International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 43: 133148, 1998. c 1998 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

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Hume and Kant on knowing the deity

BERYL LOGAN
University of Toronto, Canada

I have found it necessary to deny knowledge in order to make room for faith (Immanuel Kant)1

In the opening paragraphs of Section 57 of the Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics On the determination of the bounds of pure reason, Kant makes reference to Humes Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion as an illustration of what might result if we conceded no things in themselves or set up our experience for the only possible mode of knowing things : : : [which would] have the principles of the possibility of experience considered universal conditions of things in themselves,2 Regarding the way possible experience is conditioned as the way things in themselves are conditioned (making the principles of possible experience transcendent) results in skepticism: everything that transcends experience is worthless as it is unknowable. Just as he sought to relieve the skepticism that he saw resulting from Humes analysis of causality, so too in x57 ff. Kant seeks to relieve the skepticism with respect to the knowability of the Supreme Being that he perceives in Humes work. Kant suggests that noumena, as that which are presupposed in all possible experience and through which reason achieves the satisfaction and completeness not available in phenomena, are found in the void, beyond all experience. He then asks What is the attitude of our reason in this connection of what we know with what we do not, and never shall, know? (P: x57, 113) How does reason approach the unknown and unknowable world of noumena when reason is applicable only to the known and knowable world of phenomena? In this and the following sections, Kant intends to show how a connection is possible between these two worlds, by means of such concepts as express their relation to the world of sense, and he will use the notion of the Supreme Being as an example, as a concept that may be thought, if not known. In this paper I will address the arguments that Kant uses to show the way in which we can think but not know the Deity, and how Kant thinks his

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arguments combat the skepticism that he nds in Humes arguments in the Dialogues. Kants reading of the Dialogues as negative and skeptical is in accord with that generally adopted in the Hume literature, but by offering my own account of the belief that is expressed in the Dialogues I show that for Hume as well, the Deity is ultimately unknowable as it is not an item of knowledge. However, Kants means of relieving this ignorance is quite unHumean, as Humes means is quite unKantian. Kant would appear to have had a more substantial acquaintance with Humes Dialogues than with Humes other texts. A German edition of the Dialogues was published in 1781, two years after the initial publication of the Dialogues in English. In addition to referring to Humes arguments in the Prolegomena, Kants knowledge of this text is clearly evident in his Lectures on Philosophical Theology.3 He refers there to objections raised by Hume against inferring that an intelligence is responsible for purposiveness in nature (what Kant calls the physicotheological proof, which makes use of experience of the present world in general and infers from this to the existence of an author of the world and to the attributes which would belong to its author as such).4 I Kant begins Section 57 of the Prolegomena, On the determination of the bounds of pure reason, by opposing two absurdities, or contradictions. The rst has two parts: rst, it would be contradictory to think that we can know anything more about an object than belongs to the possible experience of it. That is, we can only have experience of objects through the forms of intuition of space and time, and we can only know them as phenomena, as they appear to us as objects of sensory experience. We can never know any object independent of or outside of space and time, or as something other than a sensory experience. Then, of course, we can have no knowledge of how any object that is outside of space and time and sensory experience can be or whether or not it is determined by its own nature in the way that the objects of sensory experience are determined by the a priori principles. This sets the boundaries of our knowledge, but objects are not limited by the ways in which we are able to know them. Bounds : : : always presuppose a space existing outside a certain denite place and enclosing it; limits do not require this, but are mere negations, which affect a quantity, so far as it is not absolutely complete (P: x57, 111). Completeness, things in themselves, lie beyond the boundary. The second contradiction occurs when reason regards our way of knowing things as being the only way of knowing. The objects of possible experience

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must be intuited in space and time; as conditioned, they are limited to being experienced in these ways. This is a contradiction, because things in themselves or noumena, which must exist for it to be possible to have experience of phenomena, would no longer be things in themselves but would be objects of possible experience. It would be contradictory to regard things in themselves as objects of reason (the role of reason being to apply the synthesis of representation to its objects). And, it would be presumptuous of us to declare that the means by which empirical objects are known intuited in space and time conditioned by the principles of possible experience is the only way any things, including things in themselves, can be known. Unless reason is the object of a careful critique (P: 110) (an examination of the objects and limits of reason), it may transcend the empirical use of the concepts go beyond that to which they are by nature applicable - and attempt to similarly limit things in themselves, i.e., know them as objects of experience.5 The principles or conditioning concepts are valid only as they are applied to the undistinguished manifold of perceptions, and the limits of reason lie in its application of just these principles to just this manifold of perceptions. The limits inherent in the principles and our reason (valid only as applied to possible experience) must not be taken to indicate the limits of things in themselves, which would make them unknowable because they cannot be known by our way of knowing. Things in themselves are not objects of possible experience, and thus are not knowable by the means that such objects are known. If this means is regarded as the only way of knowing then these objects are unknowable. It is the claim that there is only one way of knowing which Kant is concerned with. And Kant regards Humes Dialogues to be an example or illustration of this contradiction: Our principles, which limit the use of reason to possible experience, might in this way become transcendent, and the limits of our reason be set up as limits of the possibility of things in themselves (as Humes Dialogues may illustrate) : : : . (P: x57, 110) I will now show why Kant regards the arguments of the Dialogues to be an illustration of his point, and how he combats the perceived skepticism of the Dialogues. In this section I will adopt Kants view of the Dialogues, that Hume takes only a critical position, and draws only a skeptical conclusion. II In the Dialogues, Cleanthes presents the anthropomorphic Argument from Design that draws analogical inferences regarding the nature of the Deity from what is found in experience. He argues that the intelligence and benevolence of the Deity, the cause, can be inferred from what we nd in the world, the effect. This position assumes that reason can achieve results in natural

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theology by using the same methods that it would apply to an empirical investigation. For example, I can infer by an analogical argument that if I buy a new car that is similar to my old car, and if I know from experience that my old car uses x litres to drive y kilometers, then my new car will do the same. In the same way, Cleanthes says, I can infer by an analogical argument that as we know from experience that a machine or human artifact that has certain features was designed by a being with intelligence, that the world, which has similar features, was also designed by a being with intelligence. As the effects resemble, the causes also resemble, in proportion to the complexity, or grandeur, of their effects: as the universe, the effect, is vastly greater and more complex than a computer or a sewing machine, their designers, or causes, are proportionately different only in greatness a difference of degree, not kind. The thrust of Philos (Humes) criticisms of the Design Argument is that nothing can be inferred about the nature of the cause, the Deity, by examining the effect, the world. Philo shows Cleanthes that the methods he is using are applicable only to empirical investigation, and not to objects that lie beyond the limits of human experience.6 So long as we conne our speculations to trade, or morals, or politics, or criticism, we make appeals, every moment to common sense and experience, which strengthen our philosophical conclusions and remove (at least in part) the suspicion, which we so justly entertain with regard to every reasoning, that is very subtile and rene. But in theological reasonings, we have not this advantage; while at the same time we are employed upon objects which, we must be sensible, are too large for our grasp : : : . We are like foreigners in a strange country to whom everything must seem suspicious, and who are in danger every moment of transgressing against the laws and customs of the people with whom they live and converse. We know not how far we ought to trust our vulgar methods of reasoning in such a subject : : : . (D: 101) As a result of the inability of the experimental, or empirical, method of reasoning, i.e., making general inferences drawn from the data of experience, to know anything about what is not an object of sense experience, no determinate conclusion with respect to the Deitys intelligence, benevolence, or mode of existence may be drawn. This position is an illustration of Kants point in the following way. Kant had stated that a contradiction results if reason, the means by which we know sensible objects, applies itself to objects beyond its proper application (i.e., to sensible objects only) to objects that are not sensible, and proceeds to claim that as such means cannot know these objects, the objects cannot be known. This regards the way of knowing

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sensible objects to be the only way of knowing at all. So, if Hume concludes that the experimental method fails with respect to the Deity because the Deity is not part of the data of experience, this leaves him with only one position in natural theology that of skepticism. No other way of knowing, in any sense, is available. As the appropriate way of applying the experimental method to the Deity is by analogy from what is known, and since what is known is the human world of sense and experience, then any claims about the Deity must be anthropomorphic. Kant argues that for Hume theism and anthropomorphism are inseparable, such that if anthropomorphism falls so does theism. As Humes arguments in the Dialogues devastate anthropomorphism, theism vanishes. Kant thus proposes a third way, one that preserves theism and combats Humes skepticism by proposing a non-anthropomorphic analogical argument through which we may think the Deity. The series of arguments in sections 57, 58 and 59 leads to this proposal. Kant brings the contradictions from earlier paragraphs of x57 to bear on the concept of the highest being. Natural theology leads reason to the objective boundary of experience on our side of the boundary is the world of phenomena, of appearances, of experience. At that boundary, reason connects experience with that which lies beyond that boundary, in the world of things in themselves, which are not objects of experience but which are the grounds or conditions of experience. Hume is left on our side of the boundary, limited to experience alone, unable to make the connections with what would give perceptions an objective ground. He is thus left with skepticism with respect to anything beyond perceptions. Natural theology is : : : a concept on the boundary of human reason, being constrained to look beyond this boundary to the idea of a Supreme Being (and, for practical purposes, to that of an intelligible world also), not in order to determine anything relatively to this pure creation of the understanding, which lies beyond the world of sense, but in order to guide the use of reason within it according to principles of the greatest possible (theoretical as well as practical) unity. For this purpose we make use of the reference of the world of sense to an independent reason, as the cause of all its connections. Thereby we do not purely invent a being, but, as beyond the sensible world there must be something that can only be thought by the pure understanding, we determine that something in this particular way, though only of course according to analogy. (P: x59, 118119)

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This quote alludes to a distinction drawn by Kant in the Preface to the Second Edition of the CPR between thinking an object and knowing an object.7 He states there that while we cannot know these objects as things in themselves, we must yet be in a position at least to think them as things in themselves. Without being able to think of things in themselves as things in themselves, i.e., that there are things in themselves, we should be landed in the absurd conclusion that there can be appearances [phenomena] without anything that appears [noumena]. In a footnote, Kant explicates this distinction: To know an object I must be able to prove its possibility, either from its actuality as attested by experience, or a priori by means of reason. But I can think whatever I please, provided : : : my concept is a possible thought. (That is, it contains no contradictions.) Thinking an object does not answer for there being : : : an object corresponding to it(CPR B xxvii). To know an object is to determine or condition it, i.e., to know the conditions under which it is an object of possible experience, or to know the concepts under which it is subsumed. (As the contradictions discussed earlier show, though, such knowledge of things in themselves is not possible as they are not able to be either determined or conditioned.) While we think the possibility of such a Being, we are not merely inventing it,8 as it would be absurd to claim that there are connections in the world of the senses without there being a cause of those connections. So we look beyond the boundary of what we can know (the objects of possible experience), to think the idea of a Supreme Being, but anything we may say about that Being can only be accomplished by analogy. According to Philos critical arguments, neither reason nor experience can achieve anything that is useful for religion. According to Kant, though, while reason is limited to objects of possible experience, its limits are only boundaries beyond which lie things in themselves. Kant thinks he can save theism by pushing possible experience to the boundary and making a connection between possible experience and the Deity as a thing in itself. The analogy that he proposes does not depend upon the similarities of objects being compared. Rather, Kant employs what he calls symbolic anthropomorphism, which concerns language only and not the object itself (P: x57, 115). It is a way of thinking and talking about the Deity that reects the relationship between the sensible world and the Deity without purporting to describe the Deity. As a thing-in-itself, the Deity is unknowable. It is the point of connection between the worlds of phenomena and noumena. This symbolic anthropomorphism is established by an analogical argument that is relational rather than descriptive, i.e., it intends to establish similar relations between items, not to describe the items. It does not allow us to have knowledge of a thing-in-itself, something which Kant believes we are unable to do, but it does allow us to think and talk about the Deity through terms and

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relations that are within the scope of our knowledge; we are describing what our experience is like for us and speaking about God in those terms that are knowable by us. When we speak of, and reason about, God in these terms, we are not describing what God is like nor are we drawing any conclusions about God as God as a thing-in-itself. God as a thing-in-itself is unknowable as a thing in itself. Further, this analogy does not mean, as is commonly understood, an imperfect similarity of two things, but a perfect similarity of relations between two quite dissimilar things (P: x58, 115). Dogmatic anthropomorphism, such as that employed by Cleanthes in the Dialogues, attributes to the highest being in itself those properties through which we think objects of experience. A standard analogical argument infers a missing feature on the basis of the similarity of the items being compared. Car X has features (a) standard transmission, (b) V-6 engine, and (c) for every litre of gasoline, it travels 20 kilometers. If Car Y has features (a) and (b),then we can infer that it will also have feature (c). The two cars being compared exhibit relevantly similar features, and on the basis of this relevant similarity a conclusion may be drawn with respect to the missing feature. The two items being compared are placed in that comparison on the basis of their similarity, and the conclusion draws its strength from the degree (and relevance) of that similarity. There is a justication, based on similarity, for placing these two items in the relationship and inferring the presence of the missing feature. This is the form of argument utilized by Cleanthes. Kants analogical argument, on the other hand, is not based on similarity of features of the items compared, but on their relationships: : : : I can obtain a relational concept of things which are absolutely unknown to me. For instance, as the promotion of the welfare of children (= a) is to the love of parents (= b), so the welfare of the human species (= c) is to that unknown in God (= x), which we call love : : : (P: x58, 115116). Making this relational claim does not infer that the Deity is or is not intelligent, or if it is intelligent that the Deitys intelligence is anything like human intelligence. It only determine[s] it as regards the [sensible] world and therefore as regards ourselves. When we speak of the world as being intelligently ordered, we say much about ourselves in the world of phenomena when we speak of God being in a relation (one we can understand) to us like the relation of parent and child, but we say nothing of God. The predicates that we attribute to God in this way are thus determined subjectively for us and by us. They are not determined objectively this is what God is like as is the case in the standard argument. If I say that we are compelled to consider the world as if it were the work of a Supreme Understanding and Will, I really say nothing more than that as

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a watch, a ship, a regiment bears the same relation to the watchmaker, the shipbuilder, the commanding ofcer as the world of sense (or whatever constitutes the substratum of this complex of appearances) does to the Unknown, which I do not hereby cognize as it is in itself, but as it is for me or in relation to the world of which I am a part. (P: x57, 115) This, according to Kant, saves theism by freeing it from its dependence upon anthropomorphism, as it is not an anthropomorphic analogy. It makes no claim, as Cleanthes argument does, as to what are the nature or features of the Deity, and whether they in any way resemble those of humans. This kind of reasoning about God, in the face of our inability to know things-in-themselves is conned to the reasoning we are entitled to undertake: the Deitys features and existence is not directly knowable as our consciousness of all existence : : : belongs exclusively to the unity of experience : : : any existence outside this eld, while not indeed such as we can declare to be absolutely impossible, is of the nature of an assumption which we can never be in a position to justify (CPR: 506). Any reasoning about religious matters can and must take place only within the realm of sensous experience. The analogy that we are entitled to employ i.e. one that makes reference only to our experience and what humans are like and not what God is like can, however, make no anthropomorphic claims, as the concept of God must be carefully puried and freed of all such human ideas; from a practical point of view, though, we may momentarily represent God using such predicates whenever by this means the thought of God affords more power and strength 9 : : : . Thus our reasoning about God (and religious matters) is conned to our reasoning about any other matter: it can only refer to the world of experience. Through the symbolic anthropomorphism we indulge in this practical representation to speak of God as we speak of humans, that God loves humans in the way that a parent loves her child. But this reasoning is not knowing God as a thing-in-itself something we cannot do it is rather reasoning about our world and experience, and when we speak about God we (can only) speak in these terms. The unknowability of things-in-themselves precludes us from supposing, or reasoning, that how we speak and think about God is saying something about what God is like. Religion (as the recognition of all duties as divine commands10) is still, however, within the limits of reason. Reasons recourse to the objects of sense establishes the relation in the analogy as it applies to sensible objects, i.e. parental love for children. But this analogy only serves to make perceptual, in the interests of practicality, what is invisible: But we cannot know anything at all about supernatural aid whether a certain moral power, perceptible to us, really comes from above or, indeed, on what occasions and under what conditions it may be expected.12

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Religion must remain within the limits of reason, as applicable to and referring to, only the objects of experience. We approach the limits of this reasoning when we refer to God, as a concept lying beyond the boundary between phenomena (benevolence, intelligence, etc. as they apply to humans) and noumena (God as thing-in-itself) through the symbolic anthropomorphic analogy. But reason would be going beyond its limits if it thought it could apply these phenomena to God to say what God is like. God is not directly knowable, and is not related to the world or its inhabitants in any vital way; the anthropomorphic representation of God and Gods being, is harmless enough (so long as it does not inuence concepts of duty).12 But what can be known, and what is within reasons limits, is the recognition of our duties and the laws. The representation of God through the relational, symbolically anthropomorphic analogy, plays a practical role in making visible what is invisible. In the next part of this paper, I return to Philos claims in the Dialogues to show that he too expresses a non-anthropomorphic belief in a Deity, and that his role is more than just that of critic. III The purpose of the Dialogues, as stated by Pamphilus in the Introduction, is not to establish the Deitys existence, which is self-evident, but only to address the issue of the Deitys nature. Cleanthes claims to know the Deity by inference from the data in the world, while Demea (and Philo) maintain that the Deity is mystedously adorable. According to Cleanthes arguments, the orderliness and purposiveness of the world allow us to infer that the Designer of the world has an intelligence that is like the intelligence of the designers of orderly and purposive objects (machines or human artifacts) in the world. In Parts 4 to 8, Philo shows that the claim that the designer of the world is intelligent like humans are intelligent is only one of a number of hypotheses that are possible when inferring from the data in the world, including the conjecture that there is more than one designer, and that an anthropomorphic Deity is not like a Deity at all.13 In Part 9, Cleanthes shows, in answering Demeas a priori argument, that the necessity of the Deitys existence cannot be established. In Parts 10 and 11, he shows that the data or evidence in the world permit only the inference that the Deity is not benevolent and/or malevolent, but is indifferent. In Part 12, Philo sums up these claims by stating that while there is some analogy between the effects (human artifacts and the world) and the causes (humans and the Deity) it is very remote one. All that results from an argument like Cleanthes is the claim that the cause or causes of order in the universe

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probably bear some remote analogy to human intelligence, but alleges that the argument is too weak to provide any basis for religious belief. It warrants only philosophical assent to its legitimate conclusion, as the argument outweighs the objections. While earlier in Part 12 Philo had stated That the works of nature bear a great analogy to the productions of art is evident : : : . No man can deny the analogies between the effects: To restrain ourselves from enquiring concerning the causes is scarcely possible: From this enquiry, the legitimate conclusion is, that the causes also have an analogy : : : , this is, I submit, Philo admitting simply that there is some analogy, and that it is reasonable to draw the conclusion. The weakest analogy is still a legitimate inference: if I infer from the fact that one pair of size 8 1 shoes ts that all 2 other size 8 1 shoes will t, I am drawing an analogical inference, even though 2 it may be a very weak one because I am inferring from one case to many cases. The issue is whether or not this constitutes Philos expression of belief, and I would urge that it does not.14 It is merely what Philo refers to in the penultimate paragraph of Part 12 as the plain philosophical assent that the inquisitive person would give to the proposition as often as it occurs and the only belief that arises from this assent is the belief that the arguments, on which it is established, exceed the objections, which lie against it : : : . In Part 5, Philo tells Cleanthes that one who follows your hypothesis, is able, perhaps, to assert, or conjecture, that the universe, some time, arose from something like design: But beyond that position he cannot ascertain one single circumstance : : : (D: 131). Philo claims in Part 2 of the Dialogues that while we can use words to describe the Deity, such as intelligent, wise, benevolent, we should not think that the words we use actually do refer to or accurately describe the characteristics or features of the Deity:
:::

we ought never to image that we comprehend the attributes of this divine Being, or to suppose that his perfections have any analogy or likeness to the perfections of a human creature. Wisdom, thought, design, knowledge these we justly ascribe to him because these words are honourable among men, and we have no other language or other conceptions by which we can express our adoration of him. But let us beware lest we think that our ideas anywise correspond to his perfections, or that his attributes have any resemblance to these qualities among men. (D: 108)

In sum, in spite of arguments to establish the Deitys nature, reason cannot in the end determine anything about the Deitys nature. We cannot say that a human-like intelligence is the cause of the world, that this cause is benevolent, or that its existence is necessary. It is not possible to establish conclusively anything about a God who [does] not discover himself immediately to our senses. We may use the words intelligent, benevolent, necessary, but

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we cannot claim that they accurately describe the Deity. Humes position is, then, that we cannot know the Deity, i.e., grasp the Deitys nature, by utilizing the experimental method. This critical stance is not, however, Humes nal word in the Dialogues. It may, though, be the nal suspense of judgement one faces when one applies reason to issues of natural theology. It is my position that Philo (and Hume) presents a positive statement of belief, and for this belief the Deity is likewise unknowable. Throughout the Dialogues, Philo has taken a consistent position: while Cleanthes had maintained that the Design Argument constituted proof of the Deitys existence and the Deitys similarity to humans (thus allowing the Deity to be comprehensible), Philo shows Cleanthes that in fact the only position tenable in natural theology is a suspense of judgement.15 This is hardly satisfactory to be religious belief, as Philo further notes: the contemplative person feels some contempt of human reason if all it can produce is such a weak argument, and the most natural sentiment which a well disposed mind will feel on this occasion, is a longing desire and expectation for some resolution of this position of profound ignorance. The failure of the Design Argument to produce any denitive conclusion leads the inquisitive thinker to seek a further revelation in nature. Early in Part 12 Philo states that the striking appearances in nature prevent one from doubting a supreme intelligence; that all a divine Being need do is copy the present economy of things; render many of his artices so plain, that no stupidity could mistake them; A purpose, an intention, a design strikes every where the most careless, the most stupid thinker; and no man can be so hardened in absurd systems, as at all times to reject it (D:172). That is, Philo would say: Look round the world, look at the wonderful variety and exact propriety, look at the whole face of nature, how can one be so obstinate as to deny that there is a supreme intelligence. I would argue that these claims of Philos are the result of an irregular argument like the one that Cleanthes utilizes in Part 3: such arguments appeal to the sentiments, to the imagination and emotions rather than to reason; they contravene accepted rules. The model for such arguments in literature is some forms of poetry. Rather than conform to accepted or established patterns of rhyme and metre, many poems in fact lack both these features. Their construction is meant to evoke vivid imagery and incite passions. Likewise, the irregular argument in natural theology does not make a reasoned inference from the evidence (the effect) to the Deity (the cause), as does the Design Argument. (In fact, in Part 2, Philos initial criticisms of this argument focus on its lack of adherence to the requirements for analogical arguments, relevant similarity and repeated experience, and that it commits the fallacy of

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composition16). Philos irregular argument, expressed in the above passages as well as at the conclusion of the penultimate, and crucial, paragraph of Part 12,17 give rise to a belief in an intelligent designer that is not based on any inference from the evidence or effect to the cause: it is drawn, quite simply and quite irresistibly, when one is confronted with the very numerous (so many that no human nature can compute their number) and forcible (so that no understanding [can] estimate their cogency) facts in nature. The force of this argument is not drawn from the inference from effect to cause by analogy. One is struck or impressed with great force by the facts of nature, and cannot hesitate a moment concerning the cause of it all.18 What is important to note for our purposes is that it makes no claim as to the nature of the Deity, that the Deity has this or that feature that is comprehensible to us because it is similar to us. We are by nature irresistibly and inextricably drawn towards the belief in a Supreme Being to which we pay profound adoration whenever we contemplate the complexities of nature. I will now focus the interesting similarity that has emerged from our discussions of Hume and Kant on the Deity. IV We saw in a previous section that for Kant we cannot know the Deity, as knowledge requires both a concept and a sensuous intuition, and as the Deity is part of the noumenal world, such intuition is not possible. We may think about the Deity, by drawing analogies to relationships that are knowable in the phenomena world, and represent the invisible through the visible in the interests of practicality. So when we talk about certain features of the Deity, we are really only talking about what holds in the sensible world of experience, and we are not truly describing the Deity. Further, for Hume, the experimental method fails in its attempt to establish that the Deity has the features of intelligence, necessary existence, and benevolence. The Deity remains mysteriously adorable, and while we can use words such as wisdom or benevolence when we speak about the Deity, we cannot presume that these words actually describe the Deity. We may be irresistibly drawn to acknowledge a designer of the world, but we can say nothing that would claim to describe that Deity.19 Now that we have shown the arguments presented by Hume and Kant that are concerned with the knowability of the Deity, we can see the similarity in their positions. And this similarity is that, ultimately, the Deity is unknowable by reason, and that any way we may come to speak about the Deity says much about us and nothing about the Deity. For both Hume and Kant, this lack of knowledge derives from the fact that the Deity is not an object of (possible)

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experience, and the only way we have to refer to or speak about the Deity is by our words that are applicable only to the objects of experience. Humes criticisms of what Kant calls dogmatic anthropomorphism, and its claims as to what the Deity is indeed like, show the failure of this position. The evidence does not allow for the conclusion Cleanthes seeks, given that any number of claims as to the nature of the cause are possible, and that an anthropomorphic Deity is like no Deity at all. While the empirical method is applicable to the objects of sense experience, it is not applicable to objects beyond sense experience. As a Kantian thing in itself, a concept beyond the phenomenal world, the Deity is not knowable for Kant either. Any religious reasoning must remain within the limits of reason alone, so any religious reasoning must be conned to the objects of the senses. The religious reasoning that directs us to the recognition of our duties must occur absent of knowledge of God. We carry out what we know to be our duty independent of our knowing the inuence of God on our morality, or whether God approves. Knowledge requires both concept and sensible intuition, and the latter is lacking in this case. So for both Kant and Hume, given the means by which knowledge is gained for each, we are left eager to seek some other way to approach the Deity. But the way that they each relieve this lack of knowledge is quite dissimilar, reecting their substantially divergent epistemological commitments. Kant seeks to alleviate the lack of knowledge by use of a symbolic anthropomorphic analogy. As an object that lies beyond possible experience, no method or faculty or principle that is appropriate for inferring, grasping, or ordering sensory experience is useable. We cannot know the Deity as a thing in itself, but we can think the Deity through what we can know in the sensible world, and this is done via symbolic anthropomorphism. (I can obtain a relational concept of things which are absolutely known to me : : : ) Without knowledge of the Deity, we cannot say that the Deity is intelligent, benevolent, loving, but we can think about the Deity as caring for us or as being intelligent through a relational analogy with what we can know about what caring and intelligence mean for us. And through the representation of God made visible through this analogy, we picture to ourselves our duty in the service of God, a means which, although really indispensable, is extremely liable to the danger of misconstruction; for, through an illusion that steals over us, it is easily held to be the service of God itself : : : .20 Any reasoning refers only to the world of experience, for us and by us, and not to the world of the Deity.21 Hume alleviates the lack by claiming we have an irresistible urge, or sentiment, to acknowledge a Deity whenever we contemplate the complexity and order in nature. It is impossible, in the face of nature, to maintain a position

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of skepticism with respect to the Deity. Science regards nature as being purposive and intentional; scientists always seek a use or purpose for a newly identied organ or canal, and they are faced with the wonderful variety and exact propriety, suited to the different intentions of nature, in framing each species. If even Galen could not withstand such striking appearances; to what pitch of pertinacious obstinacy must a philosopher in this age have attained, who can now doubt of a supreme intelligence? (D: 173). No anthropomorphic claims, no analogical arguments, no inferences from experience we are simply struck with the force of the appearance of nature: a Deity who does not present itself to the senses could do no more than render many of his artices so plain, that no stupidity could mistake them.22 Kant claims that Humes criticisms of Cleanthes analogical argument presented in Parts 2 and 48 in the Dialogues do not touch us. Not only do some arguments not affect Kants claims, but this relational analogical argument provides an answer to one of the requirements for analogical arguments: that of similarity between items compared. A strong (or indeed any) analogical argument must compare similar items and any dissimilarity weakens the argument. Philo claims that the world (universe) and machines are too dissimilar to permit an analogical inference of any strength. Kants symbolic anthropomorphism is immune to this criticism, as lack of similarity of objects is irrelevant, only similarity of relationship is relevant.

Conclusion According to Kants understanding of Humes Dialogues, which regards it to be a critical work that devastates theism by devastating anthropomorphism, skepticism is the only position possible given Humes arguments in the Dialogues. Hume has substituted skepticism for dogmatism. But Kant thinks theism can be preserved by symbolic anthropomorphism which does not oblige one to attribute any particular properties to the Deity. He has replaced objective anthropomorphism (which makes claims about the nature of the Deity), with symbolic anthropomorphism (which does not). By focusing on Philos positive expressions of belief in the Dialogues, I would urge that a similarity exists between Kants symbolic anthropomorphism and Philos irresistible belief in that, for both, we do not describe what the Deity is really like, we only talk about the Deity in words that are familiar to and meaningful for us, that serve a practical purpose, and talk about what our world is like. It is about our language and our world, not about the object.

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1. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, trans. N.K. Smith (Macmillan, 1929), B xxx. 2. Immanuel Kants Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics in Focus, ed. Beryl Logan (Routledge, 1996), p.109. Further references to the Prolegomena will be given in the text by P followed by section and/or page number. 3. See Lectures on Philosophical Theology, trans. Allen W. Wood and Gertrude M. Clark (Cornell University Press, 1978). Kant also refers, approvingly, to Humes Natural History of Religion in these lectures. 4. Ibid., pp. 3132. 5. For in order to arrive at [transcendent] insight [reason] must make use of principles which, in fact, extend only to objects of possible experience, and which, if also applied to what cannot be an object of experience, always really change this into an appearance, thus rendering all practical extension of pure reason impossible (Critique of Pure Reason, Preface to Second Edition, B xxx). 6. Let us become thoroughly sensible of the weakness, blindness, and narrow limits of human reason: Let us duly consider its uncertainty and endless contrarieties, even in subjects of common life and practice : : : , David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, ed. Tweyman (Routledge, 1991), p. 98. Further references to this text will be given in the body, by D, followed by page number. 7. See also the following references in the CPR: To think an object and to know an object are thus by no means the same thing. Knowledge involves two factors: rst, the concept, through which an object in general is thought (the category); and secondly, the intuition, through which it is given (B 146); If I remove from empirical knowledge all thought (through categories), no knowledge of any object remains (A254/B310). 8. While elaboration on this point is beyond the scope of this paper, some Hume commentators argue that the belief in an intelligent designer is a natural belief, like the beliefs in causality, the external world, and the self. In all four cases, there is no sense perception of the objects of any of these beliefs, and so they are regarded as ctions, although we are determined by nature to hold these beliefs. So, we are not merely inventing the objects of these beliefs, as we do with some truly ctitious ideas (like civilizations on other planets or my dream house), but they are necessary to make our perceptual experiences connected and coherent. In my A Religion Without Talking: Religious Belief and Natural Belief in Humes Philosophy of Religion (Lang, 1993), I argue that the belief in an intelligent designer is indeed a natural belief. 9. Kant, Lectures on Philosophical Theology, p. 128129. 10. Kant, Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone, Greene & Hudson edition (trans and intro. T.M. Greene and H.H. Hudson, Harper Torchbooks, 1960). 11. Ibid., p. 179. 12. Ibid., p. 156. 13. See Philos arguments in Parts 4 and 5 of the Dialogues on the inconveniences of anthropomorphism. An anthropomorphic Deity, and a Deity with human-like qualities, would be nite, faulty, multiple, etc. 14. In general, commentators regard this paragraph to constitute Philos confession of belief, that it constitutes an about face for Philo, that in spite of his criticisms the Argument from Design is all we have to ground religious belief and/or that the weakness of the analogy is an expression of Humes atheism. See for example, T. Penelhum, Natural belief and religious belief in Humes philosophy, Philosophical Quarterly 33 (1983): 166181; Nelson Pikes edition of the Dialogues; G. Priest, Humes nal argument, History of Philosophy Quarterly 2 (l985): 349351; W. Austin, Philos reversal, Philosophical Topics 13 (1985): 103112.

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15. With respect to the Deitys intelligence, this position is achieved at the end of Part 8; with respect to the modality of the Deitys existence, in Part 9; and with respect to the Deitys benevolence in Part 11. The nal statement of this position is found in the ambiguous, undened proposition, that the cause or causes of the universe may bear some remote analogy to human intelligence. 16. Thought, design, intelligence, such as we discover in men and other animals, is no more than one of the springs and principles of the universe, as well as heat or cold, attraction or repulsion, and a hundred others, which fall under daily observation. It is an active cause, by which some particular parts of nature, we nd, produce alterations on other parts. But can a conclusion, with any propriety, be transferred from parts to the whole (Dialogues, p. 113, italics added). 17. But believe me, Cleanthes, the most natural sentiment, which a well disposed mind will feel on this occasion, is a longing desire and expectation, that heaven would be pleased to dissipate, at least alleviate this profound ignorance [the nal suspense of judgement], by affording some more particular revelation to mankind : : : person, seasoned with a just sense of the imperfections of natural reason, will y to revealed truth with the greatest avidity : : : That is, a suspense of judgement is not a possible position to maintain in natural theology, as Cleanthes and Philo agree early in Part 12; the well-disposed mind (one that recognizes the order and design in nature and seeks original rather than immediate causes) seeks to alleviate this ignorance that results from the failure of reason to provide clear arguments and looks to nature (heaven) for guidance. This well-disposed mind will be drawn irresistibly to acknowledge an intelligent designer in the same way that one cannot hesitate to ascribe an intelligent cause to the Articulate voice or to the living books (Part 3). 18. See Humes Dialogues, Part 3. 19. For the full arguments on which these points rely, see my The irregular argument in Humes Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Hume Studies, November 1992, pp. 483500; and my A Religion Without Talking. 20. Kant, Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone, p. 180. 21. In the Introduction to Religion Within the Limits, Greene writes as follows regarding Kants sense of cosmic mystery. The starry heavens in their incalculable immensity, the inescapable nitude of all human cognition, the paradox of artistic genius, the sublimity of the moral law, the bafing complexity of life and human consciousness all this awakens in Kant a spirit of reference : : : It is perhaps signicant that his friend and biographer, Jachmann, was able to testify that, during all Kants destruction and construction of proofs of Gods existence, and in the presence of every intellectual doubt, he was ever convinced in his heart that the world is in the hands of a wise Providence; that, in private conversation with his friends, the philosopher and the man spoke out in undeniable testimony to an inner feeling and genuine conviction [of Gods existence] : : : , pp. xxviiviii. 22. This is, I argue in my A Religion Without Talking, the belief in an intelligent designer expressed as a natural belief. See note 8, this paper.

Address for correspondence: Professor Beryl Logan, Department of Philosophy, University of Toronto at Scarborough, Scarborough, Ontario, Canada M1C 1A4 Phone: (416) 287-7167; Fax: (416) 512-9426; E-mail: logan@scar.utoronto.ca