Blackwell Reference Online

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see also analysis , judgement , rationalism , synthetic a priori judgement . The distinction between analytic and synthetic a priori judgements is central to Kant's theoretical philosophy and developed out of his early critique of the ‘rationalist’ philosophy of the Wolffian school. In the course of his exposure of this philosophy's shortcomings, Kant elaborated a distinction between analytic and synthetic judgements. The Wolffian philosophers treated all judgements as if they were analytical, whereas, Kant claimed, they were only a specific class of judgement which he contrasted with the distinct class of synthetic judgements. He noted later in P that ‘whatever be their origin or their logical form, there is a distinction in judgements, as to their content, according to which they are merely explicative , adding nothing to the content of the cognition, or ampliative , increasing the given cognition: the former may be called analytic , the latter synthetic , judgement’ (P §2). The main distinguishing feature of analytic judgements is that their predicates ‘belong to the subject … as something which is (covertly) contained in this concept’ (CPR A 6/B 10). The subjects of analytical judgements ‘contain’ their predicates, although covertly or ‘confusedly’. It follows from this basic characteristic that the act of making an analytic judgement adds ‘nothing through the predicate ... log in or subscribe to read full text