Description
In this study, I examine how Friedrich Nietzsche's definition of truth as a "moveable army of metaphors, metonymies, and anthropomorphisms" in "On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense" responds to Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. First, I evaluate the ways in which Nietzsche's trope of metaphor as a carrying-over critiques Kant's constitutive elements of cognition, demonstrating that the synthetic relationship between intuitions and concepts in cognition is neither a priori nor determinate. Second, I focus on how Nietzsche's trope of metonymy as an exchange of cause and effect responds to Kant's a priori concept of causality, illustrating that the idea of causality is not only developed a posteriori through lived-experiences, but also that Kant's synthetic judgments are merely a metonymic exchange from the concrete to the abstract. Third, I consider in what respects Nietzsche's trope of anthropomorphism as a peculiar synecdoche appropriates Kant's own subjectcentered idealism, accepting the limits of cognition yet arguing that we must overcome skepticism through art rather than faith. I conclude by suggesting how Nietzsche's appropriation, critique, and performance of Kant allow us to reconsider the relationship between rhetoric and philosophy beyond the conventional screen of conflict.
