Baseline Document Post-Outline

Rhetorical Outline
Proposition: Kant's space argument benefit from a reconsideration in light of our modern understanding
of physics.
Audience: Someone who has read Kant's Critique of Pure Reason or at least is familiar with its
arguments. The paper assumes the audience is familiar with the style and conventions in philosophical
scholarship.
Goal: To recount for the reader Kant's space arguments and convince him that modern physics has
implications for their meaning and accuracy.
Plan: Go through the arguments themselves as Kant presented them, interspersing common criticisms
and commentary where appropriate.
Logical Outline
(Thus) Kant's space argument benefit from a reconsideration in light of our modern
understanding of physics.
(Given) Kant divides our interactions with objects into two categories, intuitions and
conceptions.
(Given) Kant argues that the fact that the only way we can represent objects as distinct from
ourselves is by representing them in space proves that we must already have a representation of
space itself.
(Given) Kant argues that space must be an intuition.
(Because) More rigorous formalisms of math have shown that the theorems of geometry are not
in fact synthetic.
(For Example) The use of isomorphisms to reduce geometry to set theory
(Because) General relativity has shown that space itself is not actually Euclidean.
(However) Kant's view can be saved by considering our perceptions as a Euclidean projection
of space, not space itself.