The Formality of Kant's Logic and Consciousness of Logical Laws

In this essay, I examine how Kant understood the formality of pure general logic, which he takes to be the distinctive feature of this science. According to Kant this formality is grounded in his conception of the faculty for thinking as the faculty that contributes the form to cognition. I argue that for Kant, pure general logic is formal cognition or formal philosophy because it studies the laws of thinking that make thinking what it is, as thinking. I investigate how we should understand this task of pure general logic by proposing two plausible interpretations of it. On the first more Fregean proposal, pure general logic makes distinct the concepts , , and , while on the second less Fregean proposal, it merely articulates the system of the laws that govern material cognitions in virtue of their form, or what they are as thoughts. Ultimately, I argue that the crux of the difference between these proposals comes down to how they understand Kant’s conception of consciousness or awareness (Bewußtsein), which is “a representation that another representation is in me” (JL, 9:33). According to the more Fregean proposal, this is a higher-order representation. According to the less Fregean proposal, consciousness is the form of the original representation – what makes the representation what it is. I argue that ultimately Kant’s system of logic dissolves on the more Fregean interpretation, and that the less Fregean proposal is truer to Kant.