On Being a Self: The Individuality of Possibility and the Possibility of Individuality

art of Kant’s reason for writing the first Critique is to show the limits of theoretical reason; one of these limits is its inability to experience transcendence, to cognize supersensible objects, to intuit the sublime. But Kant doesn’t thereby want to make these experiences impossible—indeed, part of his reason for writing the second and third Critiques, along with such works as Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone, is to show how such experiences are possible. Kant locates the possibility of transcendence within his discussions of practical reason: Transcendence, impossible from a speculative point of view, becomes possible from a practical point of view. It is Kant’s analysis into this possibility that allows him to link the two halves of his dualistic self, and shows that transcendence, far from being impossible, is necessary to individuate a self.1 On Being a Self: The Individuality of Possibility and the Possibility of Individuality