Dear Class,
I am very much looking forward to our first meeting on Tuesday.
I have three brief announcements.
1. I have added one very short reading to week 2. It is Kant’s 1784 public letter, “An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment?” For background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_Enlightenment%3F Numerous translations of it exist and can be easily found.
I am usually loath to add anything to what is originally on the syllabus, but I have added this reading for a few reasons:
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- it is among the shortest and clearest pieces by Kant you are likely ever to read;
- it will help to situate how and why Kant and his contemporaries thought of him as a leading champion of the Enlightenment;
- and, (most importantly), it will help frame the project of the Critique of Pure Reason as Kant understands it, which is the chief theme of week 2.
2. For those of you outside of North America, please be mindful of the fact that, as of today, clocks in the USA were set forward by an hour for daylight savings time. So please double-check when Tuesday’s class will begin in your time zone.
3. Finally, some of the online submissions of the diagnostic assignment seemed not to have gone through or to have been lost by the system. Aravind will be reaching out to you directly if we do not have a submission from you at this time.
See you soon,
JGR
This message can also be viewed on the Announcement Forum of the course Kant’s Theoretical Philosophy: A Critique of Pure Reason
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