Kant on God’s Intuitive Understanding: Interpreting CJ §76’s Modal Claims

Abstract

AbstractIn §76 of the third Critique, Kant claims that an intuitive understanding would represent no distinction between possible and actual things. Prior interpretations of §76 take Kant to claim that an intuitive understanding would produce things merely in virtue of thinking about them and, thus, could not think of merely possible things. In contrast, I argue that §76’s modal claims hinge on Kant’s suggestion that God represents things in their thoroughgoing determination, including in their connection to God’s actual will. I conclude by using my interpretation to argue that §76’s modal claims do not entail Spinozism.