Heidegger’s Transcendental Ontology and His Interpretation of Kant

Abstract

The transcendental thinking of Heidegger has its roots in his study of the medieval theory of ‘transcendentals’ during his Habilitation. By displacing the Aristotelico-Scholastic concept of ‘transcendentals’ from the realm of metaphysical speculation and replacing it with the context of Kantian transcendental philosophy and Husserlian phenomenology, Heidegger formed a project called ‘the explication of the transcendental horizon of time for the question of being’ in Being and Time. This point of view led him to a positive confrontation with Kantian thought. In this paper, we will investigate the traces of this transcendental thinking in Heidegger’s work, mainly based on his interpretation of Kant, and then explore the self-referential structure of transcendental imagination (Ein-bildungs-kraft), which makes the philosophical reflection in general possible through the medium of image (Bild).