Schools of Philosophy

Kantianism

KAHN-tee-uh-niz-uhm

Also Known As Critical Philosophy

Citation Formats

General Reference

Philosophy Atlas. "Kantianism." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/schools/kantianism.

APA Style

Philosophy Atlas. (n.d.). Kantianism. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/schools/kantianism

BibTeX

@misc{philosophyatlas-kantianism,
  author = {Philosophy Atlas},
  title = {Kantianism},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://philosophy.interactiveatlas.org/schools/kantianism},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

The school of thought built on Immanuel Kant's critical philosophy, which holds that human understanding actively structures experience through a priori forms and concepts. Kant's approach sought to synthesize rationalism and empiricism, and to show that scientific knowledge, morality and religious belief all rest on a single foundation: human autonomy, exercised within the limits of possible experience rather than beyond them.

Facts

Start Year

1781 1

Dated to the publication of the Critique of Pure Reason, conventionally taken as the founding text of Kant's critical philosophy.

Region

Prussia (Germany) 1

Cross-Tradition Connections