On Kant’s Critique of a Cognitio Symbolica

Konstantin Pollok (University of South Carolina, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz)

The Digital Kant-Centre NRW is pleased to invite you to a lecture by Konstantin Pollok (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz) with the following topic: "On Kant’s Critique of a Cognitio Symbolica“.

The lecture will take place online (via Webex) on Wednesday, 27 November 2024, from 18:00 – 19:30 CET.

Please see below for the Webex-link and an abstract of the lecture. 

The talk is part of the lecture series Digital Kant-Lectures, organized by Digital Kant-Centre NRW, which takes place on the last Wednesday of each month via Webex. For the program of the series, please see here: https://kant-zentrum-nrw.de/digital-kant-lectures/

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Webex-Link: 

https://uni-siegen.webex.com/uni-siegen/j.php?MTID=m7cd38f09ab5e84c0d0e48cfb55e3d622

Abstract: 

In this talk I will explore Kant’s critique of the Schulphilosophie notion of a symbolic, or figurative cognition that stands in parallel to a criticism levelled against Cassirer’s usage of the term symbol. By analyzing Johann Heinrich Lambert’s objections, but also approval of some of Kant’s claims, I argue that the dichotomy of intuitive versus symbolic representation helped Kant to develop his critical view of the interdependence of rational cognition and sensible intuition. I extrapolate a taxonomy of possible kinds of representation from Kant’s critical writings that is meant to replace the Leibnizian stipulation of a cognitio symbolica by contrasting discursive and intuitive kinds of representation. According to Kant’s critical view, symbolic representation is meant to provide epistemic access to the supersensible, but with respect to the sensible world it should be rejected in favor of discursive, intuitive-empirical, and intuitive-schematic kinds of representation.