divergent concepts of space and time.11 Newton grounded his

concepts of space and time as “absolute(s) . . . as a substance or a property of any

substance”, while Leibniz asserted to the contrary that space and time were

“something we abstract from perceived relations of objects”.12

Of the two ‘natural philosophers’, it would be Newton who would provide the

young Immanuel Kant his earliest foundations in the physics of the day.13 But Kant

was distinctly aware of Leibniz’s discourses on the topic of space and time. Indeed,

while today Leibniz is known for his Discourses on Metaphysics, during the 18th

century he was more known for his writings on “the pre-established harmony of the

monads14 and his dispute with the Newtonians about the nature of space and time”.15

It is noteworthy to mention that Kant’s first publication in 1746, Ideas Concerning

the True Estimation of Living Forces, was a critique “dealing with a problem drawn

from the intellectual world of Descartes, Newton, and Leibniz,”16 reflecting just how

central the concepts of space and time really were to the ongoing debate in ‘natural

philosophy’.17

Clearly Kant possessed an understanding concerning the controversy on concepts

of space and time, and the monstrous task of synthesizing Cartesian rationalism with

Humean skepticism only complicated the issue. Once awoken from his “dogmatic

10 Simon Blackburn. Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, The. (Chatham, UK: Mackays, Ltd.), 215. 11 ibid, 214-6, 260-1. 12 Kant (Paul Geyer and Allen Wood), 42-3. 13 Paul Strathern. Kant in 90 Minutes. (Chicago, IL: Ivan R. Dee, Inc.), 12-3, 17-9. 14 Leibniz believed that monads were “self-sufficient, extensionless, mental entities” that were the only real or “true substances” that could exist. “The foundation of the doctrine is that relations must ultimately be explained by the categorical, non-relational nature of things”. See Blackburn, 248. 15 Kant (Geyer and Wood), 707. 16 Karl Jaspers. Kant. (New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace, and Co.), 4. 17 Strathern, 17.

slumber”, Kant would use this understanding of space and time to his advantage by

marrying Newtonian physics with a Leibnizian concept of universal harmony.18

Just as the rationalism of Descartes and the empiricism of Hume are set poles

apart philosophically, so equally are the scientific groundings of Leibniz and Newton

concerning their notions of space and time. It would become Kant’s synthesizing of

all four that would become the real triumph of the Critique of Pure Reason. As Paul

Geyer and Allen Wood state in their introduction to the Critique:

(I)t should by no means be thought that Kant’s mature philosophy, as first expressed in the Critique of Pure Reason, represents and outright rejection of the philosophy of his predecessors, above all the original philosophy of Leibniz. On the contrary, Kant’s philosophy can be thought of as an attempt to synthesize Leibniz’s vision of the pre-established harmony of the principles of nature and the principles of grace with the substance of Newtonian science and the moral and political insights of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. . . . These critical forerunners led Kant to transform Leibniz’s vision of a harmonious world of monads under the rule of God and Rousseau’s vision of a social contract expressing a general will into ideals of human reason, neither of which can simply be asserted to exist in well-founded cognitive judgments made within the limits of human sensibility and understanding, but both of which can and must represent the ultimate even if never completely attainable goals of human theoretical and practical thought and conduct.19

In a sense, Immanuel Kant was wrestling with the issue of merging rationalist

dogmatism with empirical skepticism, and a synthesis between Newtonian physics

and Leibnizian monadology would provide the glue for doing so. Thus the central

issue of the Critique of Pure Reason – how to “undermine the arguments of

traditional metaphysics” while replacing them with “a scientific metaphysics of his

[Kant’s] own,”20 - would become a path that would ultimately embrace Newtonian

18 Kant (Geyer and Wood), 24. 19 Kant (Geyer and Wood), 24. 20 ibid, 3.

physics, coloring it with a Leibnizian flavor while saving epistemology from David

Hume’s withering skepticism.

The Kantian Universe

If the writings of David Hume had “interrupted [Kant’s] dogmatic slumber”,21 it

was a bleak world Kant discovered himself in. In addition to the total refutation of

certifiable human knowledge, Hume rejected any concept of the infinitude of space

by decrying that “the idea, which we form of any finite quality, is not infinitely

divisible.”22 Since our ideas of space are no longer infinite, Hume argued that time

could not be infinite as well, “(f)or if in time we could never arrive at the end of

division. . . there would be an infinite number of co-existent moments, or parts of

time; which I believe would be allow’d to be an errant contradiction”.23

Hume begins his interrogation of the Newtonian concepts of space and time by

calling into question the notions of infinity. Hume states:

I first take the least idea I can form as part of an extension, and being certain that there is nothing more minute than this idea, I conclude, that whatever I discover by its means must be a real quality of extension. I then repeat this idea once, twice, thrice, &c. and find the compound idea of extension, arising from its repetition, always to augment, and become double, triple, quadruple, &c. till at last it swells up to a considerable bulk, greater or smaller, in proportion as I repeat more or less the same idea. When I stop in the addition of parts, the idea of extension ceases to augment, and were I to carry on the addition in infinitum, I clearly perceive, that the idea of extension must also become infinite. Upon the whole, I conclude, that the idea of an infinite number of parts is individually the same idea with that of an infinite extension; that no finite extension is capable of containing an infinite number of parts; and consequently that no finite extension is infinitely divisible.

This Humean approach to knowledge is a re-visitation of Zeno’s Movement

Paradox, where one must cover half the distance in order to reach a point, and then

21 Kant (Geyer and Wood), 23. 22 David Hume. Treatise on Human Nature, A. (Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press), 26. 23 ibid, 31.

cover half the distance again, repeating this halving of distance ad infinitum, thereby

never reaching one’s destination. Hume would use the paradox to demonstrate the

illogical foundations against infinite space and time. Interestingly enough, Newton

and Leibniz had already disposed of the paradox by discovering the property of

converging limits, eventually leading Zeno’s perpetual halving to its destination if

given an infinite set, thus rejecting the Humean notion that “no finite extension is

infinitely divisible”. 24 Moreover, the calculus of both Newton and Leibniz

demonstrates that it is because of this infinite divisibility that finite extensions

exist.25 Newton and Leibniz’s extrapolations on space and time reveal this error in

Hume’s skepticism, and thus the groundwork is laid for Kant to re-create human

knowledge and metaphysics in his own image and likeness.

Although the refutation of Hume’s paradox prevented his philosophy from being

properly employed, the responsibility of demonstrating the existence of human

knowledge would still lie with Immanuel Kant. Kant readily yields to Hume the

notion that “all our cognition commences with experience, yet it does not on that

account all arise from experience.”26 With this distinction of cognition in mind, Kant

illustrates the difference between a priori knowledge which has no basis in

experience or sense perception, and a posteriori knowledge, or empirical knowledge

that has every basis in experience and sense perception.27

Furthermore, Kant discusses the types of judgment, that of clarification or

analytic judgments, and that of amplification or synthetic judgments.28 Analytic

judgments are defined as statements where “the predicate B belongs to the subject

24 Dan Cyran, Sharron Shatil, Bill Mayblin. Introducing Logic. (St. Leonards, AUS: Allen & Unwin Pty, Ltd.), 83. 25 ibid, 83. 26 Kant, 136. 27 ibid, 136. 28 ibid, 141.

A as something that is (covertly) contained in this concept A”, such as “all bachelors

are unmarried men”.29

Conversely, Kantian forms of synthetic judgments are statements where “B lies

entirely outside the concept A, though to be sure it stands in connection with it”.30

To carry our bachelor example a bit further, “these bachelors are wearing suits”

would be an example of a judgment based on the amplifying qualities of the

bachelors; therefore the statement is a synthetic judgment.

So where do these judgments coincide with knowledge? Kant uses the analogy

of a body as an a priori proposition by “merely draw[ing] out the predicate in

accordance with the principle of contradiction, and can thereby at the same time

become conscious of the necessity of the judgment, which experience could never

teach me.”31 Therefore if a body such as a cube is to have weight, the a priori

concept of a body takes precedence over the “predicate of weight with the concept of

body”.32 While the predicate of weight may lie entirely outside the concept of body,

the concepts “nevertheless belong together, though only contingently, as parts of a

whole, namely experience, which is itself a synthetic combination of intuitions.”33

Thus Kant arrives at the concept of synthetic a priori knowledge.

As for the other possibilities as to where a priori and a posteriori knowledge

intersects with analytic and synthetic judgments, Kant is quite curt. Synthetic a

posteriori knowledge is nothing more than subjective thought that is verifiable.34

On the other half of the coin of Kantian judgment, analytic a priori knowledge is a

consequence of logical necessity, and while Kant believes them to be “most

important and necessary,” this type of knowledge is only used “for attaining that

disctinctness of concepts which is requisite for a secure and extended synthesis as a

29 ibid, 141. 30 ibid, 141. 31 ibid, 142. 32 ibid, 142. 33 ibid, 142. 34 ibid, 141.

really new acquisition.”35 Therefore, the statement “every child has a mother” is an

analytic a priori judgment. But while Kant believes this form of knowledge to exist,

Kant completely discredits the notion of analytic a posteriori knowledge, believing

it to be “absurd to ground analytic judgment on experience, since I [Kant] do not

need to go beyond my concept at all in order to formulate the judgment, and

therefore need no testimony from experience for that.”36 In the Newtonian universe,

there is simply no need to define an object of clarification through empirical

evidence. Synthetic a priori judgment is the only useful form of knowledge for Kant,

and it becomes the foundation for both his epistemology and metaphysics.

Using this basis of synthetic a priori knowledge, Kant stridently conquers the

known philosophical world, turning on mathematical judgments, natural science, and

metaphysics in kind and asking whether each of them are possible as sciences. But

in order to do this, Kant knows he must have a foundation or superstructure for

these sciences of human experience to exist within. That foundation would be the

pure principles of a priori cognition found in the Transcendental Aesthetic and what

for Kant would be the only “pure forms of sensible intuition . . . namely space and

time.”37

Kant wastes no time in tackling the issues of space and time by asking whether

or not they are objects as Newton would describe them, mere relations as Leibniz

identified them, or were they truly “attach(ed) . . . to the subjective constitution of

our mind” as Hume contends.38

Beginning with space, Kant makes five specific assertions. Firstly, Kant rejects

the idea that space is an “empirical concept . . . drawn from outer experiences”

because Kant believes that one can only draw outside experiences from space.39

35 ibid, 143. 36 ibid, 142. 37 ibid, 157. 38 ibid, 157. 39 ibid, 157-8.

Space becomes a pre-qualification for perception, and “outer experience is itself first

possible only through this representation”.40

Secondly, “one can never represent that there is no space,” and while one can

conceive of a space without object, one can never conceive of an object without

space, making space an a priori intuition.41

Third, it is necessary for all “geometrical principles” to be grounded as an “a

priori necessity” because without it “the first principles of mathematical

determination would be nothing but perceptions.”42 Kant goes further in this

explanation, citing that without this “apodictic certainly . . . one would therefore only

be able to say that as far as has been observed to date, no space has been found

that has more than three dimensions”.43 In the second edition of the Critique, Kant

expounds on this further, stating that the “explanation alone makes the possibility of

geometry as a synthetic a priori cognition comprehensible,” concluding that the

characteristics of “explanations that do not accomplish this” can still derive itself

from this Kantian first principle concerning geometry.44

Fourth, one cannot have a ‘part’ of space, nor can one consider a relation of

these ‘parts’ as space, for Kant describes space as “essentially single, the manifold in

it . . . (t)hese parts cannot as it were precede the single all-encompassing space as

its components (from which its composition would be possible), but rather are only

thought in it.”45

Fifth, Kant defines space as infinite, for “(a) general concept of space . . . can

determine nothing in respect to magnitude. . . [for] if there were not boundlessness

in the progress of intuition, no concept of relations could bring with it a principle of

40 ibid, 158. 41 ibid, 158. 42 ibid, 158 43 ibid, 158. 44 ibid, 176. 45 ibid, 158-9.

their infinity.”46 Infinity therefore becomes an intuition by virtue of the fact we are

aware of the concept.

Once Kant makes these statements about these concepts, only then is he

satisfied that “space represents no property at all”, but with a note of caution that

the human intellect “can only speak of space . . . from the human standpoint. If we

depart from the subjective condition . . . then the representation of space signifies

nothing at all.”47 One realizes why when Kant makes the statement “(t)his predicate

is attributed to things only insofar as they appear to us, i.e. are objects of

sensibility.”48 Predicate B must always lie entirely outside of concept A. Just as

Leibniz’s ‘parts of space’ are connected to the “all-encompassing space”, thus our

concepts of space must remain within our realm of a priori truth.

Thus Leibniz loses to Newton on the topic of the absolute and objective reality of

space, and Hume is refuted as to the infinity of space. But as Hume is refuted

entirely, Leibniz’s monadology is amazingly rehabilitated to fit as a justifiable

explanation of an object’s relation to space; a testament to Kant’s brilliance.

On time, Kant’s arguments are fairly similar to those of space save one; while

space deals solely with the “form of our intuition only of outward things . . . time is

the form also of the inner sense, and hence of all phenomena whatsoever.”49

Upon this stage Kant outlines the foundation his epistemology by answering the

question of how synthetic a priori knowledge is possible, “namely [by] pure a priori

intuitions, space and time, in which, if we want to go beyond the given concept in an

a priori judgment, we encounter that which is to be discovered a priori and

synthetically connected with it, not in the concept of but in the intuition the

corresponds to it.”50

46 ibid, 159. 47 ibid, 159-60. 48 ibid, 160. 49 Jaspers, 21. 50 Kant, 192.

Kant therefore rests his synthetic a priori knowledge on infinite intuitions of space

and time.51 It was a coup for the Age of Reason, synthesizing not only the Cartesian

world of distinct ideas with Humean empiricism, but also the monadology of Leibniz

with the deterministic laws of Newton. “My work,” Kant would write to his student

and longtime colleague Marcus Herz, “may it stand or fall, cannot help but bring

about a complete change of thinking in this part of human knowledge

[metaphysics].”52

To say that Kant succeeded would be an understatement; Kantian epistemology

so revolutionized modern thought that all philosophy since has been nothing more

than attempts to respond to it.53 Kant’s Critique would prove to be the capstone to

the Enlightenment and the beginning of a new wave of post-Kantian thought,

influencing such philosophers as Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel.54 It was a victory for

Newtonian determinism and a complete resuscitation of metaphysics from the near-

death suffered at the hands of David Hume. When Kant died in 1804, it is little

wonder why he was immediately noted as one of the greatest philosophers in all of

Western history.55

Kantian epistemology found itself crowned as the philosophical emperor of the

Newtonian universe. It would stand virtually unchallenged until the advent of a

young physicist named Albert Einstein.

Kant and Relativity Theory

By the 19th century, the physics that Kant knew so well was beginning to

demonstrate its shortcomings. With the advent of the First and Second Laws of

Thermodynamics and the confirmation of the existence of the atom in the early to

mid 19th century, Scottish physicist J.C. Maxwell developed his kinetic theory of

51 ibid, 192. 52 ibid (Geyer and Wood), 66. 53 ibid (Geyer and Wood), 1. 54 Jaspers, 152. 55 ibid, 152.

gases in 1859.56 In this theory, Maxwell was the first to assert that Newtonian

physics could not calculate the motion of atoms.57 By the turn of the 19th century,

this discovery had turned into a controversy between classical Newtonian physics’

ability to reconcile with Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism.58 For instance,

physicist John Gribbin uses the example of a ball being thrown from a moving

vehicle:

(I)f you are riding in a car at a certain speed and throw a ball out ahead of you, the speed of the ball relative to the road is equal to the speed of the car plus the speed of the throw.59

Classical Newtonian physics would assume the ball, if thrown, would move at the

speed the ball was thrown plus the speed of the moving vehicle.60 One of the

precepts of Maxwell’s equation is that the speed of light is a constant (c)61 that does

not change with the perception of that which observes the light. Concerning

Gibbon’s analogy of the ball and the moving vehicle, Gribbin shows how replacing the

ball with “a beam of light ahead of you at (a speed) relative to the (vehicle), the

speed of the beam of light will . . . not be measured as c plus the speed of the car.”62

Newtonian physics was not applicable at the speed of light, and this seed of

discontinuity would continue to grow.

As Gribbin demonstrates using the analogy of a ball thrown at light speed, so

Einstein would reveal to the scientific community in his 1905 paper entitled “On An

Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Nature of Light.”63 Specific relativity, more

famously known as E=mc2, was born.

56 McEvoy, 20. 57 ibid, 22. 58 John Gribbin, Q is for Quantum, (New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Inc.), 341 59 ibid, 341. 60 ibid, 80. 61 ibid, 347. 62 ibid, 347. 63 McEvoy, 53.

Shortly after special relativity was presented to the scientific community, Einstein

delivered his Theory of General Relativity towards the end of a series of lectures in

1915, publishing this theory one year later.64 Crucial to general relativity is

Einstein’s equivalence principle, which Einstein compared to a person falling from a

roof, yet not feeling the effects of gravity, the “acceleration of the fall . . . exactly

cancel(ing) out the feeling of weight.”65

Gribbin abbreviates Einstein’s example of using a “beam of light” on a free falling

elevator to explain how gravity bends light.66 While Newtonian physics already

claimed this phenomenon to exist, what is remarkable about Einstein’s general

relativity is that the “deflection of light is predicted to be exactly twice as great as it

is according to Newton’s theory.”67 When scientists tested this prediction during a

solar eclipse in 1919, Einstein’s theory matched the “bending of starlight caused by

the gravity of the Sun . . . [and] the general theory of relativity was hailed as a

triumph.”68

Classical Newtonian physics was slowly suffering a death of a thousand knives,

and Kantian epistemology would become the natural philosophical victim of the

Newtonian fallout. “To a Kantian,” physicist Steve Weinberg writes, “the most

shocking thing about Einstein’s theories was that they demoted space and time to

the status of ordinary aspects of the physical universe.”69 Classical physicists as well

as Kantian scholars both were posed with a new and massive challenge.

64 Gibbon, 338. 65 ibid, 338. 66 “Suppose that the elevator has walls of glass, and that the path of the light beam is measured by sensitive instruments on each floor that the elevator falls past. Because the ‘weightless’ elevator and everything in it is actually being accelerated by gravity, in the time it takes the light beam to cross the elevator the falling laboratory has increased its speed. The only way in which the beam can hit the spot on the other wall exactly opposite the spot it started from is if it has followed a curved path, bending downwards to match the increase in speed of the elevator. And the only thing that could be doing the bending is gravity.” See ibid, 340. 67 ibid, 340. 68 ibid, 340. 69 Steve Weinberg, Dreams of a Final Theory. (New York, NY: Vintage Books), 173.

For Kantian epistemology in particular, the once immutable stages of space and

time were now being demonstrated in scientific experiments to be mere objects

influenced by “motion (in special relativity) and gravity (in general relativity).”70 With

these concepts now regulated to mere objectivity, the foundation for synthetic a

priori knowledge, “namely pure a priori intuitions [of] space and time” were now

threatened to no longer be immutable and objective pre-conditions for all

experience, but rather subject to change by external noumenal events.71 If this is

the case, then there is nothing a priori about space and time, for they are always

subject to the conditions of relativity. Human perception rather than necessity is the

driver of experience; or in Kant’s own words, his immutable intuitions of space had

“depart(ed) from the subjective condition under which alone we can acquire outer

intuition . . . the representation of space signif(ying) nothing at all.”72 On a

philosophical plane, it was as if Einstein’s theory of relativity shared everything with

the little boy exclaiming that the emperor had no clothes. Quantum theory would

prove this to be the case.

Quantum Physics, Space, and Time

By the time Einstein published his Theory of Special Relativity in 1905, questions

were already mounting against the deterministic world of Sir Isaac Newton. It was

not a questioning that went without serious examination by the scientific community

of the early 20th century, for classical Newtonian physics had already shown great

success in defining the movement of objects, predicting the existence of radio waves,

and a host of other scientific phenomena including the properties of light, causality,

and atoms.73 The challenges posed by the new theories would be met with suspicion

70 ibid, 173. 71 Kant, 192. 72 Kant, 159-60. 73 J.P. McEvoy, 8-9.

if not complete derision, taking decades before their adherents would be qualified as

true physicists.74

Trepidation and suspicion would mark the new universe that science began to

forge in a world without Immanuel Kant. Time however would vindicate the new

scientific discoveries made by Max Planck, Albert Einstein, and Niels Bohr, not only

by offering examples that classical Newtonian physics was incapable of answering,

but presenting solutions that would lay the foundations for a new type of scientific

understanding; quantum theory.

By 1926, “three distinct and independent developments of a complete quantum

theory were published.”75 The first development, published by Werner Heisenberg,

was a “mathematical formalization” of how energy states reacted with differing

intensities in the light spectrum, known as matrix mechanics.76 The significance of

matrix mechanics was that it implied “that the order of which the measurements

were made might be important,” thus introducing subjectivity to scientific analysis of

light waves.77

This new ‘matrix mechanics’ did not sit well with Erwin Schrödinger, who would

unwillingly become responsible for the second development – wave mechanics.

While developing a mathematical method behind physicist Louis deBroglie’s theory of

wave/particle duality, Schrödinger developed what is hailed as one of “the greatest

achievements of 20th century thought;” Schrödinger’s Equation.78 Following from

disbelief that his wave mechanics were mathematically equivalent to Heisenberg’s

matrix mechanics, Schrödinger eventually attempted a last stand for classical

Newtonian physics by proposing the analogous Schrödinger’s Cat problem:

74 J.P. McEvoy and Oscar Zarate, Introducing Stephen Hawking. (St. Leonards, AUS: Allen & Unwin Pty, Ltd.), 90-1. 75 McEvoy, 120. 76 ibid, 120-31. 77 ibid, 131. 78 ibid, 134-36.

Schrödinger imagined a bizarre experiment in which a live cat is placed in a box with a radioactive source, a Geiger counter, a hammer, and a sealed glass flask containing deadly poisonous fumes. When a radioactive decay takes place, the counter triggers a device releasing the hammer which falls and breaks the flask. The fumes will then kill the cat.

Quantum theory (with the Born interpretation) would predict that exactly one hour after the experiment began, the box would contain a cat that is neither wholly alive nor wholly dead but a mixture of the two states, the superposition of two wave functions. (emphasis original)79

Believing that he had resolved the quantum problem once and for all by offering

what seemed to be a ridiculous proposition, Schrödinger unfortunately arrived at an

insight that quantum physicists applauded; the “so-called paradox would be used to

teach the concepts of quantum probability and superposition of quantum states.”80

It would be physicist Max Born who would reveal the secret that the act of

observation collapses Schrödinger’s wave function, a concept that would have

ramifications in the future.81

The third major development would be from the Englishman Paul Dirac, who

would arrive at a version of quantum theory that would allow physicists to treat light

spectrum as both waves and particles.82 This new quantum field theory has led

directly into quantum electrodynamics, or QED.83 The significance of QED is the

theory’s allowance to treat light as either a wave or a particle, not only implying a

dualism between the two, but also demonstrating how light interacts with matter

without paradox.84 As QED was refined, the theory has been able to measure the

“interactions involving photons (light) and charged particles” with a high degree of

79 ibid, 146-47. 80 ibid, 147. 81 ibid, 147. 82 ibid, 152. 83 ibid, 153. 84 ibid, 153-54.

accuracy, thus providing quantum theory with it’s “crown jewel” of scientifically valid

proof.85

In addition to Dirac’s prediction of the existence of anti-matter,86 another major

discovery was made by Heisenberg in 1927, namely the concept that one could

never pinpoint the exact location and the exact momentum of a particle at the same

point in time.87 This theory, known today as Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle

(HUP), was the final blow for determinism, for now the entire position and

momentum of the universe was held in question.88 Classical Newtonian physics no

longer became a viable explanation for the operation of the universe, and diehards

were eventually forced to compliment quantum theory in order to remain

consistent.89

By this time, Niels Bohr had added the final piece to the quantum puzzle by

stating that the wave/particle duality of Dirac was not only central to the

understanding of quantum mechanics, but it was complimentary as well.90

Newtonian physics would have recoiled at the notion of this idea claiming if “two

descriptions are mutually exclusive, then at least one of them must be wrong.”91 But

to the quantum physicist, whether one observed a wave or a particle was entirely

dependent on what one used to observe it.92

This dualism eventually united with Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle (HUP), the

observation of the wave/particle, and the concept of superposition into the grand

umbrella of the Copenhagen Interpretation, or CHI. Under CHI, “all possible wave

functions are intermingled into what is called a superposition of states, until a

85 Gribbin, 312. 86 McEvoy, 154. 87 ibid, 156. 88 ibid, 159. 89 Gribbin, 80. 90 McEvoy, 160. 91 ibid, 160. 92 ibid, 160.

measurement is made,”93 implying in a real way that “reality is in part created by the

observer,” bringing back to the forefront Max Born’s commentary regarding

Schrödinger’s Cat and the direct observation of a consciousness.94

Philosophy vs. Science

With this new scientific understanding of human existence, it is little wonder why

the epistemology of Immanuel Kant is discarded wholesale by modern physicists

today. Steven Weinberg in his explorative thesis In Search of a Final Theory devotes

an entire chapter to the charge that “philosophical principles have not generally

provided us [the physicists] with the right preconceptions.”95 In his indictment of

Continental philosophy, Weinberg charges that Kant is entirely responsible for the

“metaphysical presuppositions” that physics suffers from today, especially when

regarding concepts of space and time.96 “Even now,” Weinberg laments, “almost a

century after the advent of special relativity, some physicists still think that there are

things that can be said about space and tine on the basis of pure thought.”97 This is

a criticism that Weinberg extends to other philosophers who have unwittingly

stymied scientific research such as Descartes, Voltaire, Democritus, and Epicurus, if

not through direct advocacy of errant philosophies then by the scientific community

presupposing that philosophy should guide science.98 Science, just as politics or

economics, lives in danger of “heroic ideas that have outlived their usefulness,”

philosophical or otherwise.99

Weinberg makes a distinct analysis of where physics and philosophy do meet on

an epistemological ground.100 Here, Weinberg makes clear how the philosophies of

the ages “do as much harm as good,” citing the examples of how the Vienna Circle

93 Gribbin, 89. 94 ibid, 90. 95 Weinberg, 167. 96 ibid, 173. 97 ibid, 173. 98 ibid, 169-72. 99 ibid, 169-70. 100 ibid, 174.

did much to eat away at the epistemology of Kant while simultaneously giving the

fertile ground for relativity and quantum theory to take shape.101

Weinberg is ready to admit the marginal benefits that philosophy has upon

scientific research. For instance, positivism did much to “free Einstein from the

notion that there is an absolute sense to a statement that two events are

simultaneous,” thus enabling Einstein to develop his theory of special relativity.102

But the positivist demand “that every aspect of our theories must at every point

refer to observable quantities” has in fact slowed progress in other areas, most

notably in the discovery of the electron.103

While J.J. Thompson is credited with the discovery in 1897, a German scientist

named Walter Kaufmann performed the same experiment with better and more

precise results.104 The difference between the two experiments was that while

Kaufmann’s results were far better and more precise than Thomson’s, Kaufmann

dismissed that he had found a new particle because his positivist background refused

“to speculate on things that [Kaufmann] could not observe.”105 On the other hand,

Thomson “was working in the English tradition of Newton, Dalton, and Prout – a

tradition of speculation about atoms and their constituents.”106 Positivist philosophy,

much like all past philosophies in Weinberg’s opinion, only prevents scientists from

perceiving experiments and their results for what they are.

Concerning Kantian epistemology, it was the Kantian intuitions of space and time

that held back general acceptance of Einstein’s relativity theory.107 Einstein himself

spent a considerable amount of time refuting Cartesian (and by extension Kantian)

concepts of space and time, arguing as late as 1954:

101 ibid, 173-77. 102 ibid, 175. 103 ibid, 175, 177-78. 104 ibid, 178. 105 ibid, 178. 106 ibid, 178. 107 ibid, 173-78.

Kant’s attempt to remove the embarrassment by denial of the objectivity of space can, however, be hardly taken seriously. The possibilities of packing inherent in the inside space of a box are objective in the same sense as the box itself, as the objects which can be packed inside it.108

This argument of a vacuum in response to Cartesian and Kantian objections to

Einstein’s proven experimentation entitled Relativity and the Problem of Space was

written as late as forty years after the theory had been demonstrated, showing how

Einstein even then felt it necessary to respond to philosophical criticisms of his

theory of relativity.109

This debate over philosophy’s influence over physics since quantum theory has

evolved from the more noted and rational explanations of Einstein to the outright

condemnation of Weinberg. As shown previously, Weinberg’s insistence that

scientists disregard the epistemological theories of philosophy directly stems from

Kantian epistemology’s defense of space and time as pre-existing conditions for

existence. Having demonstrated this condition to be false, Kantian epistemology is

left not only with a false foundation, but a dubious historical application as well.110

A Qantian Epistemology?

With the final nail being driven into the heart of Newtonian physics’ concept of

space and time, it would seem as if Kant would simply surrender epistemology back

to David Hume and return to his ‘dogmatic slumber’. If the implications of Max Born

108 Albert Einstein, Ideas and Opinions. (New York, NY: Crown Rivers Publishing), 361. 109 ibid, 360-77. 110 It is worth mentioning the effects Einstein’s theory of relativity has held on Kantian scholars since Einstein began his defense against philosophical critiques in earnest. Most notably, towards the end of James Ellington’s 1970 translation of Schriften zur Naturphilosophie (Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science) the author mentions speaks of non-Einsteinian versions of general relativity and Einstein’s own disbelief in quantum mechanics as potential places of hope for Kantian epistemology’s concepts of space and time. Modern science has today dispelled such notions, and the introduction is resigned to state that “all this richly varied scientific inquiry should not dismay the philosopher. It simply points out the fact that the New Jerusalem is as elusive in science as it is in philosophy or religion. Let man keep thinking! That is his glory.” This statement is a relative surrender to the effect Einstein has held upon Kantian epistemology. “The problem today for Kant of for a disciple would be not so much to overhaul the Critical Philosophy in the light of modern science (assumed to be definitive) as to show how the categories are functioning or might function better in contemporary science, how a clearer understanding of them might provide viable options in present discussions, how they might help to solve problems which other philosophical theories cannot. This would be a task truly worthy of the genius of another Kant.” See the James Ellington 1970 translation of Kant, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, xxxi.

and CHI are true, implying that consciousness does impact reality, then how much of

the world is truly subjective to our experience? Is there any hope at all for a true

epistemology?

Remarkably, Kant still offers hope. Despite Weinberg’s indictment, it would be

foolhardy to reject the contributions of philosophy towards science. Indeed, since

the time of Aristotle philosophy has driven scientific analysis from the very

beginnings of Western civilization. That a Kantian epistemology based on previously

held scientific theory should then be forced to re-examine itself in light of new

scientific findings is not a sign of a false foundation. Rather, as in the past, Kantian

epistemology must revitalize itself in the same way as Aristotelian epistemology was

forced to re-examine its principles after the discoveries of Newton.

The true question at stake is whether Kantian epistemology and its reliance on

synthetic a priori knowledge is sufficient enough to be categorized as a true

epistemology. The answer to that question is no – Kantian epistemology is not

comprehensive enough to be defined as an epistemology. But while synthetic a

priori knowledge may not be as wide-ranging as it was under Newtonian

determinism, there is form of knowledge yet to be accounted for that deserves re-

examination.

As a result of the recent scientific findings concerning relativity and quantum

theory, one of the more popular theories approaching the scientific community of

late has been chaos theory. Chaos theory, or the theory of a deterministic world

directed by non-linear events, offers a revealing new look at how we understand our

seemingly randomized existence.111 Simply stated, while quantum theory works well

in the atomic world, it begins to acquire classical, Newtonian characteristics as it

111 Ziauddin Sardar and Iwona Abrams. Introducing Chaos. (St. Leonards, AUS: Allen & Unwin Pty, Ltd.), 16.

approaches the ‘classical limit,’ or particles in high energy states.112 As it re-

approaches these high-energy levels, there is evidence to support that the idea of

determinism may not be as dead as previously thought. Experiments have shown

that quantum mechanics “actually suppress(es) the classical chaos” of the four-

dimensional universe.113 Additional experiments on electrons between strong and

weak magnetic forces have demonstrated that in-between these two states, the

electrons become chaotic, showing a degree of symmetry behind chaos and the

universe.114

But while chaos theory may offer a large degree of stability for our four-

dimensional world, it offers very little reconciliation to Kantian concepts of space and

time. Space and time both remain objects to be affected by motion and gravity, and

not the pre-existing superstructure they were once perceived to be. Furthermore,

we know that certain events that could be categorized as nomena in the Critique

have sources beyond the fourth dimension. For instance, light waves actually ‘wave’,

but scientists have yet to discover what the waves are actually ‘waving’.115 Without

question, light under a Kantian understanding is a phenomenal event with a nomenal

source. Quanta also fit into this category, as do most quantum phenomena.

We know Kant’s nomenal world now affects the phenomenal world we live in.

The question remains how we can Kantian epistemology account for these effects?

Kant may have stumbled upon the answer himself, but a careful excavation of the

Critique is necessary.

Returning to the 18th century world of Sir Isaac Newton, one has to understand

the tools Kant was given to use and ask the question: what epistemology would Kant

have arrived at if he were presented with the other side of the coin? Surely

112 ibid 102. 113 ibid, 103. 114 ibid, 104. 115 Michio Kaku, Hyperspace. (NewYork, NY: Bantam Books), 8.

synthetic a priori knowledge works well describing our account of knowledge in

Newtonian physics, but what of quantum theory?

If determinism is a consequence of Newtonian physics, and chaos theory indeed

stabilizes the four-dimensional world with a form of non-linear determinism, then

Kantian epistemology fits that world quite well. At this point, one begins to assume

the Kantian response to the challenge of relativity theory and quantum physics. If it

is impossible to know nomenal objects, could it be possible to know of nomenal

events either by location and quality? Furthermore, are nomenal events dissimilar to

particle events, thus opening the door to a Kantian understanding of quantum

duality?

The answer to these questions lies in Kant’s concepts of judgments and

knowledge. As stated previously, Kant believed that there were exactly two types of

knowledge, a priori and a posteriori.116 Conversely, Kant believed that the intellect

could form two types of judgment about this knowledge, analytic or synthetic.117

Kant briefly considers combinations of the four concepts in the beginning of the

Critique, and it is worthwhile to recall these four possibilities of knowledge and Kant’s

critique on each:

�� Synthetic a priori knowledge �� Synthetic a posteriori knowledge �� Analytic a priori knowledge �� Analytic a posteriori knowledge

The foundations of synthetic a priori knowledge are indeed crucial to a Kantian

understanding of the world. Under Kantian epistemology, it was the synthesis of

knowledge based on pure reason and synthetic relation that provided any real basis

for human knowledge.118 Synthetic a posteriori knowledge is experience-based

inference on relation,119 the realm of every subjective unverifiable thought. Analytic

116 Kant, 136. 117 ibid, 141. 118 ibid, 141. 119 ibid, 141.

a priori knowledge is merely a logical necessity – statement such as “every child has

a mother” being true or false by its content and needing no further commentary.

But it is interesting to note that Kant completely discards a notion of analytic a

posteriori thought, claiming it to be “absurd to ground analytic judgment on

experience”.120 But is this really the case? Analytic judgments by definition are self-

explanatory and rely on the law of non-contradiction for validity. But as has been

demonstrated, this cannot maintain itself, for while the law of non-contradiction may

still apply in the four-dimensional world, under CHI and wave/particle duality it is no

longer a framework which we can assume as constant. Contradictions, duality, and

other phenomena are intrinsic to quantum theory, and therefore part of our

experience.

Taking a step back, when one fully considers the implications of chaos theory, we

realize not only that there is an admission of a deterministic blueprint for the world,

but that this blueprint is a non-linear existence that is directly impacted by

independent consciousnesses.121 This is a profound and demanding position for

chaos theory to make, for not only does it explain why Newtonian physics works

under mundane or ordinary events, it also explains how individuals impact that

existence. It becomes a marriage of predestination and free will; of ordinary laws of

nature with quantum phenomena. In short, chaos theory explains in great detail the

operations of a seemingly random world that is in every respect predetermined. The

universe is a massive chess game, with individuals traveling along and choosing

which paths to take. To complicate matters further, there are a potentially infinite

number of conscious acts that are occurring within this universe, each of which

interact and change the deterministic blueprint and giving it a non-linear and fractal

120 ibid, 141. 121 Sardar, 154.

nature, thereby making the classical deterministic predictions of Simon Laplace quite

impossible.122

Furthermore, our quantum universe does not escape the Copenhagen

Interpretation (CHI), and concepts of superposition, possibility, and the condition of

the observer still apply. The consequences for Kantian thought are entailed in the

notion that one may be forced to make an analytic judgment that could only be

known through experience.

That category of knowledge – analytic a posteriori knowledge – has been the

recent topic of linguist Saul Kripke, and the missing link in Kantian epistemology.

While interested in the linguistic applications of analytic a posteriori knowledge,

Kripke makes a convincing case for distinguishing this from synthetic a priori

knowledge. A given example is “water is H2O,” or for a more Kantian example,

“gold is a yellow metal.”123 Kripke begins his analysis of the latter statement by

asking the question “What is gold?”124

Kant states in the Critique that all analytic judgments are a priori because of its

dependence on the law of non-contradiction.125 But Kripke responds to this by

hypothetically questioning the yellowness of gold due to some optical illusion that

makes gold appear yellow.126 If this optical illusion were to be removed and gold

revealed to be blue, Kripke asks if the headlines in newspapers would read ‘Gold

does not exist’, with Kripke asserting that there would in fact be no such

announcement.127 Gold for Kripke is “a term used for a certain kind of thing,”

122 ibid, 154. 123 Saul Kripke, Naming and Necessity. (Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell Publishing), 116. 124 ibid, 116. 125 Kripke quotes Kant by stating that “(a)ll analytic judgments depend wholly on the law of contradiction, and are in their nature a priori cognitions, whether the concepts that supply them with matter be empirical or not. For the predicate of an affirmative analytic judgement is already contained in the concept of the subject, of which it cannot be denied without contradiction. . . . For this very reason all analytic judgements are a priori even when the concepts are empirical, as, for example, “Gold is a yellow metal”; for to know this I require no experience beyond my concept of gold as a yellow metal. It is, in fact, the very concept, and I need only analyze it without looking beyond it.” See ibid, 117 126 ibid, 118. 127 ibid, 118.

contending that we have “discovered that certain properties were true of gold in

addition to the initial identifying marks by which we identified it.”128 “Possession of

most of these properties,” i.e. the yellowness of gold, “need not be a necessary

condition for membership in the kind, nor need it be a sufficient condition.”129 Kripke

further enquires whether or not it is an analytic or synthetic property of gold to have

the atomic number of 79, and furthermore whether something could be gold without

having the atomic number of 79.130 Using a notion of ‘fool’s gold’ (pyruvate or

otherwise), Kripke argues that “such statements representing scientific discoveries

about what this stuff is are not contingent proofs but necessary truths in the strictest

possible sense.”131 The knowledge of gold’s properties was gained analytically, yet

through experience – an analytic a posteriori proof of knowledge.

Kripke elaborates on this notion of analytic a posteriori knowledge with the

statement “that water is H2O”:

We identified water originally by its characteristic feel, appearance and perhaps taste, (though the taste may usually be due to the impurities). If there were a substance, even actually, which had a completely different atomic structure from that of water, but resembled water in these respects, would we say that some water isn’t H2O? I think not.132

Kripke moves through a variety of analytic a posteriori statements such as ‘light

is a stream of photons’, ‘heat is the motion of molecules’, and ‘lightning is electricity’

as further evidence, claiming that Kant’s fundamental error in misunderstanding such

knowledge to be possible lay within his supposition “that ’gold’ could be defined as

‘yellow metal’,” with the tradition of naming objects in terms of its “genus and

differentia”, with the ‘metal’ being the genus, the ‘yellow’ becoming the differentia.133

128 ibid, 119. 129 ibid, 121. 130 ibid, 123. 131 ibid, 125. 132 ibid, 128. 133 ibid, 134.

The impact this type of knowledge has on Kantian epistemology is two-fold when

seen in the light of quantum theory and a chaotic universe. Firstly, objects of

Kantian epistemology which deal with concepts that are confined by the human

experience in a four-dimensional state can still be known as synthetic a priori

knowledge. Scientific information, as Kripke states, can only be known as analytic a

posteriori knowledge.134 The closer one gets to the quantum universe, the more

factual this statement becomes. Analytic a posteriori knowledge therefore becomes

the only real knowledge we have of the quantum world.

With the other half of the epistemology in place, Kant’s Critique can arrive at the

fullness of its potential. While the Newtonian foundations were revolutionary for its

time, it was only half of the puzzle. For this world, it is altogether natural to expect

a synthetic a priori foundation to become the basis of Kantian (or any) epistemology,

for no other reason than the fact that Kant was constricted not only by his senses

but by the science of the day. One wonders what Kant would have thought of non-

Euclidean geometry, Einsteinian physics, or quantum theory? How would Kant have

altered his ideas of free will if offered a chaotic view of the universe we live in?

Not only does the possibility of analytic a posteriori knowledge flesh out quantum

events, but it also offers Kant an avenue to explore beyond human intuitions of the

world. Feedback theory, or the idea that random events around us effect our reality,

give Kantian epistemology a chance to explore the world’s effect on the human

intellect, our free will, and other such phenomena. While it is beyond the scope of

the paper to explore these ramifications, the non-linear determinism of chaos theory

is influenced directly by conscious experience, and the implications such a worldview

has upon our understanding of the world draws many parallels with Eastern

134 ibid, 125.

philosophies, game theory, and process systems.135 Analytic a posteriori knowledge

perfectly mimics the non-linear determinism of chaos theory, and may very well

provide an entirely new avenue of epistemological thought.

Conclusions

Einstein’s relativity theory has demonstrated that Kant’s immutable concepts of

space and time as the pre-condition for all experience are indeed objects that can be

altered by such phenomena as motion and gravity. While relativity alone would have

spared Kant from further criticism by defending the position that all human

experience could only occur within the intuitions of space and time, the advances of

quantum theory all but crush the old epistemology of Immanuel Kant.

But as the rush of new scientific analysis begins to come to a head with the

combining of relativity with quantum theory in a new superstring theory or grand

unified theory, within their wake comes new hope for Kantian epistemology.

Newtonian mechanics still find a home in today’s understanding of the universe even

if slightly altered to accommodate quantum theory, formulating a better

understanding of the field of physics. Likewise then, Kantian epistemology can and

should be reconciled to these new findings by re-analyzing and incorporating

135 At this point, it could be confused as to whether the author is insisting that human observation makes the difference in altering the non-linear determinism as opposed to the human consciousness. Concerning observation and consciousness; the connection between quantum physics, the principles of Niels Bohr, chaos theory, and non-linear determinism vs. the effects of consciousness is in the predicates. A classical argumentation is the old adage of whether a tree falls in the forest, and there is no one there to hear it, does it make a sound? It could be argued that the tree does not make a sound because there is no conscious observer to witness the event. But this is implicitly false, because we do know that the tree falls through space that possesses air particles that makes a sound during the fall and during the impact. This action does occur independent of consciousness and observation. Observation only affects the empirical result of the experiment, while consciousness only affects the tools used for the experiment itself. In other words, observations affect the ‘how’, the conditions for the experiment demanded by the consciousness effect the ‘what’. In Schrödinger’s Cat for example, the consciousness will place the cat in the box, will place the radioactive material in the box, will place the poison gas in the box, etc. The observation will observe the event after the event takes place. So our tree still falls, but we don’t know that it fell until we look at the tree and look. At this point we can perform an observation. The connection concerning chaos theory is that the consciousness will place the pinecone at the spot of the tree, thus allowing it to grow in that spot and fall in the vicinity of that first pinecone. The non-linear determinism will allow the tree to grow and fall. The observation (concerning chaos and quantum theory) will observe the act and analyze the event according to the method and/or tools used. Consciousness determines what is involved; observations determine how they are measured.

quantum theory rather than rejecting the genius of Kant wholesale – or even worse

starting a new epistemology from scratch.

The intellect of Immanuel Kant is undeniable, and he is to be celebrated just as

much in the philosophical community as Newton is celebrated among physicists. But

unlike our scientific counterparts, when the scientific data does not subscribe to the

philosophy of the Western world, it is not time to return to the beginnings and start

over. Philosophy is meant to be built upon and explored in much the same way as

science.

In the case of Immanuel Kant, it is not unreasonable to re-examine the basic

foundations of his epistemology and search for items that were discarded because of

the constraints of the science of the day, much as Weinberg asserts in his protests

against philosophy. As Kripke’s evidence for analytic a posteriori knowledge has

shown, Kant’s once “absurd” classification of judgment is an amazing fit to chaos

theory’s non-linear determinism, deserves better consideration, and is the saving

grace for Kant’s epistemological thought.

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Ante Studium

Creator ineffabilis, Ineffable Creator,

qui de thesauris sapeinteiae tuae Who, from the treasures of Your wisdom,

tres Angelorum heirarchias designasti, have established three hierarchies of angels, et eas super caelum empyreum have arrayed them in marvelous order miro odrine collocasti, above the fiery heavens, atque universi partes and have marshaled the regions of the universe elegantissime disposuisti, with marvelous skill. tu inquam qui You are proclaimed verus fons the true font luminus et sapientiae diceris of light and wisdom, atque supereminens principium raised high above all things. infundere digneris Into the darkened places super intellectus mei tenebras of my mind pour forth tuae radium claritatis, a ray of your clarity. duplices in quibus natus sum Disperse from my soul the twofold darkness a me removens tenebras, into which I was born: peccatum scilicet et ignoratiam. sin and ignorance. Tu, qui linguas infantium facis disertas, You make eloquent the tongues of infants. linguam meam erudias Refine my speech, atque in labiis meis gratiam pour forth upon my lips tuae benedictionis infundas. the goodness of your blessing. Da mihi Grant to me intelligendi acumen, keenness of mind, retinendi capacitatem, capacity to remember, addiscendi modum et facilitatem, skill in learning, interpretandi subtilitatem, subtlety to interpret, loquendi gratiam copiosam. and eloquence in speech. Ingressum instruas, May you guide the beginning of my work, progressum dirigas, direct its progress egressum compleas. and bring it to its completion. Tu que es verus Deus et homo, You Who are true God and true Man, qui vivus et regnas in sawcula saeculorum. Who live and reign, world without end.

Amen.