THE THING IN ITSELF AS AN IMPASSE OF A DELIMIT A TION GESTURE

Abstract

Article tries to illustrate the impasse, which the thing in itself constitutes for the interpretation of Kant's philosophy as a delimitation gesture. For, if it is true, that in Kant's philosophy we have always a delimitation of two fields, and if it is true, that this delimitation is, although pressuposed, only a retroactive product, it seems, that there is at least one distinction, at least one example, in which this intepretation does not hold true - the demarcation between appearances and things in themselves. This demarcation is paradoxical, if we know that the first part, the appearance, is for Kant not disputable at all, while the second part, thing in itself, holds as something the most problematic in Kant's philosophy as a whole. As Kant's statements about thing in itself vary, it can be understood in various ways, but none of them is compatible with basic premises of Kant's theoretical philosophy and it seems, that Kant succeed to solve this impasse not earlier than in his last but unpublished work Opus Postumum.