29.11.2024

“Four Paradoxes of Kantian Philosophy”: Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Vadim Vasiliev Delivered a Lecture at IKBFU

On 29 November, Vadim Vasiliev, Doctor of Sciences in Philosophy, Head of the Department of History of International Philosophy, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, gave a lecture for the participants of the Second International Philosophy Olympiad for Students. The expert highlighted the four paradoxes of Kantian philosophy.

Vadim Vasiliev, Doctor of Sciences in Philosophy, Head of the Department of History of International Philosophy, Lomonosov Moscow State University:
Immanuel Kant was a revolutionary in philosophy. His contemporaries perceived his works as something completely new and radical. But the paradoxical nature of Kant’s philosophy is connected not only with his innovativeness, but also with the profound nature of his ideas, for they may not be what they seem. For example, Kantian things-in-themselves may not be as unknowable as they appear, and Kantian ethics, which look like an abstract theory, actually have direct implications for practice. Kant’s criticism of the ontological argument for the existence of God can at the same time be seen as a defence of this evidence, and his aesthetic theory explains the phenomena of modern art.

Vadim Vasiliev, Doctor of Sciences in Philosophy, Head of the Department of History of International Philosophy, Lomonosov Moscow State University:

Immanuel Kant was a revolutionary in philosophy. His contemporaries perceived his works as something completely new and radical. But the paradoxical nature of Kant’s philosophy is connected not only with his innovativeness, but also with the profound nature of his ideas, for they may not be what they seem. For example, Kantian things-in-themselves may not be as unknowable as they appear, and Kantian ethics, which look like an abstract theory, actually have direct implications for practice. Kant’s criticism of the ontological argument for the existence of God can at the same time be seen as a defence of this evidence, and his aesthetic theory explains the phenomena of modern art.

The lecture took place in the IKBFU Rare Book Library, which has more than 8,000 antiquated volumes, including exemplars from the Library of Martin von Wallenrodt, as well as domestic pre-revolutionary literature.