BASES DE PRESENTACION DE LOS ESTADOS CONTABLES CONSOLIDADOS

In the "Discipline of Pure Reason with Regard to Hypothesis" Kant explains the uselessness of transcendental hypotheses for forming foundational principles that can expand our understanding. He takes particular aim at "hyperphysical hypotheses" or any appeal to a divine author. Kant begins by asking whether or not the fact that critique shows us that we cannot have pure speculative knowledge from reason is sufficient to make hypotheses impossible. Before we can hypothesize we need to show that any objects under consideration are at least possible objects. He defines a hypothesis as, “an opinion concerning the actuality of an object that must be connected as a ground of explanation with that which is actually given and certain.”228

Kant explains that given the limitations of pure reason we have relatively limited resources available with which to

construct hypotheses. We cannot construct a priori the concept of the possibility of dynamical connection, and the category of the pure understanding allows us to

understand things but not invent them as apart from empirical properties. We can think up nothing new beyond the laws we have, thus all possible hypotheses will have to be constructed within the confines of the connections and properties already available to us in the categories. We cannot create new conditions for the possibility of things or new things which are independent of those conditions and anticipate that they would hold any explanatory power. They would be concepts without objects. Even the concepts of reason which we do have are mere ideas and have no object in experience. They are thought only “problematically” as “heuristic fictions.”229

Kant here provides a rare illuminating example. He explains that I can think of a soul as simple in order to make a mind a unity, but that to assume that it is a simple substance is indemonstrable and “hazarded entirely arbitrarily and blindly,” since no experience can give us this.230

Kant uses the example of the soul as a unity to transition into a discussion of a particular type of hypotheses, transcendental hypotheses. He claims that while we cannot rely on hypotheses that make recourse to the ideas of reason, possible intelligible

properties of things in the sensible world cannot be assumed with any authority of reason but they also cannot be dogmatically denied. A transcendental hypothesis is a,

“hypothesis which uses a mere idea of reason for the explanation of things in nature.”231

Such a hypothesis provides no genuine explanation as any grounds of explanation on

229 _{KrV, A771/B799.}

230 _{KrV, A771-772/B799-800.} 231 _{KrV, A772/B800.}

which it might rest can serve only for the satisfaction of reason not the, “advancement of the use of the understanding with regard to objects.”232

When we attempt to explain nature, the “wildest” physical hypothesis still better than a hyperphysical one (i.e. one which appeals to a divine being as a form of explanation). While it may be the case that a divine being is ultimately responsible for all that we encounter, attributing any individual effect to this cause is not a sign of devotion but of “lazy reason.” Genuine explanation of objects in the world must explain things in terms of their location within a causal chain. If we are allowed recourse to divine intervention it allows us to ignore the relevant causes that lead to real understanding. Kant claims that while we may find these sorts of ideas “comforting to reason” they fail to contribute to learning.

Moreover, Kant claims that a license to explain things by means of a transcendental hypothesis which makes recourse to mere ideas of reason would

ultimately destroy experience. According to Kant order and purposiveness in nature must be explained from natural grounds, and any good hypothesis must be adequate for

determining a priori the consequences that follow. As a result, there can be no real or physical hypothesis that the soul is a unity or that God exists. These hypotheses cannot contribute anything to explanation through natural causes. In addition to making recourse to objects outside of experience hyperphysical hypotheses also leave us without any clear method of integrating them into the causal chain. If I explain the rotation of the planets through recourse to divine love than I must also explain how divine love is capable of causal efficacy in the physical realm. A hypothesis which requires new hypotheses to

support it adds to the trouble because the additional hypotheses are as unsupported as the first.

For Kant hypotheses are not useful for grounding or proving positions, but they may be used to defend them. As mentioned in the discussion of reason’s polemical use, sometimes it is necessary to make arguments for the purpose of showing an opponent (or oneself) that a particular position cannot be shown as any more valid or convincing than the opposing position. It is perfectly reasonable to put a hypothesis to such a use as long as one is not thereby persuaded to accept as an opinion the claim put forward as a hypothesis. Like the other tools of reason which Kant outlines in the “Discipline” hypotheses have an exclusively negative function. We cannot build our knowledge from them, but we can use them to keep reason from becoming corrupted by arguments which cannot be substantiated.

There is a small but important ambiguity in the way in which Kant’s discussion of hypotheses is written. One could read it as a broad argument for eliminating all

metaphysical speculation (i.e. any appeal to an idea of reason as holding explanatory power within the realm of experience). One could also take the argument as being intended in a more narrow sense which outlaws only those hypotheses which appeal to a divine fiat in a way which cuts off any additional insight which the understanding might provide through experience. The narrow sense of the argument is clearly within the realm of things which Kant wishes to eliminate, but it is not clear that all possible

transcendental hypotheses pose the same problem. Would all appeals to non- hyperphysical hypotheses close off paths of empirical inquiry? Kant admits that a

physical hypothesis (no matter how wild) is always preferable to a non-physical one, but what if this physical hypothesis includes implicit assumptions about the unity of the soul as a simple substance or the beginning of the world in time? Does Kant have the

resources (or the desire) to rule out these forms of speculation as well?

Consider, for example, two possible hypotheses about matters of fact. In scenario one we are attempting to answer a question about why some tobacco smokers get lung cancer while others do not. We are interested in what makes the difference between the two cases. One potential hypothesis that would solve this problem would be if the world is ordered by a divine being who doles out lung cancer as a punishment for wrong doing. One can infer that the smokers who get lung cancer are simply more blasphemous than the smokers who do not. In Kant’s view the problem with this hypothesis (God uses lung cancer as a punishment for blasphemous behavior) is that it does not leave room for information gathered via the sense and the understanding to contribute further

information to the way in which we think about the case. Genetic markers, age of the patients, exposure to other carcinogenic substances, etc. all become irrelevant

information for determining anything about the causes of lung cancer. Moreover, the hypothesis is not genuinely falsifiable. Even if I discover several devout patients with lung cancer, this is not enough to show me that my hypothesis is false. Perhaps they only seem devout. They all curse God in secret. My hypothesis prevents me from drawing helpful conclusions about the way things operate in the world of experience. Even if I am correct, it will not provide me the sort of information that will lead to additional laws of nature. My understanding cannot process blasphemy as a causal mechanism for illness in

a way that contributes to a systematic picture of how the world of experience is organized.

In scenario two we want to know why people who are abused as children as more likely to experience a psychotic break later in life. One hypothesis that might contribute to our thinking about the relevant cases is that the soul or self is singular and unified through time. While the hypothesis relies upon ideas of reason and makes reference to something which is potentially supersensible, it seems to open rather than close potential avenues of discovery. If I assume that the self is a unified whole, then I can consider whether the childhood abuse might have some causal relation to the psychotic break. Perhaps further investigation will reveal other elements of childhood experience that contribute to psychological illness or wellbeing in adults. I could discover some empirical laws that would allow me some measure of predictive power about what populations are most at risk for mental illness. My hypothesis, while transcendental, has informed rather than controlled my inquiry. It places me in a position to better consider what import the empirical data in front of me may have. It seems unlikely that Kant wishes to rule out metaphysical speculations of this variety.