University of Rhode Island DigitalCommons@URI Open Access Master's Theses 1981 Kant on the Theoretical Arguments for God's Existence Ralph Herbert Slater University of Rhode Island Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/theses Recommended Citation Slater, Ralph Herbert, "Kant on the Theoretical Arguments for God's Existence" (1981). Open Access Master's Theses. Paper 1543. https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/theses/1543 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@URI. It has been accepted for inclusion in Open Access Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@URI. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. - KANT ON THE THEORETICAL ARGUMENTSFOR GOD'S EXISTENCE BY RALPH HERBERTSLATER A THESIS SUBMITTEDIN PARTIAL FULFILLMENTOF THE REQUIREMENTSFOR THE DEGREEOF MASTEROF ARTS IN PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF RHODEISLAND 1981 KANT ON THE THEORETICAL ARGUMENTSFOR GOD'S EXISTENCE ABSTRACT Kant's statement limiting the material of cognitive categories to the empirical--that which appears to us in the manifold of sensible intuition--is examined in its relation to the concept of a Thing presumed by definition to be nonempirical or transcendent of the empirical, the God of modern theism. Kant's limiting statement forbids the appli cation of the a priori concepts of understanding, the categories of Existence, Causality, and determinate Necessity, in three proofs of the existence of a transcendent ens realissimum. Rather the application of these categories is limited to natural states of affairs in the sections of Kant's Dialectic devoted to three traditional arguments for God's existence. In what follows the Kantian theory of existence is explored in close detail as is Kant's limitation of the meaning of causality and necessity.