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The Concept of Teleonomy in Immanuel Kant’s Idea of Teleology - A Study of the Pattern of Organism and the Whole Nature -

  • Journal of Humanities
  • 2015, (58), pp.249-269
  • Publisher : Institute for Humanities
  • Research Area : Humanities > Other Humanities
  • Received : July 6, 2015
  • Accepted : August 5, 2015

Park, Phil-Bae 1

1가톨릭관동대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

Kant's views on organisms are at the heart of his philosophical system that pursued the harmonization and the unity of nature and freedom. We can find a clue from Kant’s concept of teleonomy (Zweckmäßigkeit) – a key Kantian concept for the study of organism and nature. Kant’s concept of teleonomy mediates “principality” of the intellect that constitutes nature and “ultimate purposiveness” of reason that ideologizes nature and thus performs an important role of systematically figuring out the whole nature. The idea of the relation between inner teleonomy and outer teleonomy are well manifested in the context of the systematic issues of the Critique of Judgment. The issues of the system can find their clues in the process from the concept of freedom to that of nature or from the concept of nature to that of freedom. For Kant, these processes are the necessary steps because the question of a system is not made arbitrarily but is a fundamental one that is based on the contemplation of the existence of natural outcome and on the special characters of our intellect. The structure of teleological debates is based on the reciprocality between the outer contemplation on nature and the inner reflection on morality. Nevertheless, in carrying out the critique of teleological judgment, Kant deduces the principle of objective teleonomy from his own critical theory of behavior, i.e., practical philosophy, and applies to his philosophy of nature. The evaluation of the special principles in nature is closely related to moral teleology accompanied by the reflection on the outer teleonomy. It is because the ground for the judgement of reflection in the realm of outer teleonomy lies in the theoretical and, ultimately, technological-practical reason and could become the motive for the imposing moral- practical laws.

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This paper was written with support from the National Research Foundation of Korea.