The Legacy of Newton for the Pre-Critical Kant

Abstract This chapter assesses Newton’s legacy for Kant by concentrating on the evolution of Kant’s view of space in the pre-Critical period (1748–1768), with two main goals in mind. The first goal is to draw attention to the role that Newton’s matter theory and chemistry played for the young Kant. The second is to argue against the received view that has portrayed the young Kant as embracing Newton’s absolute space in 1768 via the argument from incongruent counterparts (short-lived as this conversion to Newton’s absolute space proved to be). By contrast to the received view, this chapter shows that in the period 1748–1768, Kant was working with a thoroughgoing relationalism, consonant with Kant’s matter theory, which was, in turn, inspired by speculative Newtonian experimentalism itself. Hence, the case is made for a slightly different interpretive stance on Newton’s legacy for the young Kant.