Heidegger on judgment in Leibniz and Kant: Overcoming rationalism through transcendental philosophy

Heidegger offers an account of a development of judgment in Leibniz and Kant that overcomes rationalism. On his reading, these thinkers call rationalist prejudices into question by exploring the givenness at the heart of judgment and illuminating the space in which such givenness is possible. Heidegger connects this development of judgment to the breakthrough of transcendental philosophy. His intention is to motivate a new, non-rationalistic philosophy.; Contemporary scholarship tends to overlook Heidegger's account of a modern development of judgment and focus instead on his critique of modern philosophy as the "forgottenness of being" (Seinsvergessenheit). This dissertation, then, reconsiders Heidegger's relation to modern philosophy, demonstrating on the basis of his own texts that he appropriates modern philosophy but in a non-rationalistic way. Indeed, Heidegger continues to rely on transcendental-phenomenological philosophy in his later writings. Another consequence of this study, then, is a vindication of phenomenology's transcendental turn, because only a transcendental phenomenology can provide an adequate account of judgment in terms of givenness.; The modern development of judgment figures prominently in several key texts from before and after Heidegger's so-called "turn." The 1927 Sein und Zeit provides a phenomenological exposition of givenness by tracing judgment back to the temporal disclosedness of care. The summer 1928 lecture course, Metaphysische Anfangsgrunde der Logik im Ausgang von Leibniz, has Leibniz move away from rationalism by transferring the ground of judgment from the principle of non-contradiction to the principle of sufficient reason. The 1929 book, Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik , argues that Kant's articulation of transcendence is the properly understood, phenomenologically disclosed, principle of sufficient reason.; The winter 1935-36 lecture course, Die Frage nach dem Ding: Zu Kants Lehre von den transzendentalen Grundsatzen, again offers a phenomenological interpretation of Kant. Heidegger argues that Kant's transcendental exposition of the highest principle of synthetic judgment brings to light the pre-subjective and pre-objective "between" in which things can be available to us. This important text is supplemented by the 1936-38 Beitrage zur Philosophie (Vom Ereignis), the winter 1955-56 lecture course on Leibniz, Der Satz vom Grund, and the 1961 lecture, "Kants These uber das Sein."...