In this blog post, we will examine how Kant resolved the conflict between empiricism and rationalism, focusing on his epistemology. Let’s explore Kant’s unique approach.
Humans are beings who seek knowledge. Our lives can be viewed as a continuous process of exploring knowledge, ranging from the everyday to the specialized. Epistemology is a branch of philosophy that systematically examines this knowledge. Although the problem of cognition was discussed in ancient times by figures such as the Sophists, Plato, and Aristotle, it did not emerge as a central issue in philosophy until the modern era. This is because modern philosophy demanded the same certainty as scientific knowledge, thereby elevating the problem of knowledge to prominence. Modern epistemology can be broadly divided into empiricism and rationalism.
Empiricism, which developed primarily in 17th-century England, regarded only what was obtained through sensory experience as knowledge and believed that all knowledge could be derived from human experience. Empiricists did not recognize a priori concepts—those that cannot be known through sensory experience—as knowledge. Empiricism primarily used the inductive method to acquire knowledge. It sought to observe and verify individual phenomena to identify common characteristics or identical relationships, and based on this, construct laws or derive concepts. However, just as one cannot conclude that all swans in the world are white simply because European swans are white, there are inherent problems with the inductive methodology itself.
Meanwhile, Rationalism, which developed primarily on the European continent, did not regard individual facts obtained through the senses as knowledge because they were subject to change. Rationalists believed that knowledge is eternally unchanging and that one must pursue universal truths. They believed this was possible only through reason and therefore regarded knowledge derived from reason alone as the most ideal form of knowledge. Reason refers to an innate cognitive faculty that stands in contrast to acquired sensory faculties. Rationalism sought to derive individual facts from universal principles through the deductive method. However, this approach has the problem of disregarding sensory experience and physical reality, thereby ignoring knowledge of concrete reality, and failing to provide adequate explanations for the discovery of new facts.
Regarding the conflict between empiricism and rationalism, Kant proposed a new system of cognition capable of overcoming it. Kant divided human cognitive faculties into sensibility and understanding. Sensibility is the faculty that transforms stimuli (sensory data) from the external world into sensory intuitions, while understanding is the faculty that conceptualizes based on these sensory intuitions. Kant believed that knowledge must possess both content and form. Content refers to sensory experience, while form refers to reason. Kant held that when stimuli from the external world are organized through sensibility, reason then structures them through categories to complete knowledge. In this way, Kant critically engaged with and synthesized the shortcomings of empiricism—which relies solely on sensory experience—and those of rationalism—which excludes sensory experience.
