Immanuel Kant

(1724-1804)
Biography
Immanuel Kant was baptized as "Emanuel"
but later changed his name to "Immanuel"
after he learned Hebrew.
was born in 1724 in Knigsberg, as the
fourth of nine children.
His father J ohann Georg Kant (1682-1746)
was a German craftsman from Memel.
His mother Anna Regina Porter (1697-1737)
was the daughter of a saddle/harness maker.

was raised in a Pietist household, a then-
popular Lutheran reform movement that
stressed intense religious devotion, personal
humility, and a literal reading of the Bible.
Kant received a stern education strict,
punitive, and disciplinary that favored
Latin and religious instruction over
mathematics and science.
The young scholar
Kant enrolled in University of Knigsberg in
1740, at the age of 16.
He studied the philosophy of Leibniz and
Wolff under Martin Knutsen, a rationalist who
was also familiar with the developments of
British philosophy and science and who
introduced Kant to the new mathematical
physics of Newton.

Kant became a private tutor in the smaller
towns surrounding Knigsberg, but continued
his scholarly research.
1770 >> at the age of 45, Kant was finally
appointed Professor of Logic and
Metaphysics at the University of Knigsberg.


At the age of 46, Kant was an established
scholar and an increasingly influential
philosopher.
When Kant emerged from his silence in
1781, the result was the Critique of Pure
Reason.
Although now uniformly recognized as one of
the greatest works in the history of
philosophy, this Critique was largely ignored
upon its initial publication.

The critical turn


Kant's later work

Kant published a second edition of the
Critique of Pure Reason in 1787, heavily
revising the first parts of the book.
He continued to develop his moral
philosophy, notably in 1788's Critique of
Practical Reason (known as the second
Critique) and 1797's Metaphysics of Morals.

The 1790 Critique of Judgment (the third Critique)
applied the Kantian system to aesthetics and
teleology. He also wrote a number of semi-popular
essays on history, religion, politics and other topics.
These works were well received by Kant's
contemporaries and confirmed his preeminent
status in eighteenth century philosophy.
The Enlightenments motto: Sapere aude ("Dare to
Know") = think autonomously and free from dictate of any
authority
Kant's health, long poor, turned for the worse
and he died in 1804.
Kant's health, long poor,
turned for the worse and he
died in 1804.