ABSTRACT
There is no doubt that a number of historical influences have had an impact on John McDowell's ideas in Mind and World. McDowell claims that Kant's philosophy could offer valuable insights and that it should play an important role in any discussion of how thinking can relate to an external world. Kant and McDowell are both concerned with the limits of our knowledge although their ideas in this regard differ. Kant's main concern, as described by Patricia Kitcher, is that 'philosophy errs when it tries to draw metaphysical conclusions about the way the world is apart from our knowledge on the basis of epistemological arguments about how people do or must acquire knowledge of the world'. Kant and McDowell are in agreement on the cooperation between the faculties of sensibility and understanding that is required for knowledge. Kant's use of the transcendental, in McDowell's view, leads towards idealism which is quite contrary to his intentions.
