The following essay argues that Immanuel Kant’s critical philosophy is insufficiently critical
because he explicates the necessary conditions of experience without establishing that the
rational structure through which those conditions are derived is itself necessary. This critique
stems from the demands of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel who, while justified in demanding
that rational structure be derived without presuppositions or any external rational structures,
fails in his own attempt at deriving such a structure in The Science of Logic, leaving the
problem of deriving a rational structure without presupposing rational structure an ongoing
philosophical problem. The essay will first assess Kant’s critical project before moving to an
analysis of whether the critique of critical insufficiency sticks. This will include exploring a
possible defense for Kant’s project in the form of the counter argument that Hegel is
excessively critical. Hegel’s critique of Kant however, will be shown to be successful. Next,
the essay will turn to Hegel’s attempt at deriving a presuppositionless rational structure
before concluding that he also fails to do so. A defense for Hegel’s project will be attempted,
but it too will be argued as being unsuccessful.
Kant’s critical method involves deriving the conditions necessary for the possibility of
experience. At the time he published his works, Kant’s strategy of explaining the conditions
of experience was a revolutionary new idea. Much of the philosophy produced in the early
modern period preceding Kant had instead focused on the contents of experience, asking
what reason could infer about the structure of reality on the basis of what is given through
experience. For instance, Descartes begins from the experience of thinking and attempts to
establish what can be known with certainty about the self, God, and the external world
(Descartes 1641/2008). Similarly, Berkeley begins from the contents of experience and
develops an idealist metaphysics in which objects consist of ideas that exist only insofar as
they are perceived by minds (Downing and Hilbert 2026, sec. 3.1.1). The strategy of using
the content of what is experienced to make metaphysical inferences remained characteristic
of the early modern tradition until it was challenged and dramatically undermined by David
Hume’s empiricism.
Hume accepts and radicalises the empiricist position that all knowledge comes from
experience. Where early modern philosophers such as Descartes and Berkeley used reason
to make claims about the structure of reality, Hume rejected the possibility of such inferences
completely because they posit a necessity that cannot be derived from experience. Hume
argues if all knowledge must ultimately be grounded in experience, then reason cannot
independently provide knowledge of aspects of reality that experience itself does not
disclose. This proved devastating for metaphysics as a legitimate field of philosophical
inquiry, since it removed the possibility of even the metaphysical inferences considered to be
basic. The metaphysical notion of causality is one such basic inference. Hume points out
that we never experience a cause as a necessary connection between events, we only ever
experience the conjunction of one event following another. Any inference made to a
necessary connection of causality is nothing more than a custom of thought supplied by the
mind of the observer to organise what is perceived (Lorkowski n.d.). The notion of the self is
similarly undermined. Hume argues that we only ever experience a bundle of perceptions. In
order to conclude the presence of a unified and enduring self underlying those perceptions,
we would have to infer something that is never itself given in experience (Hume 1740,1.4.6).
Hume therefore leaves philosophy with a fundamental problem: If all knowledge must come
from experience, can we know anything beyond what is immediately given to us in that
experience? Kant’s critical philosophy can be understood as a direct response to this
problem.
Kant’s inquiry begins by considering the occurrence of experience as given. Unlike his
predecessors in the early modern tradition, Kant does not conduct his inquiry by analysing
the contents of experience in order to make claims about the structure of reality, he instead
asks the question of what must already be true for experience to occur (Kant 1783/ 2023,
sec. 17). By conducting this inquiry, Kant argues that a priori knowledge in the form of the
conditions of experience can be obtained. Conditions of experience are a priori in that they
must already be true prior to experience: unless these conditions are somehow satisfied,
experience itself would not be possible. Thus, they are true prior to experience. By
explicating these conditions, Kant believes metaphysics can be established a priori as an
inquiry into the necessary structure underlying experience. Kant identifies two fundamental
components of this a priori structure: the forms of intuition, space and time, through which
objects are given, and the categories of the understanding, which provide the fundamental
conceptual structure necessary for cognition of particular objects.
First, the forms of intuition. Kant argues that all experience necessarily occurs within the
forms of space and time. To experience an external object, we must already represent it as
spatially located. Likewise, to experience events as simultaneous, successive or temporally
positioned, we must already represent them within a structure of time. Kant consequently
argues that space and time must be present as a priori forms through which experience
occurs, rather than derived from its content (Kant 1783/2023, secs. 8–10).
Space and time, however, explain only the forms through which objects are given in
experience. Kant argues that further a priori structures are required for those objects to be
perceived, cognised or understood. These are the categories of the understanding, among
which Kant includes: unity, plurality, substance, causality, possibility, and necessity,
organised under quantity, quality, relation, and modality. Kant derives these categories from
basic logical forms of judgement, arguing that the forms through which we make judgements
correspond to the basic categories through which objects are cognised. To establish these
categories, Kant begins with the forms of judgement identified by general logic and derives a
corresponding category from the identified form (Kant 1783/2023, sec. 21). For example,
Kant connects the category of causality with hypothetical (also known as conditional)
judgements, in which one proposition is understood as following from another (Kant
1783/2023, sec. 29).
Kant then undertakes what is commonly referred to as the transcendental deduction to
establish the validity of the categories. Kant argues that for objects to be cognised and
understood, what is given through space and time must also be organised according to the
categories of the understanding. Without the categories, what is given in space and time
could not be organised into a coherent experience of objects. Kant therefore concludes that
the categories necessarily apply to every possible object of experience (Kant 1783/2023,
secs. 21a–22).
Kant’s account of the a priori conditions of experience also establishes a limit on what can
be known. Because space, time, and the categories are conditions through which objects
are experienced and cognised, they determine objects only as they appear to us, rather than
as they may exist independently of these conditions. Kant therefore distinguishes between
objects as they appear to us as appearances, and objects considered as they are in
themselves, irrespective of how they appear: things-in-themselves. Since knowledge is
possible only through the a priori conditions of experience, things-in-themselves considered
independently of those conditions cannot themselves become objects of knowledge (Kant
1783/2023, sec. 32).
Taken together, Kant’s account of the forms of intuition and categories that make experience
possible, and the distinction between appearances and things-in-themselves, can be
described as his rational framework. This is a useful label because it encapsulates the
elements of Kant’s philosophy which Hegel critiques as insufficiently critical into a single
concept. Hegel retains Kant’s insight that experience is structured by a priori forms and
categories but extends the critical demand to include the rational framework through which
those structures are identified or derived (Maybee 2020, secs. 1–2). If the rational structure
used to explicate the necessary conditions of experience cannot itself be justified as the
necessary framework from which those judgements are made, then those judgments face
the possibility of being arbitrarily presupposed rather than critically established.
Hegel’s critique is particularly pronounced when analysing Kant’s table of the categories in
which the conditions of the experience of objects are explicated. Recalling how Kant derives
these categories from a corresponding logical form, we can identify a point in which rational
structure appears to be simply asserted rather than derived as a necessity. In the case of
causality, Kant derives causality as a category through its relation without the logical form of
conditional judgements. A conditional judgement presents one proposition as following from
another (if A, then B) which Kant takes to correspond to the relation between cause and
effect (Kant 1783/2023, sec. 29). He ultimately accepts the conditional judgement simply as
a given feature of thought without enquiring further as to whether it is necessary. Since Kant
offers no additional justification for the necessity of such logical forms, their validity must
already be accepted in order for the derivation of the categories to proceed. In this sense,
they are presupposed rather than established through the critical inquiry itself.
Kant’s notion of things-in-themselves is similarly vulnerable to Hegel’s charge of being
insufficiently critical. Within Kant’s account, things-in-themselves provide the sensible input
which the mind organises into experience. However, since the a priori categories that
constitute appearances can only be applied within experience, things-in-themselves remain
beyond the possibility of knowledge. The distinction between appearances and
things-in-themselves may be necessary for the coherence of Kant’s system, but this does
not establish that the distinction itself is necessary. Additionally, some post-Kantian
philosophers point out that in the very act of positing things-in-themselves as unknowable,
Kant nevertheless makes claims about their nature (Stang NF, 2016). This threatens to
render things-in-themselves internally contradictory: they are said to be unknowable while at
the same time something about them is claimed to be known. The internal instability of the
appearances and things-in-themselves opposition strengthens the charge that its necessity
has not been established. If the distinction produces a contradiction, Kant struggles to justify
it even as a necessary feature internally within his own system.
Overall, Kant’s project is insufficiently critical because its scope is too narrow: it examines
the conditions of experience without examining the rational framework through which those
conditions are established. At this point in the discussion, we can ask whether Kant’s system
can be defended by assessing the counter-claim that Hegel is over-critical and demanding
excessive justification. The problem with this claim is that Kant’s project is specifically
concerned with establishing the possibility of a priori metaphysical knowledge. If the rational
structure through which Kant derives the conditions of experience is not itself necessary,
then the concepts derived through that structure cannot possess the necessity required of a
priori knowledge. If we take Kant’s table of categories as an example, it remains plausible
that one or more of its derivations could be reformulated by establishing a different relation
between a logical form and its corresponding category. This would require only a stronger,
clearer or more comprehensive connection between a logical form and an alternative
category. The possibility of such an alternative undermines Kant’s claim that his categories
are necessary. If the categories remain open to revision, then the metaphysical knowledge
founded upon them also remains dependent upon a potentially revisable framework and thus
cannot possess the necessity required of a priori knowledge. Kant therefore cannot simply
remain unconcerned with the necessity of his rational framework without undermining the
very status of the metaphysical knowledge his critical philosophy seeks to establish. This
creates an extremely difficult problem: how can rational structure be obtained without
presupposing rational structure? Hegel attempts to address this problem in his Science of
Logic.
In the Science of Logic, Hegel attempts to derive rational structure without taking any
particular concepts or logical forms as given in advance. To bring forth a new logical form or
determination, he proceeds by explicating what is already implicit in the form being
considered. Hegel’s methodology can therefore be described as an immanent critique, since
each new form emerges from within the preceding form rather than being introduced from
outside it (Maybee 2020, sec. 1). Since his method involves explicating what is immanent
within a preceding determination, which must itself have been derived immanently from an
earlier determination, the method appears to bring forth an infinite regress: every
determination requires a prior determination from which it can be derived. Hegel proposes
that the concept of pure being represents a presuppositionless starting point which allows
him to enter the critique. He reasons that pure being is sufficiently bare of determinate
qualities and content that it does not depend upon any prior concept for its meaning
(Maybee 2020, sec. 2). Pure being expresses only being, without specifying what that being
is. Beginning with anything more specific would already introduce concepts that the
proposed Logic is supposed to derive.
Having established pure being as the starting point, Hegel then argues that pure being
contains an instability within its own determination: because it lacks any distinguishing
content whatsoever, it is indistinguishable from another determination: pure nothing. In
attempting to conceptualise pure being without introducing any further content, nothing
remains by which it can be distinguished from pure nothing (Maybee 2020, sec. 2). Here,
Hegel makes a bold move. If another philosopher were attempting a similar imminent critique
commencing from pure being, they might interpret its indistinguishability to nothing to be a
reason for why pure being is incompatible with such a critique. Hegel instead makes a
unique inference that being’s indistinguishability to nothing yields a further determination
beyond the content of being and nothing: becoming (Maybee 2020, sec. 2).
Becoming is a single concept that contains the movement of being into nothing and of
nothing into being. Being, being indistinguishable from nothing, passes into nothing. Nothing,
being indistinguishable from being, passes back into being and so on. From this process,
becoming emerges as a new and richer determination. Hegel describes this process of
overcoming an earlier concept while preserving it in the following determination as sublation.
Being and nothing are not simply discarded as Hegel’s project progresses, they are retained
as moments within becoming (Maybee 2020, secs. 1–2). From here, Hegel continues to find
internal instabilities in the determinations he establishes, and then sublates them into richer
determinations. His logic culminates in the determination he calls the Absolute Idea, in which
the distinction between thought and its object is overcome and the rational structure
developed throughout the Logic is comprehended as a unified whole (Maybee 2020, sec. 3).
The movement from pure being through nothing to becoming demonstrates the basic
structure of Hegel’s immanent method. He begins from a point which he argues is not part of
any external rational framework and allows each successive concept to emerge from within
those already established. In this way, the rational structure of the Logic is intended to
establish its own necessity through its development rather than presupposing that necessity
from an external source.
Hegel’s claim that he does not presuppose a rational structure in his Logic is open to
rebuttal. One such critique of Hegel’s Logic comes from Trendelenburg who contends that
Hegel’s transition from pure being and pure nothing to becoming relies upon a notion of
movement that has not itself been derived. Trendelenburg notes that neither being, nor
nothing contain any notion of movement implicit within them. Becoming, however,
necessarily introduces movement through the continual transition between the two concepts.
Therefore, becoming cannot be derived from pure being and pure nothing alone.
Trendelenburg concludes that Hegel must therefore presuppose the movement required to
derive becoming (Trendelenburg in Bonnell 2016, pp. 89–90).
A possible defense for Hegel here could be to point out that movement is not introduced
externally, but is already implicit in the relation between being and nothing. Their
indistinguishability means that neither can remain fixed as distinct from the other, and
movement simply explicates the resulting transition between them.
A more difficult critique for Hegel to overcome comes from different angles from
Trendelenburg and Dunphy. Dunphy’s discussion suggests that when Hegel justifies pure
being as the starting point of his Logic, he relies on a pre-existing rational structure from
which to determine its suitability (Dunphy 2023, sec. 2). Hegel positions being as the
starting point of his inquiry because he reasons that a presuppositionless beginning must be
immediate and without any further content, and that pure being alone satisfies these
conditions. However, in order to make this judgement designating pure being as the starting
point, he must already employ rational criteria concerning what a presuppositionless
beginning requires and reason that pure being satisfies that criteria. Trendelenburg makes a
similar critique targeting Hegel’s positioning of being as the starting point from a different
angle. He points out that Hegel has abstracted pure being from all particular content in order
to arrive at a completely indeterminate starting point. However, abstraction itself requires
something from which to abstract. If pure being is reached by removing all particular content,
then that content must already be available to thought before the abstraction can occur
(Bonnell 2016, pp. 88–89). If a preexisting rational structure is in any way involved in the
process of arriving at being, it seems plausible to suggest that Hegel cannot claim to have
derived rational structure from a genuinely presuppositionless starting point.
A counterargument in support of Hegel could be to suggest that the act of abstraction does
not introduce any of the content abstracted from into pure being itself. Although the process
of arriving at pure being was through the removal of prior content, none of that content
remains within pure being once the abstraction has been made. The remaining concept is
ultimately minimally basic and may yet still function as a presuppositionless starting point.
The problem with this defence is it concedes just enough to disqualify pure being as the kind
of starting point Hegel initially sought. By acknowledging that pure being must first be
reached through abstraction, the defence accepts that it is not itself given independently of a
prior conceptual process. Rather than being an immanent critique of what is immediate, it
becomes a critique of a concept fashioned by the rational process of abstraction itself.
A further defence of Hegel’s pure being could be that no genuinely presuppositionless
starting point is available, and beginning with pure being is acceptable because it is
sufficiently minimal. Even if pure being is reached through abstraction, it may still be justified
as the starting point if immanent rational structure otherwise has no basis from which to
begin. This defence, however, depends upon the absence of a viable alternative. One
possible alternative can be found in Descartes’ Cogito. The Cogito is an intriguing possibility
since, although it is not a singular determination like pure being, it is a single proposition
whose determinate meaning can be examined without introducing content external to it. The
Cogito might appear contingent on the language and concepts through which the Cogito is
expressed; however, they serve only to articulate its determinate meaning. Whatever
concepts are used to express the Cogito, it is the attempt to doubt its truth that necessarily
confirms it. Therefore, the meaning of the Cogito remains independent of any language
structure, and its determinate meaning remains presuppositionless regardless of how it is
expressed. Given that it emerges as absolutely certain from the act of radical doubt itself, the
Cogito does not need to be established through any prior conceptual process. It emerges as
a rational certainty simply from positing radical skepticism (Descartes 1641/2008, Meditation
II). In this sense, it can be considered to be presuppositionless. Furthermore, the Cogito
contains a precise meaning within which a plurality of determinations and necessary
relations are already implicit. For example, to understand “I think, therefore I am” is to
already understand that something exists, that which exists is designated as I, the I thinks,
and its existence is known through that thinking. It is possible that an immanent critique
could be performed on the Cogito through which the determinations implicit within its
meaning are explicated. If the Cogito’s viability as an alternative starting point for an
immanent critique can be accepted, any appeal to pure being as the only possible basis for a
presuppositionless derivation of rational structure becomes redundant.
The charge that Hegel requires external presuppositions in order to qualify pure being as the
starting point of his project remains despite appeals to its minimal content and the supposed
absence of a viable alternative. The result is a critical failure in Hegel’s own project similar to
that of Kant’s failure. For Kant, rational structure is presupposed in the logical forms and
distinctions through which he derives the conditions of experience. For Hegel, it is
presupposed in the rational criteria through which pure being is selected as the starting point
of the Logic. Even if Hegel’s Logic is rejected on the grounds that pure being cannot be
defended as a presuppositionless starting point, this does not disqualify his claim that
rational structure should derived from a presuppositionless starting point.The failure of pure
being establishes only that Hegel has not successfully identified such a starting point, rather
than that no such starting point is possible. The methodological problem remains: if rational
structure is to be established without being presupposed, it must be derived from a starting
point that does not itself presuppose rational structure.
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