I have responded to the above critique of Kant but it had been ignored.
This OP is a ready reference and response to the above sort of bald claims.
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There had been many critiques and challenges to Kant's philosophies since it was first presented.
However, none in my knowledge had been able to refute [or debunked] Kant's concept of the illusory thing-in-itself.
While many critiques and challenges did open up new vista of knowledge for further deliberations, all the critiques against Kant's thing-in-itself are strawman[s].
Kant anticipated the following 'virus' pandemic,
Schopenhauer critiqued Kant's denial of the positive existence & knowability of the thing-in-itself and he postulated a Will-in-Itself.Even the wisest of men cannot free himself from them {the illusions - things-in-themselves}.
After long effort he perhaps succeeds in guarding himself against actual error; but he will never be able to free himself from the Illusion, which unceasingly mocks and torments him. CPR B397
Schopenhauer was infected with the thing-in-itself virus.
How?
Here's ChatGpt [with reservations] answer.
Others Kantians who had countered Schopenhauer;Yes, there have been Kantian scholars who have defended Kant's conception of the thing-in-itself against Schopenhauer's critiques. One notable defender is Henry E. Allison, a prominent Kant scholar. Allison has written extensively on Kant's philosophy and has engaged with Schopenhauer's criticisms.
In his book "Kant's Transcendental Idealism: An Interpretation and Defense," Allison provides a detailed defense of Kant's theory of the thing-in-itself. He argues that Schopenhauer's interpretation of Kant's thing-in-itself as the Will misses the mark and misrepresents Kant's philosophy. According to Allison, Kant's thing-in-itself is not a positive entity or substance, like Schopenhauer's Will, but rather a limiting concept necessary for Kant's critical philosophy.
Allison contends that Kant's thing-in-itself is a concept that signifies the limit of human cognition, beyond which we cannot have knowledge. It is not something that can be known or experienced directly, but rather a regulative principle that guides our understanding of phenomena. Allison emphasizes that Kant's aim was to establish the limits of human knowledge and to delineate the boundaries of what can be known through experience.
Furthermore, Allison argues that Schopenhauer's interpretation overlooks the crucial distinction Kant makes between appearances (phenomena) and things-in-themselves. According to Allison, Schopenhauer collapses this distinction and conflates the two, which leads to a misrepresentation of Kant's philosophy.
Other Kantian scholars have also engaged with Schopenhauer's criticisms, providing various interpretations and defenses of Kant's philosophy. However, Allison's work is particularly noteworthy for its thorough and detailed examination of Kant's transcendental idealism and its defense against Schopenhauer's critiques.
References:
Henry E. Allison, "Kant's Transcendental Idealism: An Interpretation and Defense" (Yale University Press, 2004).
Henry E. Allison, "Kant's Transcendental Idealism and Empirical Realism" (Oxford University Press, 2004).
Henry E. Allison, "Kant's Theory of Freedom" (Cambridge University Press, 1990).
Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi: In his "Letters on the Doctrine of Spinoza," Jacobi criticized Schopenhauer's interpretation of Kant and argued that Kant's concept of the thing-in-itself was not intended to be a mysterious unknowable entity but rather a placeholder for the limits of human knowledge.
Eduard von Hartmann: In his "Philosophy of the Unconscious," Hartmann attempted to reconcile Kant and Schopenhauer by suggesting that the unconscious Will described by Schopenhauer was the same as the thing-in-itself described by Kant. However, this interpretation was not widely accepted.
Hermann Cohen: In his "Kantian Idealism," Cohen focused on defending the transcendental nature of Kant's philosophy against Schopenhauer's more empirical approach. He argued that Schopenhauer's Will-in-itself was a flawed attempt to conceptualize the thing-in-itself.
So do not just throw in an unsupported statement against Schopenhauer and hope to get away with it.