Pub Date : 2023-05-27DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2263710
Aidan McGlynn
ABSTRACTDeep disagreements are those involving a disagreement about (relatively) fundamental epistemic principles. This paper considers the bearing of testimonial injustice, in Miranda Fricker’s sense, on the depth of disagreements, and what this can teach us about the nature and significance of deep disagreements. I start by re-evaluating T. J. Lagewaard’s recent argument that disagreements about the nature, scope, and impact of oppression will often be deepened by testimonial injustice, since the people best placed to offer relevant testimony will be subject to testimonial injustice, pushing the disagreement into one about the bearing of certain epistemic sources on the original debate. I take issue with this last step, but I build on the argument to bring attention to unappreciated and worrying ways in which prejudices can make a disagreement deep in ways that can be hidden from one or more of the participants and from observers. Finally, I revisit some of the ways that deep disagreement has been thought to be problematic for the proper functioning of a democracy, and I examine whether the kinds of hidden deep disagreements I argue for in the paper make these problems any worse, concluding that they likely do.KEYWORDS: Deep disagreementepistemic injusticetestimonial injusticedemocracypolitical polarisation AcknowledgmentsThis publication was made possible through funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 870883.My thanks to audience members at the 2022 European Epistemology Network meeting, hosted by the Cogito Epistemology Research Centre at the University of Glasgow, particularly to Thirza Lagewaard, Guido Melchior, Chris Ranalli and Mona Simion, as well as to anonymous readers for this journal.Disclosure StatementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. Though if I regard you as an epistemic peer with respect to the issues under contention, there are tricky and widely discussed questions about whether and how I need to change my confidence in my original verdict while we wait for this further evidence. The restaurant example comes from Christensen (Citation2007, 193), and the horse race from Elga (Citation2007, 486–487).2. Such ‘faultless’ disagreements have often been thought to call into question the objectivity of the domain under dispute (for example, matters of taste), and to call for some kind of relativistic treatment, though it’s contested what exactly this involves. See, for example, Wright (Citation1992) and the papers in Wright (Citation2023), and MacFarlane (Citation2014, chapter 7).3. Lynch calls the kinds of cases we’re interested in ‘epistemic disagreements’ instead of the more standard ‘deep disagreements’.4. Reflecting my primary focus in section 5 below, this sketches de Ridder’s point rather than Lynch’s, though I do say a little about the latter below too.5. For Fricker, epistemic injustice involves a person being wronged disti
{"title":"Hidden Depths: Testimonial Injustice, Deep Disagreement, and Democratic Deliberation","authors":"Aidan McGlynn","doi":"10.1080/09672559.2023.2263710","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2263710","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACTDeep disagreements are those involving a disagreement about (relatively) fundamental epistemic principles. This paper considers the bearing of testimonial injustice, in Miranda Fricker’s sense, on the depth of disagreements, and what this can teach us about the nature and significance of deep disagreements. I start by re-evaluating T. J. Lagewaard’s recent argument that disagreements about the nature, scope, and impact of oppression will often be deepened by testimonial injustice, since the people best placed to offer relevant testimony will be subject to testimonial injustice, pushing the disagreement into one about the bearing of certain epistemic sources on the original debate. I take issue with this last step, but I build on the argument to bring attention to unappreciated and worrying ways in which prejudices can make a disagreement deep in ways that can be hidden from one or more of the participants and from observers. Finally, I revisit some of the ways that deep disagreement has been thought to be problematic for the proper functioning of a democracy, and I examine whether the kinds of hidden deep disagreements I argue for in the paper make these problems any worse, concluding that they likely do.KEYWORDS: Deep disagreementepistemic injusticetestimonial injusticedemocracypolitical polarisation AcknowledgmentsThis publication was made possible through funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 870883.My thanks to audience members at the 2022 European Epistemology Network meeting, hosted by the Cogito Epistemology Research Centre at the University of Glasgow, particularly to Thirza Lagewaard, Guido Melchior, Chris Ranalli and Mona Simion, as well as to anonymous readers for this journal.Disclosure StatementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. Though if I regard you as an epistemic peer with respect to the issues under contention, there are tricky and widely discussed questions about whether and how I need to change my confidence in my original verdict while we wait for this further evidence. The restaurant example comes from Christensen (Citation2007, 193), and the horse race from Elga (Citation2007, 486–487).2. Such ‘faultless’ disagreements have often been thought to call into question the objectivity of the domain under dispute (for example, matters of taste), and to call for some kind of relativistic treatment, though it’s contested what exactly this involves. See, for example, Wright (Citation1992) and the papers in Wright (Citation2023), and MacFarlane (Citation2014, chapter 7).3. Lynch calls the kinds of cases we’re interested in ‘epistemic disagreements’ instead of the more standard ‘deep disagreements’.4. Reflecting my primary focus in section 5 below, this sketches de Ridder’s point rather than Lynch’s, though I do say a little about the latter below too.5. For Fricker, epistemic injustice involves a person being wronged disti","PeriodicalId":51828,"journal":{"name":"INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-05-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135950565","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250186
G. Clay, Ruth Boeker
ABSTRACT This introductory article outlines how this special issue contributes to existing scholarship that calls for a rethinking and re-evaluation of common assumptions about early modern philosophy. One way of challenging existing narratives is by questioning what role systems or systematicity play during this period. Another way of rethinking early modern philosophy is by considering assumptions about the role of philosophy itself and how philosophy can effect change in those who form philosophical beliefs or engage in philosophical argumentation. A further way of advancing early modern scholarship is by examining the tight links between early modern views on metaphysics and epistemology, on the one hand, and moral, social, and political philosophy, on the other hand. Moreover, there are ongoing debates whether and how the traditional distinction between rationalism and empiricism, which has been questioned for several reasons, should be replaced. It has been proposed to replace it with a distinction between experimental and speculative philosophy, but this distinction cannot easily accommodate early modern debates concerning moral, social, and political philosophy. In addition to highlighting several ways how early modern philosophy has and can be rethought, we summarize how the papers in this special issue contribute to these ongoing efforts.
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Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250178
Vili Lähteenmäki
ABSTRACT I will focus on Anik Waldow’s reading of Descartes as contributing towards a specific form of human experience and the related capacity for self-determination. I discuss how this notion of experience relates to what is often taken to be the crux of Descartes’s Meditations. I conclude by noting that three elements are central to Waldow’s interpretation: Descartes’s intellectual metaphysical pursuit for epistemic certainty about essences of things, the specific kind of experience of our selves that arises out of the embodied state of the mind revealing ourselves as both active and passive, and a resulting new capacity for self-determination. The moral of Waldow’s reading is that we should not read the Meditations as an account of what the mind is but as an account of what the mind can do and how we can upraise ourselves not as metaphysicians but in our interactions with the world and others.
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Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2235369
Mark Boespflug
ABSTRACTDescartes appears to hold that everything we believe is the product of a voluntary choice. Scholars have been reluctant to take this particularly radical version of doxastic voluntarism as Descartes’ considered position. I argue that once Descartes’ compatibilist conception of free will as well as his position on the ‘freedom of indifference’ are taken into account, the primary motivations for the rejection of the aforementioned radical version of doxastic voluntarism lose their force. Consequently, we may take Descartes at his word when he maintains that everything we believe, we believe freely – even if we cannot believe anything we wish.KEYWORDS: Descartesdoxastic voluntarismvoluntary beliefwillassentepistemic deontologism Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. As will be seen below, however, it is a matter of dispute whether Descartes means to be articulating a voluntarist position in the Fourth Meditation. Some scholars directly challenge this interpretation of the Fourth Meditation (O’Hear Citation1979). Others argue that Descartes endorsed the less extreme indirect version of voluntarism (Newman Citation2015; Cottingham Citation2008, ch. 11)—which, in spite of the name, amounts to a rejection of the view that belief is under the voluntary control of the will.2. I will follow that portion of the literature that refrains from drawing a distinction between assent, belief and judgment in Descartes. Della Rocca (Citation2006) makes this explicit. Schuessler (Citation2013, 150) uses the three terms interchangeably. Though Newman (Citation2015, 63) appears to understand judgment to be a discrete concept from belief and assent, he claims that the latter two notions are interchangeable. Cottingham (Citation2008, ch. 11) uses belief and assent interchangeably.3. Though Williams (Citation1978) and Alston (Citation1988) are most explicit about this, their influential interpretations have been taken up by a number of Descartes scholars. Alston, it should be noted, only mentions Descartes in passing.4. Newman (Citation2015, 65); Cottingham (Citation2008, 225-7) seems to reject this as a possibility as well. See also Grant (Citation1976).5. Vitz (Citation2010); Davies (Citation2001); Schuessler (Citation2013).6. Cottingham (Citation2008, ch. 8); Newman (Citation2015); Carriero (Citation2009, ch. 4); Kenny (Citation1973).7. Direct doxastic voluntarism can come in a variety of strengths—from holding that we may exercise direct control over some very specific subset of our beliefs to holding that we exercise direct control over all of our beliefs. Descartes, I argue, falls on the latter end of the spectrum.8. I am thinking here of the seminal attacks on doxastic voluntarism by Alston (Citation1988) and Williams (Citation1970). While there is a great deal of philosophically valuable material in both works, there are also systemic deficiencies such that even if one grants the premises of the argumen
{"title":"Why Every Belief is a Choice: Descartes’ Doxastic Voluntarism Reconsidered","authors":"Mark Boespflug","doi":"10.1080/09672559.2023.2235369","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2235369","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACTDescartes appears to hold that everything we believe is the product of a voluntary choice. Scholars have been reluctant to take this particularly radical version of doxastic voluntarism as Descartes’ considered position. I argue that once Descartes’ compatibilist conception of free will as well as his position on the ‘freedom of indifference’ are taken into account, the primary motivations for the rejection of the aforementioned radical version of doxastic voluntarism lose their force. Consequently, we may take Descartes at his word when he maintains that everything we believe, we believe freely – even if we cannot believe anything we wish.KEYWORDS: Descartesdoxastic voluntarismvoluntary beliefwillassentepistemic deontologism Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. As will be seen below, however, it is a matter of dispute whether Descartes means to be articulating a voluntarist position in the Fourth Meditation. Some scholars directly challenge this interpretation of the Fourth Meditation (O’Hear Citation1979). Others argue that Descartes endorsed the less extreme indirect version of voluntarism (Newman Citation2015; Cottingham Citation2008, ch. 11)—which, in spite of the name, amounts to a rejection of the view that belief is under the voluntary control of the will.2. I will follow that portion of the literature that refrains from drawing a distinction between assent, belief and judgment in Descartes. Della Rocca (Citation2006) makes this explicit. Schuessler (Citation2013, 150) uses the three terms interchangeably. Though Newman (Citation2015, 63) appears to understand judgment to be a discrete concept from belief and assent, he claims that the latter two notions are interchangeable. Cottingham (Citation2008, ch. 11) uses belief and assent interchangeably.3. Though Williams (Citation1978) and Alston (Citation1988) are most explicit about this, their influential interpretations have been taken up by a number of Descartes scholars. Alston, it should be noted, only mentions Descartes in passing.4. Newman (Citation2015, 65); Cottingham (Citation2008, 225-7) seems to reject this as a possibility as well. See also Grant (Citation1976).5. Vitz (Citation2010); Davies (Citation2001); Schuessler (Citation2013).6. Cottingham (Citation2008, ch. 8); Newman (Citation2015); Carriero (Citation2009, ch. 4); Kenny (Citation1973).7. Direct doxastic voluntarism can come in a variety of strengths—from holding that we may exercise direct control over some very specific subset of our beliefs to holding that we exercise direct control over all of our beliefs. Descartes, I argue, falls on the latter end of the spectrum.8. I am thinking here of the seminal attacks on doxastic voluntarism by Alston (Citation1988) and Williams (Citation1970). While there is a great deal of philosophically valuable material in both works, there are also systemic deficiencies such that even if one grants the premises of the argumen","PeriodicalId":51828,"journal":{"name":"INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-03-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135747866","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250177
Anik Waldow
ABSTRACT This précis provides a summary of the major arguments of Experience Embodied together with an overview of the three parts and individual chapters. By examining the concept of experience in the theorizing of Descartes, Locke, Hume, Rousseau, Herder, and Kant, this book sets out to complicate one of the most firmly established narratives of early modern philosophy. In its traditional form, this narrative focuses on the distinction between rationalism and empiricism and possesses a strong epistemological focus. Through this, it fails to acknowledge that the concept of experience was discussed in a much broader philosophical context, which included moral, social, political, and historical considerations. Experience Embodied demonstrates that the six philosophers examined constructively engaged with the fact that experience affects body and mind, and shapes what we can think and do. More generally, the book shows that during the early modern period a positive conception of the mind’s embodiment and principal malleability through the influences of artifice and nature was not only available, but also frequently used to counterbalance standard claims about the negative impact of passions, instincts, and undesirable social influences.
{"title":"Précis: Experience Embodied","authors":"Anik Waldow","doi":"10.1080/09672559.2023.2250177","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2250177","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This précis provides a summary of the major arguments of Experience Embodied together with an overview of the three parts and individual chapters. By examining the concept of experience in the theorizing of Descartes, Locke, Hume, Rousseau, Herder, and Kant, this book sets out to complicate one of the most firmly established narratives of early modern philosophy. In its traditional form, this narrative focuses on the distinction between rationalism and empiricism and possesses a strong epistemological focus. Through this, it fails to acknowledge that the concept of experience was discussed in a much broader philosophical context, which included moral, social, political, and historical considerations. Experience Embodied demonstrates that the six philosophers examined constructively engaged with the fact that experience affects body and mind, and shapes what we can think and do. More generally, the book shows that during the early modern period a positive conception of the mind’s embodiment and principal malleability through the influences of artifice and nature was not only available, but also frequently used to counterbalance standard claims about the negative impact of passions, instincts, and undesirable social influences.","PeriodicalId":51828,"journal":{"name":"INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2023-03-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42496406","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250179
Ruth Boeker
ABSTRACT In her book Experience Embodied Anik Waldow devotes a chapter to ‘Locke’s Experimental Persons.’ Her chapter aims to show how Locke’s views on persons, personal identity, and moral agency in his Essay concerning Human Understanding build on his esteem-based approach to education that he develops in Some Thoughts concerning Education. After outlining main contributions that Waldow makes in her chapter, I turn to three issues that in my view deserve further consideration. First, I draw attention to the question of how Locke’s esteem-based education can be reconciled with his moral views in the Essay. I propose that the question of how children become persons or moral agents who see their actions bound by divine law is worth examining with more detail. Second, I contrast Waldow’s interpretation of what a Lockean action is with an alternative interpretation and show that this has implications for how we understand the role of consciousness in Locke’s account of persons and personal identity. Third, I take a closer look at Waldow’s view that consciousness has an epistemic function in Locke’s account of persons and personal identity and highlight advantages of also acknowledging a metaphysical function of consciousness.
{"title":"Locke on Education, Persons, and Moral Agency","authors":"Ruth Boeker","doi":"10.1080/09672559.2023.2250179","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2250179","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT In her book Experience Embodied Anik Waldow devotes a chapter to ‘Locke’s Experimental Persons.’ Her chapter aims to show how Locke’s views on persons, personal identity, and moral agency in his Essay concerning Human Understanding build on his esteem-based approach to education that he develops in Some Thoughts concerning Education. After outlining main contributions that Waldow makes in her chapter, I turn to three issues that in my view deserve further consideration. First, I draw attention to the question of how Locke’s esteem-based education can be reconciled with his moral views in the Essay. I propose that the question of how children become persons or moral agents who see their actions bound by divine law is worth examining with more detail. Second, I contrast Waldow’s interpretation of what a Lockean action is with an alternative interpretation and show that this has implications for how we understand the role of consciousness in Locke’s account of persons and personal identity. Third, I take a closer look at Waldow’s view that consciousness has an epistemic function in Locke’s account of persons and personal identity and highlight advantages of also acknowledging a metaphysical function of consciousness.","PeriodicalId":51828,"journal":{"name":"INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.6,"publicationDate":"2023-03-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42500639","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250181
Lilian Alweiss
ABSTRACT This paper questions Waldow reading of Rousseau’s ‘Letter to M D’Alembert’ [Letter]. It claims that Waldow fails to address the social and political argument that lies behind Rousseau’s critique of the theatre and, as a result, her conclusions are misplaced. First, Rousseau does not seek to quench critique rather his aim is to show that the theatre distracts us from our real concerns in life and thus quells discontent and, indeed, the possibility of dissent. Second, Rousseau does not refer to the naturally intact morals of the Genevans but argues that the Genevans are closer to the state of nature and thus less corrupt. Finally, his account of the state of nature in the Letter is not at odds with his own views about the state of nature. Just as in his other writings, he uses the state of nature as a heuristic device to justify his claim that social relations give rise to vice and virtue. It is a necessary fiction that provides us with the principle of hope that things could be otherwise.
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Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2235370
Robert Miner
ABSTRACTIn this paper, I ask whether Francis Bacon constitutes a revealing exception to the modern predilection for ‘system.’ First, I consider evidence for reading Bacon as a philosopher strongly attracted toward the ideal of system. Second, I show how reflecting on Bacon’s philosophical practice can motivate an ‘anti-system‘ reading of his texts. In considering the small number of works in which Bacon explicitly discusses ‘system’ under that name (in particular, the Descriptio globi intellectualis), I clarify what is and is not meant by ‘philosophical system’ as distinct from other ideas of system (e.g. ‘system of the heavens’). Third, I draw from the Temporis Masculus Partum and Novum Organum to argue that Bacon’s doctrine of the ‘idols of the mind’ amounts to a thoroughgoing critique of system in philosophy. Fourth, I show how and why Bacon deploys the aphoristic form in Novum Organum as an alternative to system. I conclude by suggesting some ways in which an ‘anti-system’ reading of Bacon has the power to enhance our appreciation of other early modern authors who write philosophy without pretensions to system.KEYWORDS: BaconSystemAphorismMethod Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1. In the second section of this paper, I acknowledge a sense in which Aristotle’s dialectical inquiries might reasonably count as a ‘system.’2. References to Bacon’s Advancement of Learning are to Bacon (Citation2000), cited in the text as ‘Advancement,’ accompanied by book, chapter and section number, and followed by page number. I have modernized most of the spellings.3. References to Bacon’s Valerius Terminus are to Bacon (Citation1864–74), The Works of Francis Bacon, edited by J. Spedding, R.L. Ellis and D.D. Heath, volume 3, cited in the text as ‘VT’ and followed by page number.4. Citations of Bacon’s De augmentis scientiarum, abbreviated to ‘DAS,’ are to Bacon (Citation1864–74), by book and chapter number, followed by one reference to page number in volume 1 (containing the Latin text) and another reference to page number in volume 4 (containing the English translation of Francis Headlam). The former references are useful not just for Bacon’s Latin, but also for Ellis’s suggestive footnotes.5. Jardine (Citation1974, 178n1). The ‘division/partition’ distinction is not, however, original to Melanchthon. As Vickers (Citation1968, 36) observes, it appears in both Cicero and Quintilian.6. Those who impose ‘system’ onto Bacon include his editors, early and recent. For James Spedding, the question is ‘how far, by what means, and with what motive, Bacon at one time wished to keep his system secret’ (Bacon Citation1864–74, vol. 1, 107). That Bacon has a system, he takes as beyond question. Graham Rees, the most recent editor of Bacon’s texts, seems equally convinced that Bacon has a ‘system.’ But the list of those who take for granted that Bacon has a system, never noticing the virtual absence of the term in his wri
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Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2235580
Elena Yi-Jia Zeng
The British Empire found itself in uncharted territory during the global competition over military and commercial hegemony in the eighteenth century. Many thinkers questioned the wisdom of empire by comparing Britain’s overseas expansion with the fate of ancient Rome and the government’s controversial colonial policy. David Hume distinguished himself from these critical voices by adopting a detached philosophical approach. His detachment nonetheless ended in scepticism. This article reconstructs Hume’s doubts about empire in order to illuminate the way philosophy interacts with practical political questions. Working at the intersection between political philosophy and epistemology, Hume demonstrates how scepticism shapes his remark on the perennial republican dilemma concerning the trade-off between empire and liberty. His philosophical approach shifts the focus of the debates from attempting to reconcile the two to diagnosing the crux of political instability in modern empires. I argue that Hume defended philosophy's use by highlighting the epistemological aspect of the problem. For him, ideational factors, such as extreme and false beliefs, could provoke public frenzy. This meant that popular politics posed a substantial challenge to modern imperial rule. Governing the passions for empire should therefore be made a matter of a national priority. By pinpointing in this way the role of the citizenry, Hume clarified how epistemic questions remained central to modern politics.
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Pub Date : 2023-03-15DOI: 10.1080/09672559.2023.2250184
James R. O’Shea
There has been increased attention to the empirical and naturalistic dimensions of Kant’s philosophy in recent decades, across both his theoretical and practical philosophy. Anik Waldow’s impressively wide-ranging and carefully argued book, Experience Embodied: Early Modern Accounts of the Human Place in Nature (Waldow 2020), clearly demonstrates the fruits of this reoriented focus, not only in the case of Kant, but also in all the embodied agency-oriented conceptions of experience that she brings to light across the early modern period in the thought of Descartes, Locke, Hume, Rousseau, Herder, and Kant. Here, I focus on Waldow’s analysis of the a priori and empirical dimensions of Kant’s conception of the human agent. In particular, I set that analysis within the wider context of Kant’s multi-levelled and presuppositional conception of the sciences, both theoretical and practical, and consider some of the difficult questions that arise concerning Kant’s transcendental idealist conception of our freedom within nature.
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