ABSTRACT
Much of Immanuel Kant philosophy was devoted to taking rival systems of thought and rooting out the inveterate assumptions. In attempting a reconciliation, Kant developed a philosophical system of breathtaking depth and power. Indeed it enabled him at the same time and in much the same way to arbitrate between the rationalists and the empiricists. Kant's greatest contribution towards an understanding of the infinite was a particular conception of how the metaphysically infinite and the mathematically infinite were related to each other. This had its roots in something that has emerged: Kant's belief, human rationality not with standing, in his own metaphysical finitude. Kant's metaphysically infinite whole was thus presenting itself with a mathematically infinite aspect. The fact that the metaphysically infinite had to be presented to us with a mathematically infinite aspect in the way described meant that the framework within which were given things had to be itself in some measure mathematically infinite.
