Saturday, December 1, 2012

Totalizing Reason and Distributive Reason

While Totalizing Reason unifies a multiplicity, Distributive Reason generates a multiplicity, for which the source is a universal entity.  Now, for Kant, Theoretical Reason is plainly Totalizing Reason.  However, in some respects--the Moral Law, qua first introduced by Kant; the universalization of a maxim; and the concept of a perfectly rational individual--his Practical Reason is, arguably, interpretable as Distributive Reason, while in others--the Kingdom of Ends, Soul, Deservedness, and God--it is Totalizing Reason.  Given that Totalization and Distribution are inverse processes, the admixture is potentially problematic for his Moral doctrine.  Specifically, their contrast with the productivity of Distributive Reason exposes those Totalizing elements of the doctrine as Theoretical, and not Practical, ideas.

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