Kant and Medical Philosophy.

Antonio Palomo-Lamarca*

One of the most recognized neo-Kantians in his book on the philosopher of Königsberg made the following intriguing observation:

“…Heilsberg depicts how Kant and he, together with a third young friend, Wölmer, had attended a lecture by Franz Albert Schultz, Kant’s former teacher at the Fridericianum, and had so distinguished themselves through their interest and understanding that Schultz called them to him at the close of the last class and inquired about their personal situations and plans. When Kant replied that he wished to be a doctor, while Wölmer confessed himself a jurist, Schultz further demanded to know why in that case they listened to theological lectures, a question Kant answered with the simple phrase: ‘out of intellectual curiosity’.”[i]

            There are only a few passages in which Kant directly talked about Medicine, except those in which he confronted it.  Kant’s opinion about the medical field was based primarily on his way of seeing the world and its annexed sciences.  This way of seeing was chiefly settled by his moral convictions, which in most instances came from the Pietistic sect of Protestantism.  It is curious that Kant developed his moral theories after debating the celestial research and writing on Physics and Mathematics. His moral theories are a continuation of his system of the world (physics), and morality plays the principal role in its development. Yet, how he thought was deeply connected with his moral theories about the origin of illness.  This connection appears in the categorical imperative (Kategorish Imperativen) as a pharmakon.   Nevertheless, the power, independence and strength of the mind was dreadfully bigger than that of the body.  In few words, the task of the mind was to prevail over and to discipline the body.  Discipline (Disziplin) was considered by Kant a path of controlling (Zwang) sensations. This German term implicitly carries the meaning of ‘force’ in the Kantian sense that our will must force our mind to control those appetites, indeed a complete and superb awareness about our inclinations, and how to master them.  In order to pursue such an objective Kant tried to weave what he called Transcendental Philosophy (Transzendentalphilosophie).  He openly discussed these sorts of convictions in his work The Conflict of the Faculties  (Der Streit der Fakultäten), in which we find a whole chapter discussing such matters.[ii]  Therefore, and mainly for that preoccupation with mind percussion over body, we can consider Kant the modernizer of what is called Psychosomatic Medicine today.  It is possible to say that the moral feeling (sittliches Gefühl) is clearly a mental state for Kant, more specifically as he called it “a mental attitude.”  Human beings are capacitated to see the world as it is in its reality, but only after purifying themselves by means of the Moral Law. When a human being/animal is watching the world, he only perceives appearances (Phaenomena).  To not accept and to not practice the Moral Law means to not understand how the world operates and to be exposed to illness and suffering.  The Moral Law must be put in practice by doing righteous acts, without expecting anything back as a reward.  In this sense, as Kant himself explained, looking for a reward in an after-death paradise is the most poisonous dart against the Moral Law, which will lead to further entrapment in suffering.  A man receives a reward as soon as he conforms to the Moral Law—just for the sake of being virtuous—and willingly this action is converted into duty. 

Kant, for some reason, turned himself toward the School of Philosophy, although as a secondary means he was related not only to Medicine, but also to Physics, Chemistry, etc. He was considered a prophet of “positivism” and empiricism, when in fact he was not at all a person of experimentation.  Kant never did a single experiment related with Physics, Chemistry or Mechanics, but he wrote about the method used in those fields and how to improve them.  In regard to Medicine, Kant made auto-experimentation—if one can term it that—testing himself in Conflict of the Faculties, such as he himself stated.  His critical method arrives to the creed of believing all externality as an appearance:

“…we know objects only in so far as we are affected externally, we must also confess, with regard to the internal sense, that by means of it we intuite ourselves only as we are internally affected by ourselves; in other words, as regards internal intuition, we cognize our own subject only as phenomenon, and not as it is in itself.”[iii]

            The Kantian method of science is a method of putting the possibilities of knowledge into a gap- of wondering about what I can know and what I can expect.  Kant is closest to Freud and to the Freudian method of science; that is, to the current and accepted scientific method[iv].  Therefore, keeping in mind that Freud is not considered a “scientific doctor” and that the Freudian method is very akin to the Kantian method, it could be deduced that Kant is not a scientist either. 

            It could be stated that Kant not only had an interest in the medical literature of his times, but that he also tried to make his own contributions to the arena.  Ethics and illness might be further studied in our cultural environ, where due to our modern style of living, we are all exposed to the dangers of stress and modification of behavior; which is commonly a product of our ethical conduct.  On the other hand, the so-called Kantian morality is a clear approach to a healthy way of living.  Indeed, in few words Kantian morality is a path into safety—a condensed corpus of ethical directions in order to gain equilibrium between our soul and body.  Perhaps we might arrive at this balance through a clear authority by means of discipline or one that we may title a medical philosophy. 

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Última modificación:Jueves, 10 de Junio de 2004