CRITIQUE OF KANTS TRANSCENDENTAL IDEALIST

VIEWS CONCERNING THE COSMOLOGICAL PROOF

OF THE EXISTENCE OF GOD

Paul Gerard Horrigan, Ph.D., 2015.

Regarding the question of the capacity of mans reason to demonstrate the existence of
God, the agnostic transcendental idealist Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) replies in the
Transcendental Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason1 that, since all our experience is limited
1
Studies on Kants Critique of Pure Reason: N. K. SMITH, A Commentary to Kants Critique of Pure Reason,
Macmillan, London, 1930 ; H. J. PATON, Kants Metaphysic of Experience: A Commentary on the First Half of the
Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 2 vols, Macmillan, New York, 1936 ; A. C. EWING, A Short Commentary on Kants
Critique of Pure Reason, Methuen, London, 1938 ; C. G. GARNETT, The Kantian Philosophy of Space, Columbia
University Press, New York, 1939 ; T. D. WELDON, Introduction to Kants Critique of Pure Reason, Clarendon
Press, Oxford, 1945 ; G. MARTIN, Kants Metaphysics and Theory of Science, Manchester University Press,
Manchester, 1955 ; G. BIRD, Kants Theory of Knowledge, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1962 ; R. P.
WOLFF, Kants Theory of Mental Activity, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1963 ; N.
ROTENSTREICH, Experience and Its Systematization: Studies in Kant, Martinus Nijhoff, The Hague, 1965 ; J.
BENNETT, Kants Analytic, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1966 ; D. P. DRYER, Kants Solution for
Verification in Metaphysics, Allen & Unwin, London, 1966 ; H. HEIMSOETH, Transzendentale Dialektik: Ein
Kommentar zu Kants Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 4 vols., Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, 1966-1971 ; J. HARTNACK,
Kants Theory of Knowledge, Harcourt, Brace & World, New York, 1967 ; M. S. GRAM, Kant, Ontology, and the A
Priori, Northwestern University Press, Evanston, 1968 ; T. K. SWING, Kants Transcendental Logic, Yale
University Press, New Haven, 1969 ; S. J. AL-AZM, The Origins of Kants Arguments in the Antinomies, Oxford
University Press, Oxford, 1972 ; A. MELNICK, Kants Analogies of Experience, University of Chicago Press,
Chicago, 1973 ; A. LLANO, Fenmeno y trascendencia en Kant, EUNSA, Pamplona, 1973 ; L. BECK (ed.), Kants
Theory of Knowledge, Reidel, Dordrecht, 1974 ; J. BENNETT, Kants Dialectic, Cambridge University Press,
Cambridge, 1974 ; W. H. WALSH, Kants Criticism of Metaphysics, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1975 ;
T. E. WILKERTON, Kants Critique of Pure Reason, The Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1976 ; R. VERNEAUX, E.
Kant: Critica della ragion pura, Japadre, LAquila, 1979 ; J. N. FINDLAY, Kant and the Transcendental Object:
A Hermeneutic Study, The Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1981 ; J. V. BUROKER, Space and Incongruence: The Origin
of Kants Idealism, D. Reidel, Dordrecht, 1981 ; K. AMERIKS, Kants Theory of Mind: An Analysis of the
Paralogisms of Pure Reason, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982 ; J. N. MOHANTY and R. W. SHAHAN
(eds.), Essays on Kants Critique of Pure Reason, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK, 1982 ; R.
WALKER, Kant on Pure Reason, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982 ; R. B. PIPPIN, Kants Theory of Form:
An Essay on the Critique of Pure Reason, Yale University Press, New Haven, Conn., 1982 ; H. E. ALLISON,
Kants Transcendental Idealism, Yale University Press, New Haven, Conn., 1983 ; G. NAGEL, The Structure of
Experience: Kants System of Principles, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1983 ; R. E. AQUILA,
Representational Mind: A Study of Kants Theory of Knowledge, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 1983 ;
K. ASCHENBRENNER, A Companion to Kants Critique of Pure Reason: Transcendental Aesthetic and Analytic,
University Press of America, Lanham, MD, 1983 ; P. GUYER, Kant and the Claims of Knowledge, Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge, 1987 ; A. T. WINTERBOURNE, The Ideal and the Real: An Outline of Kants Theory
of Space, Time, and Mathematical Construction, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, 1988 ; P. FAGGIOTTO,
Introduzione alla metafisica kantiana della analogia, Massimo, Milan, 1989 ; F. OFARRELL, Per leggere la
Critica della ragion pura di Kant, Pontificia Universit Gregoriana, Rome, 1989 ; R. E. AQUILA, Matter in Mind:
A Study of Kants Transcendental Deduction, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1989 ; P. KITCHER, Kants
Transcendental Psychology, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1990 ; V. MELCHIORRE, Analogia e analisi
trascendentale. Linee per una nuova lettura di Kant, Vita e Pensiero, Milan, 1991 ; S. GARDNER, Kant and the
Critique of Pure Reason, Routledge, London, 1999 ; E. WATKINS, Kant and the Metaphysics of Causality,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2005 ; J. V. BUROKER, Kants Critique of Pure Reason: An Introduction,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2006 ; G. BIRD, The Revolutionary Kant: A Commentary on the Critique
of Pure Reason, Open Court La Salle, IL, 2006 ; J. LUCHTE, Kants Critique of Pure Reason: A Readers Guide,

1
to what is in our sensibility and if the a priori categories of the human understanding described
in the Transcendental Analytic can operate only on the objects given to our understanding in and
through the forms of sensibility, then all speculative or theoretical knowledge of God is rendered
impossible. God, who is supra-sensible, is not given in the mass of sense impressions that we
receive and is incapable of being an object of speculative or theoretical knowledge to the human
mind. James D. Collins explains that, for Kant, knowledge extends only as far as experience
reaches, and experience is regulated by the material and formal conditions of objectivity. Since
these conditions lead only to the appearances or sensuous objects, Kant concludes that only
sensible objects are experienceable and hence knowable. In speculative philosophy, which
concerns our knowledge of objects, the human knowing powers are validly occupied only when
they concern themselves with sensuous objects or with the a priori, formal structures of
consciousness which bear upon knowledge of such objects. Otherwise, the mind is directed away
from experience and objectivity and so can issue only in illusions.2 For Kant, reason is never
satisfied with exploring the a priori conditions and limits of knowledge. It tries to use its ideas in
a constitutive way in order to gain knowledge of real beings without having any recourse to
sense intuition. This constitutive use leads to a transcendent metaphysics which is essentially
empty and illusoryReason has overstepped its bounds here in attempting a constitutive or
ontological use of its ideas. Since these ideas are purely formal unities and since man has no
intellectual intuition which can give them real content, every sort of transcendent metaphysics
results in a confusion of the forms of thought with the modes of being.3 Kant regarded natural
theology as the supreme instance of fetter-free thinking or the constitutive use of rational ideas
entirely apart from the limits set by the only intuition man enjoys: sensuous intuition. Lacking
any real content, the inferences about God are merely a magic lantern of phantoms having no
bearing upon the being of God in the real order.45

Collins observes that, for the transcendental idealist agnostic Kant, the existence of God
is speculatively unknowable. He reinforces this conclusion by applying to God the conditions
required of all objects of experience and hence of all knowable realities. The judgments
constitutive of philosophical knowledge are only possible when we relate the formal conditions
of a priori intuition, the synthesis of imagination and the necessary unity of this synthesis in a
transcendental apperception, to a possible empirical knowledge in general.6 Those things alone
are knowable which are temporal, subject to some finite, concrete pattern of imagination,
included within the order of appearances, and given through empirical, sensuous intuition. On all
four counts, God (as conceived by Western theists) lies patently outside the scope of speculative

Continuum, London, 2007 ; D. BURNHAM and H. YOUNG, Kants Critique of Pure Reason: An Edinburgh
Philosophical Guide, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh, 2007 ; E. WATKINS, Kants Critique of Pure
Reason: Background Source Materials, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2009 ; O. HFFE, Kants Critique
of Pure Reason: The Foundations of Modern Philosophy, Springer, Dordrecht, 2010 ; P. GUYER (ed.), The
Cambridge Companion to Kants Critique of Pure Reason, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2010 ; J.
OSHEA, Kants Critique of Pure Reason: An Introduction and Interpretation, Routledge, Abingdon, 2014 ; M.
FERRARIS, Goodbye, Kant!: What Still Stands of the Critique of Pure Reason (Suny Series in Contemporary Italian
Philosophy), SUNY Press, Albany, NY, 2014 ; L. J. KAYE, Kants Transcendental Deduction of the Categories:
Unity, Representation, and Apperception, Lexington Books, Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham, MD, 2015.
2
J. COLLINS, God in Modern Philosophy, Regnery Gateway, Chicago, 1967, p. 175.
3
J. COLLINS, op. cit., p. 179.
4
I. KANT, Critique of Practical Reason, I, ii, 2, Section vii (translation by L. W. Beck, 243).
5
J. COLLINS, op. cit., p. 179.
6
I. KANT, Critique of Pure Reason, A 158 ; B 197, 2nd ed., trans. N. K. Smith, Macmillan, London, 1933, p. 194.

2
knowledge. He is eternal and not temporal; His being is infinite and unimaginable; He is not an
appearance but the supreme intelligible reality or thing-in-itself; He lies beyond all sensuous
intuition, and man is endowed with no intellectual intuition for grasping His intelligible reality.
Not only His existence but also His nature and causal relation with the world remain intrinsically
impenetrable to our speculative gaze. Natural theology has no possibility of providing us with
true knowledge about God and should be abandoned.7

Kant maintained that there were only three possible ways of demonstrating the existence
of God with speculative reason, namely, the ontological argument or proof, the cosmological
proof, and the physico-theological proof (the teleological proof). In his Critique of Pure Reason,
he writes: There are only three modes of proving the existence of a Deity, on the grounds of
speculative reason. All the paths conducting to this end begin either from determinate experience
and the peculiar constitution of the world of sense, and rise, according to the law of causality,
from it to the highest cause existing apart from the world or from a purely indeterminate
experience, that is, some empirical experience or abstraction is made of all experience, and the
existence of a supreme cause is concluded from priori conceptions alone. The first is the
physio-theological argument, the second the cosmological, and the third the ontological. More
there are not and more there cannot be.8 Kant holds that all three proofs (the ontological
argument, the cosmological proof, and the teleological proof) are invalid, the latter two, in the
final analysis, being reduced to the invalid ontological argument, which entails an illegitimate
jump from the conceptual order or order of ideas to the real order of being.

Kant is correct in maintaining that the ontological argument is an invalid proof, and it is
to be recalled that St. Thomas Aquinas has many times refuted this form of argumentation in
many of his writings, an invalid proof which in essence entails an illegitimate jump from the
logical order or order of ideas to the real order or existential order of being. In his critique of the
various formulations of the ontological argument ngel Luis Gonzlez writes: Invalidit
dellargomento ontologico. Il passaggio dallesistenza mentale allesistenza reale rimane
ingiustificato e ingiustificabile. Tutti gli attributi predicati di un soggetto devono appartenere allo
stesso ordine del soggetto: ad un soggetto reale corrispondono attributi reali, e a un soggetto
ideale, proposizioni ideali; e i coprincipi intrinseci degli enti essenza ed essere convengono
agli esseri reali o ideali, ma non possibile mescolare essere reale ed esistenza ideale, n
esistenza reale ed essenza ideale. Si realizzerebbe una metbasis che non pu essere giustificata,
un passaggio illegittimo dallordine ideale allordine reale. contraddittorio attribuire a un
essere reale essenza ed esistenza ideali, o a un essere ideale essenza ed esistenza reali. Si
andrebbe contro a quanto esige il principio di non-contraddizione, che abbiamo gi visto
formulato da san Tommaso in modo rigoroso nei seguenti termini: eodem modo necesse est poni
rem et nominis rationem. Lidea dellente pi grande possibile (la sola entit che i sostenitori
dellargomento ontologico hanno nella mente) esige certamente lidea dellesistenza, ma non pu
esigere nulla in un altro ordine. Lente pi grande possibile ideato richiede unesistenza ideale,
7
J. COLLINS, op. cit., pp. 182-183. Collins notes that the coercive force of the Kantian critique of natural theology
depends upon acceptance of his view that the requirements for the knowledge proper to classical physics are the
requirements for all knowledge, that the conditions of the object of physics are therefore the same as the conditions
for all knowable experience, that experience is confined to sensible appearances and their formal conditions, that the
general, formal factors in knowledge derive entirely from the nature of consciousness, and that man has only
sensuous intuition(J. COLLINS, op. cit., p. 183).
8
I. KANT, Critique of Pure Reason, translated by J. M. D. Meiklejohn, Macmillan, New York, 1900, p. 331.

3
ma non gli si pu attribuire, pena la contraddizione, unesistenza reale. A meno di postulare
lidentit di ideale e reale, e di dichiarare la realt antinomica e contradditoria, come avviene in
Hegel, (la qual cosa per altro fuori dalle intenzioni degli altri difensori della prova) largomento
ontologico manca di valore dimostrativo9 Non sono possibili delle dimostrazioni a priori
dellesistenza di Dio, e nemmeno delle prove quasi a priori o a simultaneo, come largomento
ontologico. Lessere non deriva dal pensiero: lesistenza di Dio non si dimostra a partire dal suo
concetto o dalla sua essenza.10 La invalidez del argumento ontolgico. El trnsito de la
existencia mental a la existencia real es un paso injustificado e injustificable. Todos los atributos
que se dicen de un sujeto deben ser del mismo orden del sujeto; a un sujeto real le corresponden
atributos reales, y a un sujeto ideal, proposiciones ideales; y los coprincipios intrnsecos de los
entes esencia y ser convienen a seres reales o ideales, pero no es posible entrecruzar esencia
real y existencia ideal, ni existencia real y esencia ideal. Se tratara de una metbasis que no
puede ser justificada, un trnsito ilegtimo del orden ideal al orden real. Atribuir a un ser real
esencia y existencia ideales o a un ser ideal esencia y existencia reales, es contradictorio. Es
faltar a la exigencia del principio de contradiccin, que mas atrs vimos formular a Santo Toms
en estos trminos rigurosos: eodem modo necesse est poni rem et nominis rationem. La idea del
ente ms grande posible (lo nico que tienen en la mente los autores que formulan el argumento
ontolgico) exige ciertamente la idea de existencia, pero no puede exigir nada de otro orden. El
ente ms grande posible ideado exige una existencia ideal, pero no puede atribursele, sin
contradiccin, la existencia real. Salvo en el caso de postular la identificacin de lo ideal y lo real
y declarar a la realidad antinmica y contradictoria, como sucede en Hegel, lo cual est fuera de
la intencin del resto de los defensores de la prueba, el argumento ontolgico carece de valor
demostrativo11No caben demostraciones a priori de la existencia de Dios, ni tampoco
pruebas quasi a priori o a simultaneo, come es el argumento ontolgico. El ser no procede del
pensamiento; la existencia de Dios no se demuestra a partir de su concepto o esencia.12

Though Kant is right in affirming that the ontological argument is invalid (though he
misunderstands even Leibnizs invalid13 rationalist formulation of the ontological argument since

9
A. GONZLEZ LVAREZ, Tratado de metafsica, t. II: Teologa natural, Madrid, 1968, pp. 163-164.
10
. L. GONZLEZ, Filosofia di Dio, Le Monnier, Florence, 1988, pp. 82-84.
11
A. GONZLEZ LVAREZ, ob. cit., pp. 163-164.
12
L. GONZLEZ, Teologa natural, EUNSA, Pamplona, 2008, pp. 88-90, 92.
13
In his critique of Leibnizs ontological argument, Gonzlez states: Il tentativo leibniziano di salvare la possibilit
reale fallisce completamente. La nozione di possibilit si configura come la teoria fondamentale della metafisica del
filosofo tedesco, il quale tuttavia non riesce a cogliere la possibilit reale. Nel pensiero di Leibniz, la possibilit reale
aristotelica, o la potentia essendi di Tommaso dAquino viene ridotta, in fin dei conti, a possibilit logica; la
possibilit reale perde il proprio valore metafisico e viene ridotta al suo valore meramente logico. Questo discorso
applicato a Dio vuol dire che la possibilit logica (assenza di contraddizione fra le caratteristiche indicate da un
concetto) non sufficiente a dimostrare la possibilit reale dellessere divino. Lesistenza reale non si fonda sulla
possibilit, ma avviene proprio il contrario: la possibilit a fondarsi sullesistenza. Dio non reale perch
possibile, ma possibile perch reale. La possibilit o potenza metafisica si fonda sempre su di una attualit(. L.
GONZALEZ, op. cit., pp. 63-64). El intento leibniziano de salvar la posibilidad real desemboca al final en un
fracaso rotundo. La nocin de posibilidad se configura adems como la doctrina capital de la metafsica leibniziana,
pero no se alcanza la posibilidad real. En el pensamiento de Leibniz, la posibilidad real aristotlica, o la potentia
essendi de Toms de Aquino se convierten a fin de cuentas en posibilidad lgica; la posibilidad real decae en su
valor metafsico, quedando reducida a su valor meramente lgico. Aplicado al caso de Dios quiere esto decir que la
posibilidad lgica (ausencia de contradiccin entre las notas de un concepto) no es suficiente para demostrar la
posibilidad real del ser divino. La existencia real no se fundamenta en la posibilidad, sino que acontece precisamente
al revs: es la posibilidad quien se funda en la existencia. Dios no es real porque sea posible, sino que en todo caso

4
he is operating within the framework of his transcendental idealist a priori categories of the
understanding, and in particular, his understanding of existence as a modality of judgment14),
Kant is in error in holding that the cosmological proof from generation and corruption of the
sensible things of this world to the Absolutely Necessary Being (the tertia via) and the
teleological demonstration from finalized non-intelligent corporeal beings to the Supreme
Intelligent Orderer (the quinta via), as they are correctly understood in Aquinas Summa
theologiae, I, q. 2, a. 3, understanding them in the light of the analogical transcendental
participation metaphysics of the Angelic Doctor centered upon esse as actus essendi, the
actuality of all acts and perfection of all perfections, are in the end to be reduced to the erroneous
and invalid ontological argument.

Kant on the Cosmological Proof. Regarding the cosmological argument or proof (or the
demonstration from the contingency of sensible things to the Absolutely Necessary Being) Kant
describes what he thinks the demonstration consists in as follows: If something exists, an
absolutely necessary being must likewise exist. Now I, at least, exist. Consequently, there exists
an absolutely necessary being. The minor contains an experience, the major reasons from a
general experience to the existence of a necessary being. Thus this argument really begins at
experience, and is not completely priori, or ontological. The proof proceeds thus: A
necessary being can be determined in only one way, that is, it can be determined by only one of
all possible opposed predicates; consequently, it must be completely determined in and by its
conception. But there is only a single conception of a thing possible, which completely
determines the thing priori: that is, the conception of the ens realissimum. It follows that the

es posible porque ya es. La posibilidad o potencia metafsica se funda siempre en una actualidad(. L.
GONZLEZ, op. cit., p. 73.
In his critique of Kants transcendental idealist understanding of the rationalist formulation of the ontological
argument Rgis Jolivet writes: Confutazione di Kant. La confutazione kantiana dipende dai princpi della Critica e
si presenta sotto una forma tra le pi discutibili. Lessenziale dellargomentazione di Kant pu riassumersi cos. Il
giudizio Dio esiste non pu essere ritenuto evidente in s o a priori, poich lessere non un predicato reale,
cio il concetto di qualcosa che possa aggiungersi al concetto di una cosa. Se io prendo il soggetto (Dio) con tutti i
suoi predicati e poi dico: Dio , non aggiungo un nuovo predicato al concetto di Dio, ma pongo soltanto il soggetto
in se stesso con tutti i suoi predicati, e nello stesso tempo loggetto che corrisponde al mio concetto. E cos il reale
non contiene niente di pi che il semplicemente possibile. Cento talleri reali non contengono niente pi che cento
talleri possibili. (Dialettica trascendentale, c. III, 4a sez.).
Relativamente a questa critica, osserviamo dapprima essere esatto che lesistenza non pu essere concepita
come un essere sopraggiunto ad un essere: essa nientaltro che lattualit dell'essere, cio nientaltro che lessenza
posta fuori delle sue cause. Essa dunque non aggiunge niente a questa essenza (236). Sennonch la critica di Kant
implica altra cosa da questa evidenza, cio che lessere soltanto la copula di un giudizio, ossia nientaltro che latto
di affermare o di negare un attributo di un soggetto e mai un predicato reale (I, 54). Ora, ci falso, poich il verbo
essere, oltre ad avere un senso copulativo o relativo, pu esprimere quella perfezione ultima che consiste nella
attualit dell'essere (verbo-predicato). Quindi, la proposizione Dio esiste pu esprimere benissimo altra cosa dal
contenuto di un concetto ed affermare la realt dellEssere perfetto. Senza dubbio, questa posizione dellesistenza
non pu risultare immediatamente dalla posizione del concetto e Kant ha ragione di dirlo, come san Tommaso. Egli
ha per il torto di fondare la sua critica sullargomento secondo il quale ogni affermazione di esistenza, nel senso
assoluto del termine, sofistica, in quanto ogni nostra conoscenza, secondo Kant, sarebbe limitata
allorganizzazione dellesperienza fenomenica in funzione delle forme a priori dellintelletto e della sensibilit. La
critica kantiana dellargomento ontologico dunque sprovvista di reale validit.(R. JOLIVET, Trattato di filosofia
[IV] Metafisica [2], Morcelliana, Brescia, 1960, pp. 215-216).
14
For a critique of Kants transcendental idealist understanding of the ontological argument, see: . L.
GONZLEZ, op. cit., pp. 64-71 (Italian), pp. 73-79 (Spanish 2008 edition).

5
conception of the ens realissimum is the only conception, by and in which we can cogitate a
necessary being. Consequently a supreme being necessarily exists.15

Now, Kant rejects the cosmological argument for two main reasons. His first reason is
that the argument from contingency is, in the final analysis, nothing but the ontological argument
in disguise. He attempts to prove this as follows: That it may possess a secure foundation, it
bases its conclusion upon experience, and thus appears to be completely distinct from the
ontological argument, which places its confidence entirely in pure priori conceptions. But this
experience merely aids reason in making one step to the existence of a necessary being. What
the properties of this being are, cannot be learned from experience; and therefore reason
abandons it altogether, and pursues its inquiry in the sphere of pure conceptions, for the purpose
of discovering what the properties of an absolutely necessary being ought to be, that is, what
among all possible things contain the conditions (requisita) of absolute necessity. Reason
believes that it has discovered these requisites in the conception of an ens realissimum and in it
alone, and hence concludes: The ens realissimum is an absolutely necessary being. But it is
evident that reason has here presupposed that the conception of an ens realissimum is perfectly
adequate to the conception of a being of absolute necessity, that is, that we may infer the
existence of the latter from the former a proposition which formed the basis of the ontological
argument, and which is now employed in the support of the cosmological argument, contrary to
the wish and professions of its inventors. For the existence of an absolutely necessary being is
given in conceptions alone. But if I say the conception of the ens realissimum is a conception
of this kind, and in fact the only conception which is adequate to our idea of a necessary being, I
am obliged to admit that the latter may be inferred from the former. Thus it is properly the
ontological argument which figures in the cosmological and constitutes the whole strength of the
latter; while the spurious basis of experience has been of no further use than to conduct us to the
conception of absolute necessity, being utterly insufficient to demonstrate the presence of this
attribute in any determinate existence of a thing.16 In other words Kant says in the above
passage from the Critique of Pure Reason, that we go from the experience of existing and
contingent things to the idea of a necessary being, and from this idea we argue to the
existence of the necessary being, and this is nothing but the illegitimate jump from the
conceptual or logical order to the real order of being that the invalid ontological argument makes.

The second main reason that Kant advances for his rejection of the cosmological
argument or proof consists in this: causality cannot be anything other than a subjective a priori
category of the understanding, in the mind prior to all experience, a subjective form or construct
whose sole function it is to regulate the data of sense experience the phenomena in our
thinking, and, as such, has no objective value in the world of extra-mental noumenal realities.17
For Kant causality cannot lead us to demonstrate and affirm the existence of God because God is
not a sensible phenomenon, and the noumenon remains unknown and unknowable.

Criticizing Kant (and Hume as well) on efficient causality, Charles A. Hart writes: The
chief error in modern and contemporary philosophy concerning efficient causality is similar to
the error concerning substance, namely, the denial of its objective reality and indeed of the

15
I. KANT, op. cit., pp. 338-339.
16
I. KANT, op. cit., pp. 339-340.
17
Cf. I. KANT, op. cit., p. 341.

6
objective reality of the notion of cause generally in the traditional metaphysical sense of the
communication of existence between beings in some way. Indeed, it arises from a denial of the
intellects power to make an unique metaphysical report of reality in terms of being as being or
existing18

Describing the erroneous subjectivist explanations of causal necessity in Hume and Kant,
Hart writes: Various purely subjective explanations are offered to explain the necessity or
invariability of the cause-effect sequence. For Hume it was due entirely to force of habit or
custom, which it would be entirely possible to set aside. We could indeed conceive an absolute
beginning of being from nothingness. He says: As all distinct ideas are separable from each
other, and as the idea of cause and effect are separable from each other, it will be easy for us to
conceive any object as non-existent this moment, and existent the next, without conjoining to it
the distinct idea of cause or producing principle.19 For Kant it is due to an a priori form or
category of necessity innate in the intellect which imposes the note of necessity on certain
sequences presented by the senses. On others, the innate form of contingency or nonnecessity is
imposed.20

Hume and Kant have this in common: They reject the intellects metaphysical report of
efficiency in terms of being simply as existing and communicating existence. They accept only
the sense report of causality as a sensible sequence of events in time and place. Any necessity
whereby the intellect declares this effect must have an adequate cause comes entirely from the
minds own action, from the force of habit or custom according to Hume, from the imposing of
an innate form according to Kant. But such an explanation is quite evidently unsatisfactory. If
the intellect itself is the sole source of the necessity, how are we to account for the distinction the
mind makes between necessary or causal sequences and nonnecessary, and therefore noncausal
or casual sequences?

In either the Humean or the Kantian explanation the distinction must be attributed to the
arbitrary action of the mind since from the standpoint of sense data alone both the causal and the
noncausal or casual sequences are quite similar. This common-sense distinction thus becomes a
complete mystery for empiricism and Kantianism. On the other hand, from the metaphysical
standpoint of a realistic philosophy such as that of St. Thomas, the distinction is based on the
compulsion, not of the mind itself, but from that of the realities involved. Going beyond the
sense data and considering the various sequences from the standpoint of the existence of the
beings concerned, the intellect is compelled to say that certain sequences are causal and others
noncausal, or casual, because the different realities involved compel such distinction.21

18
C. HART, Thomistic Metaphysics, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1959, p. 293.
19
D. HUME, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 381.
20
Cf. I. KANT, Critique of Pure Reason, Part II, Transcendental Logic, 1, 1.
21
C. HART, op. cit., pp. 293-294.

7
 Benignus Gerritys Description and Critique of Kants Transcendental Idealist
Views Concerning the Cosmological Proof

Benignus Gerrity describes and critiques Kants transcendental idealist views concerning
the cosmological proof of the existence of God in his Nature, Knowledge and God as follows:
Kants Refutation of the Proofs of Gods Existence. In his Critique of Pure Reason Immanuel
Kant attacked both the traditional proofs of Gods existence and all attempts to give any cogent
demonstration from pure reason of the existence of a Supreme Being. It has been generally
assumed by philosophers of both the naturalistic and the idealistic schools since the time of Kant
that his criticism effectually disposed, once and for all, of all rationalistic attempts to prove that
God exists. Scholastic philosophers, however, have not been greatly impressed by the famous
refutation. They have repeatedly pointed out serious and fundamental flaws in Kants
argument, flaws which render the argument as a whole invalid. However, not many modern
philosophers read the Scholastic defenses of the arguments, because they consider the whole
question as a closed and settled one, and because the influence of Kants philosophy has been so
widespread and dominant that demonstrations based upon a pre-Kantian metaphysics and theory
of knowledge are not often given very serious consideration today. Yet the truth is that the
traditional Scholastic arguments and Kants criticism are public property which anyone who
wishes may examine and compare, so that there is no excuse for dispensing with such an
examination and assuming that the question is forever settled against the arguments.

Kants Main Argument Outlined. There are, Kant says, only three possible ways of
attempting a demonstration by pure reason of the existence of God. These are: (1) the physico-
theological (i.e., the teleological proof), from the order and harmony of the world; (2) the
cosmological proof, from the existence of the world; and (3) the transcendental or ontological
proof, from the idea of God or perfect being (ens realissimum). The last proof can easily be
shown to fail to establish Gods existence; the cosmological proof can be shown to depend upon
the ontological; and the teleological proof can be shown to depend upon the cosmological. Hence
all three are invalidated by the ontological fallacy, and there is therefore no possible way of
proving the existence of God by pure reason.

Following his exposition of this main argument Kant adds four independent arguments
against the cosmological proof in particular. These are of interest because they embody
practically every objection raised by modern philosophers against the Thomistic proofs. We shall
examine them after we have examined his main argument.

The Ontological Proof. St. Anselm, Descartes and Leibniz were among the philosophers
who had used the ontological proof. St. Thomas, as we have seen, rejected it. The essence of the
proof consists in the deduction of the real and necessary existence of God from the idea or
conception of God. To be definable as the most perfect conceivable being, or the totality of the
real (ens realissimum), God must be conceived as possessing real and necessary existence, since
without this He would obviously not be the most perfect conceivable being. But since we do
mean by God the most perfect conceivable being, or the ens realissimum, He really and
necessarily exists.

8
 Kants chief criticism of this argument is not entirely different from St. Thomas,
though, as shall be shown below, Kant does not succeed in putting his finger on the heart of the
error in the proof, as St. Thomas did. Asserting the existence of a being, Kant says, is not the
same sort of judgment as attributing a predicate to a subject. The proponents of the proof pass
from the latter sort of judgment to the former; and this is invalid. To affirm a predicate of a
subject is to assert that that subject must be conceived as having that predicate; but it is to assert
nothing at all about the real existence of the subject or the predicate. If the subject exists only in
the mind, it must have the predicate but only in the mind. If it exists in reality, it must have the
predicate in reality; but that proves nothing about whether it really exists or not; the if remains,
even though the predicate in question is necessary being. Hence, in the judgment, Ens
realissimum is necessary being, I simply designate necessity as a proper predicate of the subject
ens realissimum, but it still remains a question whether this subject with this predicate exists only
in my mind or in reality. On the other hand, the judgment, Ens realissimum exists, does not
affirm any predicate of any subject; it states that a certain subject with all its predicates, whatever
they may be, really exists. It is clear that the passage from the first proposition to the second is
unjustifiable. In a word, while it is self-contradictory to say that Supreme Being is not necessary
being, it is not self-contradictory to say that there is no Supreme Being. Consequently the
ontological proof has no value.

The Cosmological Argument. The cosmological proof is the proof of Gods existence
through the demonstration of the existence and attributes of a necessary being upon whom the
contingent beings of the world depend. Of St. Thomas arguments, the second and third come
closest to what Kant has in mind. Kants refutation consists in showing that this argument
embodies the ontological argument and depends upon it; and, since he has already shown that the
latter argument is fallacious, the cosmological argument is also fallacious.

Kant does not, at this point,22 attack the first part of the cosmological proof, that is to
say, the argument from the world to a necessary being upon whom it depends. Instead he tries to
show that the identification of this necessary being with God, the Supreme Being, is
accomplished only through the same reasoning which constitutes the ontological argument. After
we have established the existence of some necessary being, we proceed, according to Kant, thus:
A necessary being can be determined in only one way; it must be completely determined in and
by its own conception, that is to say, it must be self-existent and self-determining. It must,
therefore, be the ens realissimum or Perfect Being, for such a being alone has within itself the
entire condition of its own existence and nature. Consequently, Perfect Being or God necessarily
exists.

This mode of demonstration, Kant maintains, involves the old ontological argument
under a new guise. It starts from experience, but once it attains the concept of the necessary
being, it must abandon experience altogether; for experience can tell us nothing at all of the
properties which an absolutely necessary being ought to have. Reason, abandoning experience,
falls back upon its own conceptions in order to discover from them what attributes a necessary
being ought to have; that is to say, it seeks to discover which among all possible things contains
in itself the conditions of absolute necessity. Reason believes that it finds these conditions in the
conception of an ens realissimum, and consequently that the necessary being is the ens
22
Except in a footnote.

9
realissimum. Now that last conclusion embodies the ontological argument. In making the
conclusion, Reason assumes that the conception of an ens realissimum is perfectly adequate to
the conception of an absolutely necessary being, that is, that we can infer the existence of the
latter from the former a proposition which formed the basis of the ontological argument
What Kant means is this: in reaching the ultimate conclusion of the cosmological argument,
namely, that a supreme being necessarily exists, we make the conceptions of supreme being and
necessary being identical; but if these conceptions are identical then either of them can be
deduced from the other in Scholastic terminology, they are convertible; hence necessary
existence can be deduced from the conception of the supreme being (ens realissimum); but that is
the heart of the ontological proof, which we have already shown to be invalid. Hence, the
cosmological proof is also invalid.

Criticism of Kants Argument. Kants presentation of the cosmological proof is a

misrepresentation of it. According to him, when we have established the existence of some
necessary being, we then cast around in the pool of all our conceptions of possible beings trying
to hook one which fits the conception of an absolutely necessary being. We hook the conception
of an ens realissimum, the big fish of the ontological argument. This conception of the
completeness of reality fully determines in itself the object of which it is the conception, and
thus fulfills the demand of the notion of a necessary being, namely, that it be fully determined in
and by its own conception. Then we assert, without further ado, that the supreme being is
necessarily existent. At this point, however, the fish slips off our hook; because if we were
justified in making that assertion, we could validly demonstrate Gods existence from the mere
idea of the ens realissimum, and we have already seen that we cannot do this.

If Kants presentation of the cosmological argument were really that argument, his
conclusion could not be escaped. But the argument as Scholastics, for example, St. Thomas, give
it bears no resemblance to Kants version. In St. Thomas proofs of Gods existence, when we
have demonstrated the existence of a necessary being (and a First Cause, First Mover, Supreme
Truth, Goodness, Life, etc.), we by no means abandon experience, to cast around among the pure
Ideas of Reason for a conception which fits the notion of necessary being. On the contrary, we
turn back to experience at once. Our reason had been led, in the first place, to demonstrate that
necessary being exists because experience had shown us evident marks of contingency in the
beings of nature. Now that we know that a being which is necessary does in fact exist, we have a
very clear road open and it is the only road open to us for determining something about the
nature of this necessary being. Since it is necessary, we must deny of it those characteristics of
natural beings which are the marks of their contingency. This is the way of negation; by means
of it we demonstrate that necessary being is eternal, simple, immaterial, unlimited pure actuality,
in contrast to the temporality, composition, materiality, limitedness, and potentiality of natural
beings. Second, since this necessary being is the cause of nature, we must affirm of it every
perfection which we find in its effect, that is to say, in nature; but since it is necessary, we must
deny of it every admixture of imperfection which the contingency of nature introduces into the
perfections found in nature. This is the way of analogy; by it we demonstrate that necessary
being is supreme, original, unlimited unity, goodness, truth, life, intelligence, freedom, and
activity. Kants contention that reason abandons experience when it seeks to determine the nature
of necessary being is entirely false. In both ways, the negative and the analogical, it is the

10
objects of experience, the contingent beings of nature, which dictate to reason what predicates
must be assigned to necessary being, to the Cause of the world.23

Kants Subsidiary Criticisms of the Cosmological Argument. (a) Transcendental Use of

the Principle of Causality. Kants first contention is that the principle of causality is applicable
only within the realm of phenomena and hence cannot be used to establish the existence of God,
or an absolutely unconditioned and transcendental being. This dictum is based upon his own
theory of knowledge. Thomistic philosophy rejects Kants whole theory of knowledge, and along
with it, its implications about the nature of causality. Thomistic philosophy maintains and proves
that causality is a valid metaphysical principle of real being and not a mere subjective principle
of human thought. Hence, Thomists feel no qualms about resting their proofs of Gods existence
upon the principle of causality. We may add, without taking up again our formal criticism of
Kants system of philosophy, that he himself makes the extra-phenomenal use of the principle of
causality which he forbids others to make. Whatever words may shroud Kants meaning, the
central doctrine of his philosophy supposes causal action which involves noumena. The
noumenon acting upon sensibility produces experience; and the a priori forms of the mind
determine the character of that experience, giving rise to phenomena. Neither of these
contentions of Kant is intelligible unless causal influence exerted between noumenon and
noumenon or between noumenon and phenomenon is presupposed.

Kants argument that the principle of causality cannot be employed in such a manner as
to bring us beyond natural phenomena to a transcendent cause of nature is advanced by some
modern philosophers in a way that makes it independent of Kants theory of knowledge.
Principal Caird, a British philosopher of the recent past, presents it as follows: You cannot in a
syllogistic demonstration put more into the conclusion than the premises containAll that from
a finite or contingent effect you can infer is a finite or contingent cause, or at most an endless
series of such causes. But if, because the mind cannot rest in this false infinity, you try to stop the
indefinite regress, and assert at any point of it a cause which is not an effect, which is its own
cause, or which is unconditioned and infinite, the conclusion in this case is purely arbirary.24

G. H. Joyce comments on this argument as follows: It would seem as though he [Caird]

had failed to see that not the contingent substances themselves, but the analytic proposition
Contingent being involves the existence of necessary being provided the premises of the
syllogism.

To Father Joyces comment we may add another. Those philosophers who argue that
you cannot prove Gods existence from the existence of finite being, because in trying to do so
you pass over from the finite to the infinite and from the caused to the self-existent, which
passage is illegitimate, are unconsciously testifying to the validity of the proof which they are
attacking. They are really saying that the only adequate cause of the series of finite caused causes
of nature the only cause which can adequately explain these finite caused causes is an
uncaused infinite cause, which, because it must be infinite and uncaused, cannot be seized in any

23
There is more than this to our reply to Kants main argument. It is given below in our answer to his third
subsidiary argument (italicized headings, [c] and [d] below).
24
Introduction to Philosophy of Religion, p. 129; quoted by G. H. Joyce, Principles of Natural Theology, p. 226,
note 1.

11
human demonstration. They see, as clearly appears in Cairds argument,25 that the world can be
explained only on the supposition that God is its first cause; but then, because this throws no
explanatory light upon the first cause itself, they become confused and forget that it is the world
which they set out to explain, not God. Kant himself, as we shall see, made this error. It is also
committed, in a more crude and less excusable manner, by those who object to the argument
from causality on the grounds that it fails to give an adequate reason why, though every cause
must allegedly have had a previous cause, the first cause is excepted from the rule.26 No one in
the whole history of philosophy has ever been so absent minded as to argue that every cause
must have a cause, and that therefore there is a cause without a cause. What the proponents of
the cosmological proof argue is that caused causes, such as the ones we observe in nature,
depend ultimately on something which is not merely another one like themselves, that is, upon
an uncaused cause; to explain them merely by other things like themselves, which also need to
be explained, is not to explain them at all. If it is then charged against those who defend this
proof that they do not explain this first cause,27 they answer (1) that they never set out to do so,
and (2) that to attempt to explain it in the only in which we ever explain anything, namely, by
determining the prior conditions whence it arose, would be to ignore what they are talking about,
that is, the first cause. The First Cause is self-explanatory; if you saw it, you would see its
explanation.

b) The Possibility of an Infinite Series. Kants second subsidiary argument against the
cosmological proof is one of the constantly recurring objections to that proof. The proof, it is
argued, rests entirely upon the assumption that an infinite series of caused causes is impossible;
but such a series is not impossible; therefore the proof fails to establish its conclusion, namely,
that there must be an uncaused first cause.

All those who reject the theistic proofs on the grounds that these proofs assume the
impossibility of an infinite series of causes, are themselves assuming that what the proponents of
the proofs hold to be impossible is an infinite regress of causes into the past a regress which in
theory could always be followed back futher without any beginning ever being reached. Now,
whatever any other proponents may have meant by the impossibility of an infinite regress in
causes, this most certainly is not what St. Thomas meant. He clearly states so, when he rejects,
one after another, several arguments pretending to show that the world must have had a
beginning.28 There are two reasons why St. Thomas rejects an infinite regress of caused causes,
moved movers, or contingent beings, and neither of them has anything to do with an infinite
regress into the past or a necessary beginning of the worlds existence.

The first reason, which he states in his first and second proofs of Gods existence, we
have already explained when treating of moved movers and contingent beings. This reason is
that so long as we adduce only caused causes to account for an effect, we do not account for it
merely by increasing the number of these causes, even if we increase this number to infinity.
Caused causes are themselves effects, and an increased number of them, instead of explaining
what needs to be explained, only adds still more requiring explanation. Only the self-explanatory

25
And throughout Kants, see below.
26
RANDALL and BUCHLER, Philosophy: An Introduction, p. 160.
27
Ibid., p. 160.
28
Summa Theologiae, I, q. 46, a. 2.

12
can adequately explain anything; only the self-existent can adequately account for the existence
of anything. Without a self-existing being, or an uncaused cause, whence they derive their
caused existence, no contingent beings at all can exist. Surely, then, an infinite number of them
cannot. An infinite series of contingent causes presupposes a self-existent cause outside the
series just as certainly as does a finite series. No matter what relations of dependency contingent
beings may bear to one another, each of them and all of them together depend upon a necessary
being.

Those who object to the argument entertain a picture of the relationship of the uncaused
cause and the caused causes in which God is merely the starter who gives the series of natural
causes its beginning. Since, on the supposition that the series mught be infinite in regress, there
would be no point at which God would have to act as starter, they argue that His existence is not,
therefore, demonstrable. Their picture is very different from that of St. Thomas, in whose view
God is the cause of every contingent thing, and of every action of every contingent thing upon
another, and of every relation among contingent things the universal cause of nature, not
merely the starter of natural processes. St. Thomas picture might be shown as on page 487. In
the world represented by this picture it does not matter in the least whether there is a beginning
of contingent beings, that is, a first caused cause; God is not stuck in at the beginning of a series
of caused causes to give it a start; He is the cause of the series as a whole, of each in the series,
and of the relations of causality between the members of the series.

The other meaning of St. Thomas rejection of an infinite series of caused causes is quite
simple. He is talking about essential and actual causes, that is to say, causes upon which the
being of an effect essentially depends so that it cannot exist apart from the action of these causes
giving it existence; the actual operation of these causes is a necessary condition for the existence
of the effect. If the causes were infinite in number, an infinity of conditions would have to be
fulfilled in order for the effect to exist. But an infinity of actual and simultaneous conditions
cannot be fulfilled; hence the effect will not exist.

c) Inconceivability of a Necessary Being. The third fallacy which Kant finds in the
cosmological proof reveals the fundamental error present in Kants own mind throughout his
whole treatment of the theistic proofs. The gist of his objection is that when we conclude, from
the series of contingent or conditioned beings which make up nature, that there exists a necessary
or unconditioned being which is the primary cause or condition of contingent beings, we remove
from this necessary being all conditions; but in removing all conditions, we remove everything
which would enable us to conceive of this being as necessary; we call the being necessary, but
we cannot think its necessity, because we have excluded from its conception everything which
might determine its necessity. Hence, our idea of necessary being is empty of all meaning.

In the pages where Kant explains this objection (Book II, Chapter III, Section 5 of the
Transcendental Dialectic) he reverts over and over to the fact that I cannot cogitate an
absolutely necessary being; I cannot think any object such that I see that it necessarily exists. I
cannot avoid the inference that some necessary being exists, and yet whatever individual things I
can conceive or think, I can conceive as non-existent. Now this dilemma, Kant says, leads to
only one conclusion: contingency and necessity are not properties of things themselves, but are
merely subjective principles of reason, that is, pure conceptions by which the understanding

13
synthesizes experience. If they were properties of things themselves, I would be faced with a
clear-cut contradiction: something necessarily exists, but every individual thing is contingent. If,
however, contingency and necessity are subjective, regulative demands of reason, there is no
contradiction; for then they simply lay down two rules for reason: one requiring us to seek a
necessary ground for everything a complete explanation; the other forbidding us ever to hope
to attain this completeness, and commanding us to regard every experienced thing as
conditioned. When we make the first regulative principle, viz., a necessary ground of all
experience, into an existing being, viz., Necessary Being, we commit the fallacy of regarding a
regulative principle of reason as a constitutive principle of knowledge. Then we get into the
impossible position of trying to cogitate an unconditioned necessity trying to conceive of a
thing as necessary, while excluding the conditions which would enable us to conceive its
necessity.

Kants Fundamental Error. In this argument Kant is guilty, first of confusing the
hypothetical necessity of thought and of physical law with the absolute necessity of self-existing
being. When I think certain conditions, I must think certain consequences; for example, I cannot
think that a figure is a triangle and yet think that its angles do not add up to two right angles. In
nature, when given events occur, certain other events must follow. Both these necessities are
hypothetical or conditional; a certain condition makes a certain consequent necessary. The
necessity which we mean when we speak of a necessary being is entirely different. Such a being
must exist because of itself; it does not depend on any conditions, but its essence is to exist. Kant
realizes this, as he shows repeatedly; yet he ignores it in his objection. He equates
unconditioned with necessary, but then he goes on to use necessary as meaning required by
certain conditions. No man of Kants intellectual stature could have fallen into such an obvious
ambiguity unless some more fundamental error, some assumption which he constantly but
unconsciously made, drove him into it. What was this unconscious assumption?

Kants underlying error is the same as that of certain thirteenth-century philosophers

against whom St. Thomas argued. It consists in the failure to distinguish between what is
knowable in itself and what is knowable in respect to us. Because of this failure, Kant will not
accept as complete any demonstration of the existence of a necessary being which is not at the
same time a demonstration of the intrinsic ground of its necessity. Aware that any such proof
would be the ontological proof under some guise or other, and rejecting the ontological proof, he
rejects all proofs. This peculiar blindness of Kant is probably the root of his false statement of
the cosmological proof: he casts the latter in such a way as to involve the ontological proof
because he himself has made the unconscious assumption that any proof to be valid must do
what the ontological proof intends to do exhibit the ground of the necessity of necessary being.

St. Thomas would have described Kants error as the fallacy of assuming that wherever
a demonstration quia is possible, a demonstration propter quid must also be possible. The
former, we recall, proceeds from effect to cause, and often can establish little more than the
existence of the cause. The latter goes from the cause to the effect or from the essence to the
properties. The proof quia is a posteriori and the proof propter quid is a priori.29 It is clear that
the demonstration of the real properties of some real being by means of the a priori mode of
proof is possible only when the real essence of that being is understood. But what Kant demands,
29
A posteriori and a priori are here used in the Scholastic, not the Kantian sense.

14
both in his main argument against the cosmological proof and in his third subsidiary argument, is
that once the existence of necessary being has been established a posteriori, its property of
necessity must be deducible a priori; he asks us to cogitate it as necessary, that is, to see in its
conception the reason of its necessity. To demand this is to assume that the demonstration of the
existence of a cause must be also the manifestation or explication of the essence of that cause.

St. Thomas, as we have seen, actually had such an argument as Kants put to him.30
Gods essence is identical with His existence, since He is necessary or self-existent being; but it
is admitted that we cannot know Gods essence; therefore it is evident that we cannot know His
existence. Kant is merely a little more subtle: If I know Gods existence (ens necessarium), I
must know His essence (ens realissimum); but if I knew the latter, I could demonstrate the
former from it (ontological proof); I cannot do this; therefore I cannot know Gods existence. St.
Thomas answered his medieval oponent by pointing out that we cannot know Gods existence, if
by His existence we mean the mode of being whereby He exists, which is identical with His
essence. We can, however, prove the bare fact of His existence, so that we are certain that He
does exist, without at all comprehending what His mode of existence, namely, necessary self-
existence, is. Thus, we can know Him to exist, without knowing His essence and without,
therefore, being able to demonstrate His existence from His essence.

d) An Illicit Passage is Made from Logical Possibility to Real Possibility. Kants fourth
criticism of the logical structure of the cosmological proof is that it confuses the logical
possibility of the totality of the real (ens realissimum) with its real possibility, passing without
justification from the former to the latter. The criterion of logical possibility is the absence of
contradiction in the conception of a thing; but the criterion for real possibility is that the thing
can enter the synthesis of experience, that is, be a possible object of experience. Because the
conception of the supreme being fulfills the first criterion, we assume that it is really possible;
whereas this criterion establishes only its logical possibility.

The objection, of course, is not true. As Kant himself notes, the cosmological argument
seeks to establish the existence of necessary being; and if it succeeds, it does not have to raise the
question of the real possibility of this being. Kants argument, instead of damaging the
cosmological proof, throws a glaring light upon his own false assumption, the one pointed out
just above. The fact is that we do not and cannot, in the cosmological proof or in any other
context, make any use of the notion of the logical possibility of Supreme Being, because we
simply cannot know a priori whether such a being is logically possible, since we cannot
conceive the essence of that being. We know full well that our conception of God is only an
analogous substitute for an unattainable idea of His essence; we would be very presumptuous to
pronounce upon the logical possibility of a being which we cannot define. In giving the above
criticism Kant shows again that the source of his misinterpretation of the cosmological proof is
his failure to keep distinct in his own mind the pseudo-essence represented in our concept of
perfect being and the real essence of that being.

This failure, indeed, is apparent even in his argument against the ontological proof itself.
Here he argued forcibly that our conception of necessary being is, for all we know, quite empty
of content. He should then have said flatly that the ontological argument is useless, since we do
30
Summa Contra Gentiles, I, 12.

15
not comprehend the essence from which we are seeking to deduce necessary existence; but
instead he bases his rejection of the argument on the fact that he is unable to form the slightest
conception of a thing which, when annihilated in thought, with all its predicates, leaves behind a
contradiction. This, of course, is true; but the real point of its truth Kant does not notice: namely,
that what is annihilated in thought is not the conception of ens realissimum, but a substitute
conception. The ontological proof arose out of the confusion of our conception of perfect being
with the essence of that being. If my conception of perfect being were really the adequate
representation in my mind of the essence of perfect being, I would see that this being necessarily
exists and why and the ontological proof would be valid, though no proof would be any longer
needed. The reason why the ontological proof is not valid is not because the necessary existence
of supreme being cannot be deduced from its conception, but because I can never have the
conception of supreme being and therefore can never affirm a priori whether such being is even
possible. When I have demonstrated a posteriori that a necessary being exists, I still know only
the fact, not the essence of this being. My conception of supreme being has not been advanced
once inch nearer the real essence of supreme being, and therefore I am as incapable as ever of
starting my demonstration from that essence. But this in no way affects the validity of my a
posteriori proof of the existence of a necessary being. Having proved that there is a being which
exists by necessity, I go on from there; I do not go on from the still unknown essence of supreme
being.31

Collinss Critique of Kant on the A Posteriori Demonstration of the Existence of God

Collins critiques Kants agnosticism concerning the a posteriori demonstration of the

existence of God, dependent upon the framework of his immanentist transcendental idealist
theory of experience and theory of existence, as follows: The Kantian explanation of the three
stages in any a posteriori demonstration of Gods existence rests upon his theory of experience
and his conception of existence. The steps in the process impose themselves upon human
intelligence not through any necessity inherent in the human intellect itself or in Gods own
being but only on condition that the intellect is operating within the framework of the Kantian
view of experience and existence. What has been described, then, is the way an a posteriori
inference to God must adapt itself to the exigencies of this view, not the way in which such an
inference must always develop. Thus the analysis has a sharply limited scope.

Kants four empirical criteria (temporality, synthesis in imagination, limitation to

appearances, and presence through sensuous intuition) are determinants of the objects studied in
classical physics. It does not follow that they are the defining marks which characterize
everything we can either know experientially or infer from experience. They constitute the
empirical principle operative within Newtonian physics, but they are not identical with the
experiential principle operative within our ordinary acquaintance with the existing world and our
metaphysical analysis of this world. Human experience and its existentially based causal
inferences are not restricted to the factors required for the construction of the physical object of
Newtonian mechanics. Kants fourfold empirical principle is a univocal rule for testing the
validity of scientific reasoning. By its nature, it can extend only to objects which already belong
to the world of the physicists investigation. Hence it cannot be used to answer the question of
whether experience contains causal implications, leading to the existence of a being distinct from
31
B. GERRITY, Nature, Knowledge, and God, Bruce, Milwaukee, 1947, pp. 479-494

16
the world of physics. It can settle nothing about whether our inferences, which start with the
sensible world, must also terminate with this world and its immanent formal conditions. Hence,
Kants use of the empirical principle to rule out the a posteriori demonstration of Gods
existence is unwarranted. Granted that the starting point is found in sensible things, it cannot be
concluded, by the deductive application of such a principle, that these objects are the only things
we can know from causal analysis of experience.

Even with respect to the starting point itself, Kants physicalism did not permit him to
do full justice to his own insight into the existential aspect of experienced things. Having shown
negatively that rationalism misses the significance of existence, he was unable to find in
empiricism an adequate positive explanation of its proper reality. Just as Hume found no
meaning for existence other than the entertainment of a perception, so did Kant find no meaning
for it other than the conditions for knowing objects in physics. Not the sensible, existing being of
our experience but the objectivity of a statement in physical science guided his view of existence.
Hence he described the noetic conditions for having an object in physics rather than the act of
existing of the sensible thing. It is because Kant failed to grasp the precise starting point of the
realistic argument from changing and composite sensible existents that his account of the general
procedure of a posteriori demonstration is inapplicable to the realistically ordered inference. The
radical divergence between these two approaches to God crops out in the very first stage of the
argument; it does not wait for the second stage, where Kant thought that his disagreement with
natural theology began.

Kant has a contextual and systemic theory of existence. Capacity for integration within
the system of empirical requirements is his criterion for knowable existence. This theory
sensualizes Leibnizs view of existence as a harmonious relation among essences by making it a
harmonious relation among the factors in the network of space and time. Simultaneously, the
Kantian position intellectualizes or injects scientific objectivity into Humes approach to
existence as a perception of ideas by making the act of perceiving conform with the conditions of
universality and necessity in scientific judgment. Knowable existence becomes a category or rule
of judgment determining the insertion of a phenomenal object within the finite, temporal context.
An object can be affirmed as existent when it satisfies the requirements of experience and
secures its contextual position within the world of sensible appearances.

The first comment on this theory is that it fails to meet one of Kants own earlier
objections. He had urged that even if an object were totally determined with respect to space and
time and described in all its sensible qualities or appearances, it might still remain within the
realm of the possible. For even the empirical context of space and time does not assure us that
something which has these relations actually exists. The purely relational approach does not lead
us to the being which exercises the act of existing but only to a nodal point in a network of
general conditions for possible experience. Hence it does not radicate the possibility of scientific
constructs in some acually existing, sensible things.32 Scientific contextualism does not save

32
The purely phenomenal and relational significance of knowable necessary existence is brought out in the
following text: It is not, therefore, the existence of things (substances) that we can know to be necessary, but only
the existence of their state; and this necessity of the existence of their state we can know only from other states,
which are given in perception, in accordance with the empirical laws of causality. Critique of Pure Reason, A 227:
B 279-80 (Smith, 248; italics added). This is an a priori, physicalist conception of necessary existence, so that by the

17
Kant from beginning his description of the a posteriori demonstration with the idea of
contingency; he is in the purely ideal or possible order at the very outset. Far from having
existent reality torn from its grasp at the second stage of the demonstration, Kantian reason is
never in possession of the existential act of the sensible thing. The ontological argument is
inevitable, not only for rationalism, but also for any position which begins with Kants
description of the object of knowledge and the criterion of knowable existence.

In the second place, it is a circular procedure to employ the Kantian conception of

existence as a test of the a posteriori demonstration of Gods existence. Kants categorical view
of existence is exclusively adapted to objects which are finite, temporal, and phenomenal. Like
the empirical principle of which it is a function, this theory is thoroughly univocal and applies
only to the homogeneous world of physical objects, which admits no implications beyond its
own defining conditions. The critical use of this notion of existence does not establish that our
world contains no knowable implications beyond itself but only that the study of such existential
implications cannot be made in terms of this notion. Kant has so framed his theory of existence
that it leaves out of account any aspects of existing, sensible things that lead to a nontemporal,
nonfinite, nonphenomenal being. All that an application of his existential criterion establishes is
that a rigorous inference to the truth of Gods existence cannot be made from the phenomenalist
starting point. It must begin with the act of existing of the composite, finite being if it is to
discover the causal implications demanding affirmations of the existence of the infinite act of
existing.

The first two steps in Kants description of the a posteriori demonstration of Gods
existence depend, respectively, upon his theory of existence and that of experience. But no
reckoning is made with the realistic analysis of existence and experience. Hence the Kantian
refutation does not hold for a philosophy of God which grounds its inference upon the realistic
findings. There are only two types of theistic reasoning which are vitally affected by Kants
dialectic. One grows out of the rationalist metaphysics, which treats the existential and
experiential world in a deductive way. The other depends on an empiricist metaphysics, which is
only the highest development of physics and hence does not discern the distinctive act of
existing, as such, in sensible things. Thus the major targets of Kants dissolution of natural
theology are Leibniz and Wolff, Locke and Mendelssohn, with the lesser rationalists and deists
providing illustrative materials.33

Jolivets Critique of Kants Transcendental Idealist Views on the Cosmological

Proof

Rgis Jolivet critiques Kants transcendental idealist views concerning the cosmological
proof of the existence of God in the fourth volume of his Trattato di filosofia, Metafisica (2) as

very terms of the approach, the only object whose existence can be known with necessity is some finite, phenomenal
effect within the natural order. Even here Kants theory of knowledge permitted only a relative, a priori anticipation
of the actual perceptions that manifest the actual existents. The actual existence of sense appearances is not subject
to strict knowledge but only to the regulative use of the analogies of experience. The gap between the possible
conditions of experience and the actual exercise of the act of existing is never closed by means of speculative
knowledge, since this act escapes the reach of physics and hence also of critical philosophy. Cf. Critique of Pure
Reason, A 178-79: B 221-22, A 225-26: B 272-74 (Smith, 210, 243).
33
J. COLLINS, op. cit., pp. 184-186.

18
follows: La critica di Kant. a) Il postulato empiristico. Sotto la sua forma radicale, lobiezione
che nega la portata trascendentale del ragionamento causale per stabilire lesistenza di Dio stata
sviluppata da Kant nella Critica della ragion pura. Kant nega universalmente che la ragione
possa oltrepassare lordine fenomenico. Su questo punto, non dobbiamo riprendere qui una
discussione che stata fatta nella critica (113-120), in cui abbiamo dimostrato che la dottrina
kantiana si fonda su di un postulato gratuito e falso, di natura empiristica: cio sulla impossibilit
per la conoscenza di cogliere qualcosa di diverso dal sensibile. Kant da questo postulato deduce
immediatamente che tutte le concatenazioni, le serie naturali e lordine che ci appaiono nei
fenomeni derivano da forme a priori della sensibilit e dellintelletto. Quindi, tutte le prove
razionali dellesistenza di Dio si presentano prive di valore e in realt esprimono soltanto
esigenze della nostra struttura mentale, ma non esigenze oggettive, nel senso proprio di questo
termine.34 Qui sono dunque in questione gli stessi princpi della critica kantiana e le difficolt
che concernono la dimostrazione dellesistenza di Dio valgono per quanto valgono questi
princpi, che sono sofistici.

b) Il metodo danalogia. Tuttavia nella critica kantiana bisogna sottolineare un aspetto

che interessa in modo particolare la dimostrazione dellesistenza di Dio. quello che contesta il
valore del metodo di analogia. Il ragionamento, secondo Kant, avrebbe valore solo operando su
concetti rigorosi. Ora nessuno dei nostri concetti, n quello di essere, n quello di causa, pu
applicarsi propriamente a Dio, poich questi concetti hanno una validit solo nellinterno della
nostra esperienza, mentre lEssere infinito o la Causa prima, se esiste, necessariamente
trascendente ogni nostra esperienza.

Contro questa obiezione, basta dimostrare che il principio di causalit, qual usato da
noi, serve esclusivamente ad esigere una causa delluniverso, e ci proprio in virt di quanto
delluniverso cogliamo sperimentalmente, e in nessun modo a definire ci che o devessere in
s questa causa. Sappiamo anzi che potremo parlare di una tale Causa, considerata nella sua
natura di Causa, solo con la riserva dellanalogia, cio di un modo di pensiero in cui le cose di
cui parliamo sono simili solo proporzionalmente a quelle che concepiamo traendole dalla nostra
esperienza. Tutto dunque perfettamente corretto nel nostro uso del principio di causalit,
poich il concetto analogico di causa, che si riscontra in tutte le prove dellesistenza di Dio
come termine medio, designa, non la causalit quale esiste nellordine empirico, ma ci in cui
questa causalit dellordine creato proporzionalmente simile ad una causalit di un altro
ordine essenzialmente diverso. dunque certo che i concetti messi in esercizio dal
ragionamento, ad esempio i concetti di essere e di causa, non possono applicarsi univocamente a
Dio ed alla creatura. Che dedurne tuttavia? Che Dio non essere, n causa? Per nulla, ma che
egli non essere come lo siamo noi, non causa come noi siamo. Egli tuttavia luno e laltro,
ma ad un titolo assolutamente esclusivo, che appartiene solo a lui e che non pu condividere con
la creatura. Cos, il ragionamento fondato sulla causalit, sebbene non ci porti a penetrare il

34
Il termine oggettivo, di cui Kant si serve costantemente per caratterizzare la nostra conoscenza equivoco.
Infatti, oggettivo per Kant tutto ci che serve a costituire loggetto della conoscenza. Questo oggetto tuttavia, in
quanto realt non puramente fenomenica, non esso stesso che un prodotto delle forme a priori. Di conseguenza, la
natura intera, che loggetto della scienza, come le realt trascendenti lesperienza, oggetti della ragion pura, non
sono per Kant nientaltro che opera dello spirito. Loggettivit, in questo sistema, diventa qualcosa di simile a quella
delle immagini del sogno, che sono degli oggetti per chi dorme. dunque esattamente il contrario di ci che noi
intendiamo per oggettivo, cio ci che indipendente dal soggetto conoscente. In altri termini, Kant afferma che
lessere funzione del conoscere, mentre noi diciamo che il conoscere funzione dellessere.

19
mistero dellEssere infinito e della Causa prima, pu condurci in maniera sicura a riconoscere
lesistenza di una Causa prima e di un Essere infinito.35

Il necessario e il perfetto. Lobiezione pi speciosa quella di Kant, che pretende di

ridurre la terza prova allargomento ontologico. Non basta, egli dice, approdare ad un essere
necessario: bisogna ancora stabilire che questessere necessario Dio o lessere sovranamente
perfetto. Che ci implichi il sofisma ontologico, se ne d prova con la conversione semplice della
proposizione: Ogni essere necessario perfetto, che diventa: Qualche essere perfetto
necessario (I, 67). Ma siccome non pu esserci alcuna distinzione tra enti perfetti ed essendo
lessere perfetto necessariamente unico, la proposizione convertita equivale a questa: Lessere
perfetto necessario (= esiste necessariamente), ci che la tesi stessa dellargomento
ontologico.

Lobiezione di Kant non regge. Abbiamo visto infatti che la proposizione Lessere
perfetto esiste necessariamente, quale si presenta nellargomento ontologico, non esprime che
una necessit logica: se c un Essere perfetto, egli esiste per s. SantAnselmo, avrebbe potuto
ancora enunciare: Se un essere esiste per s ( necessario), sovranamente perfetto, poich i
concetti di necessario e di perfetto si implicano reciprocamente. Tuttavia, diciamo, rimane da
provare a posteriori lesistenza del Perfetto, consistendo il sofisma ontologico nel passare
immediatamente dal piano concettuale a quello reale. Se per si stabilisce a posteriori lesistenza
dellEssere necessario per s, non c pi alcun paralogismo nel passare dal Necessario al
Perfetto, pi che ve ne sia, una volta stabilita lesistenza del Perfetto (prima via), nellaffermare
che questo Perfetto esiste necessariamnte, per s (a se), che la sua stessa esistenza. Non c
alcun rapporto tra questi procedimenti e quello dellargomento ontologico.36

Grisons Critique of Kants Transcendental Idealist Views on the Cosmological

Proof

Michel Grison critiques Kants transcendental idealist views concerning the cosmological
proof in his Teologia naturale as follows: Si gia spiegato perch la prova ontologica non sia
dimostrativa: largomento comporta un passaggio dallordine ideale a quello reale; dal giudizio
ideale che identifica la perfezione assoluta con lesistenza necessaria, non si pu passare al
giudizio esistenziale: Nessun uomo, scrive Kant, potrebbe con semplici idee accrescere le
proprie conoscenze.37 Ma, attraverso questa critica, si fa strada un idealismo radicale. In realt,
quello che Kant dichiara impossibile il passaggio dalla rappresentazione intelligibile allessere,
alla profondit segreta del noumeno; lintelligenza non pu uscire dal campo dellesperienza o
dei fenomeni: La nostra coscienza di ogni esistenza (sia che essa venga immediatamente
dalla percezione o che derivi da ragionamenti che collegano qualche cosa alla percezione)
appartiene interamente e assolutamente allunit dellesperienza; quindi se unesistenza al di

35
R. JOLIVET, op. cit., pp.193-195.
36
R. JOLIVET, op. cit., pp. 238-239.
37
I. KANT, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 1781 (trad. francese: Critique de la raison pure, Alcan, Paris, 1905, p. 497).
Come interpetare la frase con la quale Kant illustra la sua confutazione dellargomento ontologico: Cento talleri
reali non contengono nulla di pi di cento talleri possibili (ib., p. 495)? Essa vera quanto allessenza: che
lesistenza sia in esercizio o semplicemente significata, la nozione rimane essenzialmente la stessa. Ma lesistenza in
esercizio molto di pi, per lintelligenza, della non-esistenza di ci che soltanto possibile. (Cfr. J. MARITAIN,
Les Degrs du savoir, p. 428).

20
fuori di questo campo non pu, in realt, essere assolutamente dichiarata impossibile, rimane
tuttavia una supposizione che non pu essere in alcun modo giustificata.38 Non vi pi qui,
nemmeno nella coscienza dellesistenza, unapprensione intelligibile dellessere; in realt, la
critica kantiana dellargomento ontologico procede da una corruzione dellidea stessa di
conoscenza.

Gli stessi presupposti idealistici sono alla base della confutazione della prova
cosmologica. Questa pu essere formulata nel modo seguente: ogni contingente ha una causa,
dunque bisogna arrivare a un essere assolutamente necessario (o a una necessit
incondizionata); ora questo essere assolutamente necessario anche sommamente reale:
nessuna perfezione gli manca, Dio. Ora, ecco le principali obbiezioni di Kant a questo
argomento. Anzitutto esso applica al di fuori dellesperienza il principio di causalit: Il
principio trascendentale che dal contingente ci fa trarre la conclusione di una causanon ha
valore che nel mondo sensibile, manon ha neppure pi senso al di l di questo mondo.39 Si
detto pi sopra40 che questa teoria dei principi di ragione toglie allintelligenza il potere di
captare lessere: logicamente lesercizio dellintelligenza dovrebbe cessare. Per di pi, secondo
Kant, la necessit incondizionata il vero abisso della ragione umana,41 poich nulla
impedisce, quale che sia la cosa esistente, di concepirne la non-esistenza.42 Si pu rispondere
cos a questa difficolt: lEssere raggiunto dal principio di causalit non pu pi essere concepito
come non-esistente; quello che pu dare lillusione contraria il fatto che la nostra conoscenza
comincia dal contingente e che ci difficile di non pensare Dio sotto lo stesso concetto. Se
vero che laseit divina ha per noi profondit impenetrabile, non meno vero che essa non
affatto contradditoria e che anzi richiesta dallesistenza del contingente. Kant rimprovera anche
allargomento di passare dalla necessit assoluta alla realt suprema di Dio; si realizzerebbe qui
una semplice conversione del giudizio nel quale si esprimerebbe largomento ontologico: la
realt suprema (o la perfezione assoluta) esiste necessariamente. Ora, dato che la prova
ontologica priva di vigore, largomento cosmologico dovrebbe a sua volta cadere. Ma ci
significa disconoscere il piano esistenziale sul quale si colloca questultimo argomento:
prendendo le mosse dallessere reale, esso conduce alla Realt di Dio; non vi dunque qui il
passaggio dallideale al reale che infirmava la prova ontologica

Oltre le critiche particolari che abbiamo dovuto riassumere e confutare brevemente,

abbiamo riconosciuto in Kant una presa di posizione fondamentale, che una concezione
dellintelligenza: a questa, Kant d per oggetto, non lessere, ma il fenomeno. Diventa
impossibile di uscire dallunit dellesperienza e dei fenomeni che vi si condizionano
reciprocamente. Se lEssere supremo si trovasse in questa catena di condizioni, sarebbe egli
stesso un anello di questa serie, come le membra inferiori a capo delle quali posto, esigerebbe
ancora unulteriore ricerca di un principio pi elevato dal quale dipenda. Se si vuole invece
staccarlo da questa catena e non comprenderlo, a titolo di essere semplicemente intelligibile,
nella serie delle cause naturali, quale ponte pu gettare allora la ragione per giungere sino a

38
I. KANT, Ibid., p. 496.
39
Ibid., p. 501.
40
Sopra p. 52.
41
I. KANT, Ibid., p. 503.
42
Ibid., p. 505.

21
lui?.43 Lidea trascendentale di un primo essere necessario assolutamente sufficiente cos
immensamente grande ed elevata al di sopra di tutto ci che empirico e sempre condizionato
chenon si potrebbe mai trovare nellesperienza materia sufficiente a colmare un tale
concetto.44

Tuttavia, esiste il ponte per raggiungere la realt di Dio: il principio di causalit; e

lesperienza offre la materia di nozioni applicabili a Dio: sono i concetti analogici. Lintelligenza
ha un valore, unestenzione, un potere universali: nessun essere, nemmeno lEssere divino, pu
sfuggirle totalmente; come supporre unintelligenza, per quanto umile possa essere, radicalmente
incapace di conoscere lesistenza di un essere e di penetrarne in parte lessenza? e come supporre
un essere che sia, per natura, assolutamente impermeabile a un pensiero? Ma se lintero campo
dellessere aperto allintelligenza, da un lato, lidea di causa far conoscere lesistenza di Dio, a
dallaltro si potranno dedurre, dallesperienza, concetti abbastanza semplici e vasti perch
possano convenire, per analogia, a un Dio immensamente grande ed elevato al di sopra di tutto.
Separandola dallessere, Kant ha minimizzato lintelligenza; nel cerchio ristretto ove ha ridotto la
ragione pura, non vi pi posto per la conoscenza di Dio.45

Fabros Critique of Kants Transcendental Idealist Views on the Cosmological

Proof

Cornelio Fabro critiques Kants transcendental idealist views concerning the

cosmological proof in his book Luomo e il rischio di Dio as follows: Secondo Kant nella
prova cosmologica che la Ragione speculativa sembra aver dispiegato tutta la sua arte dialettica
per produrre lillusione trascendentale pi grande possibile. Osserviamo subito che questa
prova cosmologica non ha nulla (o quasi nulla) in comune con le prove a posteriori di S.
Tommaso, neppure con la terza via tomistica che ha per punto di partenza la contingenza del
mondo fisico,46 ma Kant stesso la riferisce a Leibniz che lha chiamata la prova a contingentia
mundi. La formula kantiana piuttosto sconcertante: Se qualcosa esiste, deve esistere anche un
Essere (Wesen) assolutamente necessario. Ora esisto almeno io stesso: quindi esiste un Essere
assolutamente necessario.47 In questa formula la prova certamente sconosciuta alla tradizione
scolastica e Kant deve riferire la posizione razionalistica secondo la seguente interpretazione.
Anzitutto, a differenza della prova ontologica che ha il punto di partenza in un concetto, questa
parte da unesperienza ch indicata nella minore; la maggiore invece contiene la deduzione che
parte da unesperienza in generale per giungere allesistenza del Necessario. La deduzione
sembra ovvia, osserva Kant in nota; essa si fonda sulla presente legge trascendentale della
causalit che ogni contingente ha la sua causa e Kant dichiara che questa illazione troppo
conosciuta perch sia necessario esporla pi diffusamente.

43
Ibid., pp. 508-509.
44
Ibid., p. 508.
45
M. GRISON, Teologia naturale o Teodicea, Paideia, Brescia, 1967, pp. 112-115.
46
Sulla nozione tomistica di contingenza, v. spec. C. Gent., II, 30 e testi paralleli: di qui la distinzione fra la III
via della contingenza (propria delle sostanze corporee) e della IV via dei gradi di perfezione che si applica ad
ogni realt finita come tale e quindi anche alle sostanze spirituali incorruttibili (Cf. C. FABRO, Partecipazione e
causalit, Torino, p. 392 ss.), come si detto anche sopra (cf. p. 148 ss.).
47
I. KANT, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 1. c., A 604, B 633.

22
 In realt lesposizione di Kant, se da una parte lascia molto perplessi per la poca o punta
somiglianza con la prova tradizionale della contingenza, dallaltra molto illuminante per
afferrare dallinterno lo spirito della critica kantiana. Infatti Kant salta a pi pari il fatto e il
concetto di contingenza, il cui posto nella dimostrazione preso dal mondo come totalit di
ogni esperienza possibile, e riversa tutta la dimostrazione nella determinazione a priori del
concetto dellEnte assolutamente necessario. Sfido io, se poi la dimostrazione fatta ricadere
nella prova ontologica. La dimostrazione di Kant infatti suona cos: lEssere (Wesen) necessario
pu essere indicato soltanto con lunico predicato che lo determini a priori compiutamente, e
questo solo il concetto di Ens realissimum. Se questo lunico modo di pensare lEssere
necessario ovvio chesso esiste, in quanto lEns realissimum esiste per definizione. Kant
osserva che la prova ricorre allesperienza solo per compiere il primo passo (quello che dal
contingente lo conduca) al Necessario; il secondo passo, quello dallEssere necessario allo Ens
realissimum, fatto per puri concetti. Il nervus probandi della prova allora laffermazione:
Ogni ente assolutamente necessario insieme lessere pi reale di tutti, e qui Kant non ha
difficolt a mostrare che la proposizione si pu senzaltro capovolgere e dire: Ogni essere ch
il pi reale di tutti un essere necessario. Cos dal predicato ch posto a priori di il pi reale
di tutti si deduce la necessit assoluta, lesistenza perci di tale ente. Ma un simile procedere
altro non che una ripetizione della prova ontologica: peggio ancora, una ignoratio elenchi
poich prometteva una via nuova ed invece ricade nella vecchia.

Kant nel seguito della sua critica ha ragione di osservare che il semplice concetto
intellettuale di contingente non pu mai produrre una proposizione sintetica qual quella della
causalit. Ma la vera ragione nellaggiunta che subito segue, ossia che questo principio di causa
non trova un significato e un criterio del suo uso se non nel mondo dei sensi48: mentre nella via o
prova cosmologica si pretenderebbe di trascendere la realt sensibile. In parole pi formali: la
dialettica trascendentale comandata (e compromessa!) in partenza dalla analitica
trascendentale.

Ma la critica kantiana della prova a contingentia mundi non solo scontata in partenza:
essa anche deformata in partenza. La sua esposizione della prova non parte affatto dalla
constatazione della realt di fatto, non parte propriamente dal mondo contingente e non riflette
affatto sulla natura della contingenza di tale mondo. Es questo sia a posteriori, perch nulla si
dice della natura di questa contingenza, sia perch tale fatto ipoteticamente limitato
allesistenza dellIo (ma io stesso almeno esisto), dove la contingenza potrebbe aver senso solo
se correlata a quella del mondo e alla situazione nel mondo, ci che nellesposizione kantiana
invece manca; sia ancora perch, come si visto, il tessuto della prova nella posizione
(dialettica) a priori dei due concetti di Ens realissimum e di essere assolutamente incondizionato.
La prova a contingentia mundi, com presentata da Kant, pu dirsi a posteriori soltanto
nellaccenno iniziale al fatto di esistenza e non per riflessione sul mondo stesso dellesistenza
ch proprio della contingenza. Ma se il concetto di contingenza non fatto operare allinterno
della dimostrazione, come pu Kant parlare di una prova a contingentia mundi? Essa
effettivamente la prova anselmiana nella sua seconda formula del passaggio dallEssere sommo
allEssere necessario.49

48
I. KANT, Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 1. c., A 609, B 637.
49
C. FABRO, Luomo e il rischio di Dio, Studium, Rome, 1967, pp. 334-336.

23