Critique of Impure Reason: Horizons of Possibility and Meaning is a book by American philosopher Steven James Bartlett. A study of the limits of knowledge, reference, epistemic possibility, and meaning, it is the most extensive philosophical work by Bartlett to date.
In the book, Bartlett explains that by a "critique of impure reason" is meant a critique of the limitative boundaries beyond which concepts and claims lead to "impure reason," undermining the very conditions of their possible meaning. The central thesis of the book is that many major traditional philosophical problems can be solved in a rationally compelling manner once we recognize and rein in the many ways in which we seek to overstep these limiting boundaries. When we try to trespass beyond these boundaries, which the Critique of Impure Reason calls the "horizons" of reference, we employ concepts and make claims that violate the very conditions that must be granted for them to possess any possible meaning. The book's objective is to understand the unavoidable boundaries of the frameworks we use, and to help us to avoid conceptual confusions that come about when attempts are made to transgress beyond what is possible and meaningful.
Background
Previously published work by Bartlett leading to the Critique of Impure Reason
In the Critique of Impure Reason Bartlett builds on a series of previous publications by him that span a period of more than 50 years. Publications directly allied to the Critique of Impure Reason include:
Bartlett's doctoral dissertation A Relativistic Theory of Phenomenological Constitution: A Self-referential, Transcendental Approach to Conceptual Pathology. This work presents within a phenomenological framework a logically compelling method that makes it possible to identify and correct conceptual transgressions that are self-undermining. This is the first work in which Bartlett describes the project of a "critique of impure reason." Metalogic of Reference: A Study in the Foundations of Possibility, a monograph that translates Bartlett's earlier phenomenological analysis of conceptual transgressions into the more theoretically neutral terms of what he calls the metalogic of reference. A group of papers that apply Bartlett's method to identify, correct, and eliminate such conceptual transgressions; these papers include "The Idea of a Metalogic of Reference," "Phenomenology of the Implicit," "Self-reference, Phenomenology, and Philosophy of Science," "Hoisted by Their Own Petards: Philosophical Positions that Self-Destruct," and "Roots of Human Resistance to Animal Rights: Psychological and Conceptual Blocks," "Referential Consistency as a Criterion of Meaning, which develops and formulates Bartlett's self-validating method of analysis using the tools of mathematical logic. Later revised and elaborated in his Critique of Impure Reason. Conceptual Therapy: An Introduction to Framework-relative Epistemology, an introductory college text describing Bartlett's self-referential approach to conceptual analysis. Self-Reference: Reflections on Reflexivity, a collection, edited by Bartlett and Peter Suber with an Introduction by Bartlett, of invited papers that focus on issues and problems involving self-referential argumentation. Reflexivity: A Source Book in Self-Reference, a second collection of papers, edited by Bartlett with an Introduction by him, relating to self-reference. Two books in the field of clinical psychology which include applications of Bartlett's epistemological approach to conceptual pathology: The Pathology of Man: A Study of Human Evil and Normality Does Not Equal Mental Health: The Need to Look Elsewhere for Standards of Good Psychological Health.
Relationship to Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and to Kant's notion of a "negative science" Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, published in two editions, in 1781 and 1787, sought to provide a critique of the "faculty of reason in general," and by doing this it attempted to supply an analysis of the preconditions of experience and knowledge. In contradistinction, Bartlett's Critique of Impure Reason seeks to provide a critique of the unavoidable limitations of philosophically fundamental concepts that conflict with the preconditions of possible reference, meaning (philosophy), and knowledge. The latter task is essentially one of identifying, correcting, and eliminating the pervasive variety of conceptual error which it is the book's central purpose to analyze. It is this project which makes the book a critique of "impure reason" –- that is, reason that seeks to trespass beyond the limits of possible reference and meaning.