Method and Illusion in Kant's Inaugural Dissertation of 1770

Resumo

In his Inaugural Dissertation De mundi sensibilis atque intelligibilis forma et principiis, Kant renders central the function of illusion as an integral part of a method for avoiding metaphysical errors, without therefore doing away with the possibility of a metaphysics at all. In this paper, my aim is to draw attention to three crucial points in the Dissertation that have significant theoretical continuity: 1) the preparatory character of the discipline presented in this work (also called "ontology") with respect to metaphysics, 2) the negative or elenctic function of the real use of the intellect, and 3) the fallacy of metaphysical subreption. Secondly, I want to point out the significant presence of subreption in thetheory of transcendental demonstrations given in the “Doctrine of Method” of the first Critique with the aim of providing a methodical discipline to the proofs of pure principles of the intellect or transcendental propositions.