The ideas of reason are the result of reason’s inferential activity, so to see how they are produced we must look more closely at that inferential activity itself. Kant thinks of reason’s inferences as syllogisms, and sees them as operating according to the three canonical syllogistic forms: categorical, hypothetical, and disjunctive syllogisms. To see how the transcendental 112
ideas of reason are formed, we need to understand how reason uses these syllogistic forms to develop a systematic and coherent theory of the world. The key to that puzzle can be found in the phrase ‘reason always seeks the unconditioned.’ Let’s see how this works. 113
For our purposes, the most important of the three kinds of syllogisms will be the hypothetical syllogism. In this syllogism, we start with a premises of the form ‘if A then B’ and another of the form ‘A’ and on the basis of these we conclude ‘B.’ Kant thinks of these premises as providing conditions. In other words, the premise ‘if A then B’ makes A a condition of B. The syllogism as a whole, then, states a condition, then asserts that the condition is fulfilled, so that we can conclude that the conditioned claim (B) is true.
But reason cannot rest content with this simple conclusion - it strives to create a total and systematic theory, and this inference merely draws a connection between three judgments. So naturally its next move is to ask: what are the conditions for A? This is what is meant by the phrase ‘reason always seeks the unconditioned’: reason always seeks to discover the conditions for that part of the syllogism whose conditions are not a part of the syllogism. For a more concrete example, think of the activity of a natural scientist. Upon understanding a certain part of a causal chain, they will naturally turn to investigate the beginning of that chain, trying to understand how it all got started. Of course, when an answer to this question is found, e.g. if we
112 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason , A323/B379.
113 “The proper principle of reason in general (in its logical use) is to find the unconditioned for
conditioned cognitions of the understanding, with which its unity will be completed.” Kant, Critique of Pure Reason , A307/B364.
discover that Z is the condition of A, the next question will ask for the conditions of this new condition, i.e., what are the conditions for Z? In this way, reason constantly strives to grasp the conditions for what it sees as conditioned. In doing so, however, it naturally falls into a regress of conditions.
If we turn to reflect on this process, we find ourselves faced with a dilemma. Either we accept that there are an infinite series of conditions, or we claim that there is some point at which the series must end. If we take the second horn of this dilemma, we end up positing 114
some unconditioned entity or force that can begin the chain from nothing. This, for Kant, is how our reason leads us naturally to the ideas of a free agent and of God as a necessary being, among others. Kant calls these ideas the ‘Transcendental Ideas of Reason.’ God is posited as the 115
necessarily existing entity whose necessity grounds the chain of contingent existences. A free 116
act is posited as the unconditioned beginning of a causal chain. However, in both cases, it 117
remains possible to imagine that the chain of contingent existences or causes could simply continue on into infinity, with no God or free act to terminate the chain.
It would be easy to resolve this dilemma if our experience of the world could somehow mediate the dispute. If we had an experience of God or of a free agent, then all would be well and we could decide the issue once and for all. Unfortunately, however, such an experience is
impossible. To see why, recall that, through the transcendental unity of apperception, the
category of causation plays a constitutive role in all of our experiences - if a thing is experienced,
114 The presence of a dilemma or, as Kant calls it, an antinomy, is unique to the ideas of reason as
produced by the hypothetical syllogism. Since the antinomies are the most directly relevant parts of Kant’s project here, I restrict my attention to them, but I feel I should note that the other forms of syllogism do not yield antinomies. They do, however, yield dialectical and illusory inferences.
115 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason , A334/B392-A336/B394.
116 Kant, Critique of Pure Reason , A452/B480. In this context, when it posits existing entities, we have
what Kant calls the ‘real’ use of reason, as opposed to its logical use in drawing inferences. See Kant, Critique of Pure Reason , A299/B355.
it is experienced as part of a causal chain. Thus God and free agents, since they lie outside the influence of cause and effect, must lie forever beyond our ability to experience.
The dilemma faced by reason is thus insoluble. Kant calls this situation an ‘antinomy’, and presents us with a set of four antinomies in the course of the Transcendental Dialectic. In 118
each, we are presented with a pair of persuasive but mutually exclusive arguments. On the one hand, reason has solid grounds for positing some ending point for an infinite series of
conditions. For example, a series of causes needs something uncaused to begin the series. Yet on the other hand, reason seeks to extend the series of conditions backwards into infinity. In the case of freedom, we find that reason operates at all times under the assumption that the natural world is subject to causal laws, and that the understanding organizes all experience in accord with these same causal laws. Thus, the positing of a free agent violates that basic assumption of reason and runs contrary to all experience. Yet at the same time, some uncaused cause is 119
needed to begin the chain of causation. The question cannot be decided by argumentation, since there are equally powerful arguments on both sides. It thus presents us with a pair of
contradictory beliefs, both of which are plausible, but which cannot both be true at the same time and in the same way.