Abstract

Kant describes his philosophy as ‘startling’, and admits that it leaves unsatisfied, an ‘inextinguishable yearning’, which suggests that deflationary interpretations of him are unlikely to be wholly accurate. Ignorance of things in themselves, or humility, follows from the receptivity of knowledge, according to Kant, and this has exegetical and dialectical implications. Exegetically, one may pursue Kant's reasons for humility in territory somewhat remote from the famous but well‐trodden arguments of the Aesthetic and Analytic. Dialectically, there is a broader threat to philosophy's epistemological ambition, if Kant is right; perhaps any philosopher who accept the uncontroversial thesis of receptivity are faced with the possibility that we are ignorant of things in themselves.