%0 Journal Article
%T Canguilhem¡¯s Critique of Kant: Bringing Rationality Back to Life
%A Marina Brilman
%J Theory, Culture & Society
%@ 1460-3616
%D 2018
%R 10.1177/0263276417741674
%X Canguilhem¡¯s contemporary relevance lies in how he critiques the relation between knowledge and life that underlies Kantian rationality. The latter¡¯s Critique of Pure Reason and Critique of Judgment represent life in the form of an exception: life is simultaneously included and excluded from understanding. Canguilhem¡¯s critique can be grouped into three main strands of argument. First, his reference to concepts as preserved problems breaks with Kant¡¯s idea of concepts regarding the living as a ¡®unification of the manifold¡¯. Second, Canguilhem¡¯s vital normativity represents life as the potential to resist normative orders that judge the living, relegating Kant¡¯s ¡®lawfulness of the contingent¡¯ to a ¡®mediocre regularity¡¯. Third, Canguilhem¡¯s introduction of the environment as a ¡®category of contemporary thought¡¯ decentres the living/knowing subject and introduces contingency. His idea of the ¡®knowledge of life¡¯ leads to the conclusion that life is the condition of possibility of rationality, rather than rationality¡¯s ¡®blind spot¡¯
%K Canguilhem
%K concepts
%K contingency
%K environment
%K Kant
%K normativity
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0263276417741674