Immanuel Kant

German philosopher (1724-1804)

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Lived 1724–1804, aged 80

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182 languages
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#51
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Era
1724–1804
Aged 80

Summary

Updated 2026-08-28

The Prussian professor who reframed how humans know anything at all — arguing that space and time aren't out there in the world but structures our minds impose, and that morality binds through reason alone, not divine command.

Biography

About

Born in Königsberg in 1724, Kant spent his entire life in the same Prussian city, lecturing and writing. In 1781 he published the Critique of Pure Reason, proposing transcendental idealism: we experience only appearances shaped by our own mental categories, never things as they are in themselves. He called it a Copernican shift — objects conform to our intuition, not the reverse. From there he built a system spanning ethics (the categorical imperative binding all rational agents), aesthetics (judgment detached from desire), and politics (perpetual peace through a federation of republics). He d…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant

said1785

...happiness is not an ideal of reason but of imagination, resting solely on empirical grounds.

— Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Ethics (1785), Second Section.

Immanuel Kant

said1780

Beneficence is a duty. He who often practices this, and sees his beneficent purpose succeed, comes at last really to love him whom he has benefited.

— Metaphysical Elements of Ethics (1780). Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott, translation available at Philosophy.eserver.org. From

Immanuel Kant

said1775

The wish to talk to God is absurd. We cannot talk to one we cannot comprehend — and we cannot comprehend God; we can only believe in Him.

— A lecture at Königsberg (1775), as quoted in A New Dictionary of Quotations on Historical Principles from Ancient and Modern Sources (1946)

Immanuel Kant

said1775

Religion is too important a matter to its devotees to be a subject of ridicule. If they indulge in absurdities, they are to be pitied rather than ridiculed.

— A lecture at Königsberg (1775), as quoted in A New Dictionary of Quotations on Historical Principles from Ancient and Modern Sources (1946)

Immanuel Kant

saidundated