READING THE MARK OF THE MARK, OR “THE FALSE SUBTLETY OF THE FOUR SYLLOGISTIC FIGURES”

This paper explores the technical and philosophical contributions of Kant’s sole essay on formal logic, reconstructing the subjects that it treats, the arguments that it advances in their relations to their near and more distant precedents, and the unexpected direction toward which it tends. Although in appearance little more than a Scholastic exercise in the art of thinking, Kant’s essay, with a final turn, brings into focus what will become a crucial question in his mature work: that of the “mysterious power … which makes judging possible.”.