GIOVANNI SARTO

The present dissertation aims to elucidate the relationship between the concepts of order and contingency in the writings of Immanuel Kant. The works selected for analysis are The Only Possible Argument in support of a demonstration of the existence of God (1763) and the Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787), with special attention to three distinct chapters: the Amphiboly of the Concepts of Reflection, the Ideal of Pure Reason, and the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic. In turn, these concepts will be analyzed from the perspective of the interrelation between theology and nature. Thus, it is a thematic study that seeks to highlight a specific conceptual articulation, not always explicitly stated by the author. In this sense, the work has a narrative and comparative aspect, although it does not prioritize temporal linearity but rather thematic continuity. The general problem to be addressed can be summarized as follows. It was shown that in The Only Possible Argument the concept of natural order was linked to the being of God. Subsequently, it was argued that the Ideal of Pure Reason empties the concept of God from its ontological meaning, making possible the following question: how to think, in this new situation, the foundation of the order of nature? To make natural order a necessary consequence of the being of God, The Only Possible Argument had dissociated it from the divine will, a sign of the contingency of things’ existence. Henceforth, in the Critique of Pure Reason, without recourse to the transcendent being, the question of the order of nature translates itself into the following: how to think of nature as a concatenated system and not as a contingent aggregate of parts? In this sense, it is a matter of showing, concerning the relationship between theology and nature, that Kantian thought tends to diminish the importance of the necessity/contingency pair in favor of the order/contingency pair. In the meantime, fundamental theses of his thought are situated, as well as his opposition to notable philosophers, especially Leibniz. Identifying that in the work of the philosopher from Hannover, it is possible to find a very specific articulation between the concepts of necessity and contingency, which will later be gradually undone by Kant, we chose to make the opposition between them a guiding thread for the exposition. Despite this, the presented analyses of Kant's thought and theses are based on a structural and attentive reading of his own texts, with support and review of specialized bibliography when pertinent.