Abstract

As is indicated by its ungainly title, this is a monograph devoted to the first published version of J. G. Fichte's transcendental philosophy, and specifically to what is certainly his most famous and influential work, the Grundlage der gesammten Wissenschaftslehre of 1794/5. Though few philosophical classics cry out more loudly for commentary and explication than Fichte's Wissenschaftslehre, Hohler's new book is neither a commentary nor an introduction. Instead, it is a detailed study of several closely related themes in Fichte's early writings. All of these themes revolve around the central problem of "subjectivity." The issues addressed include: What was Fichte's understanding of the goal and method of philosophy? What is the "starting point" of philosophy, and must it begin with an "intellectual intuition"? If so, what is the nature of this "intellectual intuition," and does this imply that everything is ultimately comprised within or deducible from some "absolute I"? What are the transcendental conditions for the possibility of experience, and what is the specific function of the transcendental imagination in the "constitution" thereof? How is the I related to what is not-I, and, more importantly, how is one I related to another?