[PHILOS-L] Online Talk: Henny Blomme, Why does Kant begin the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science with a pre-categorical determination of matter? (19 March 2026, 12-14 CET)

[Tinca Prunea-Bretonnet]

Seminar of the Institute for Philosophy and Psychology, Romanian Academy

ONLINE TALK

HENNY BLOMME (Université libre de Bruxelles)

Why does Kant begin the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science with a pre-categorical determination of matter?

Thursday, 19 March 2026

12:00 - 14:00 CET

Link: https://meet.google.com/idm-boup-spy

(no registration required)

Abstract:  This talk examines Kant’s rationale for beginning the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (MAN) with a pre-categorical determination of matter rather than immediately with the dynamical forces of attraction and repulsion. While MAN is often read as a defense of a dynamical conception of matter, Kant’s introduction insists that the most fundamental determination of matter is motion. This raises the question: why not start a dynamical theory of matter with the dynamics-chapter in which the fundamental forces of matter are directly expounded?

     Whereas the Critique of Pure Reason (KrV) develops a general metaphysics of nature by articulating the a priori conditions of possible experience, MAN advances a special metaphysics of corporeal nature, which entails applying pure concepts of the understanding to an empirical concept, that of matter. The resulting tension – between a priori form and empirical reference – explains why Kant identifies motion as the most fundamental determination of matter: unlike force, which presupposes empirical derivation, motion is both constructible in the pure forms of intuition (space and time) and capable of grounding the mathematization of nature. Moreover, as the condition under which objects of outer sense can affect sensibility, motion schematizes the necessity of empirical affection and thereby provides an a priori expression of the empirical nature of matter.
      Drawing on debates in the secondary literature (Watkins, Friedman, McLear), the talk argues that Kant’s prioritization of motion reflects not a dogmatic assertion but a strategic move to secure the scientific status of physics as a proper science with a pure part. The conclusion suggests that motion functions as the mediating concept that anchors metaphysical determinations of matter both to the a priori structures of cognition and to the empirical conditions of experience.

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