(Kant’s Moral Law)

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The book is composed of two extended articles by the foremost interpreters of Kant, Konrad Cramer and Michael Wolff. It presents the moral law as a basic principle of Kant’s practical philosophy. The meaning of the moral law is interpreted and it is shown in what sense it is more fundamental than the categorical imperative. The book also provides an explanation of what Kant has in mind when he says that consciousness of the moral law may be called a fact of reason.

(Disease of the Epoch or Healing Provocation? Scepticism in Post-Kantian Philosophy)

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The present collection of essays is devoted to the debate about the new scepticism, which emerged in Germany as immediate response to Kant's critical philosophy. Sceptical doubts of Maimon and Schulze opposed the Kantian claim that it is possible a priori to determine the nature of experience and the conditions of its possibility. Reinhold defended Kant against such criticism, but modified his claim. This debate inspired Fichte, Schlegel and later Hegel to develop their own philosophy.

(Image, Self-Consciousness, Imagining)

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This volume of the Fichte-Studien (Fichte-Studies) presents Fichte's conception of image in systematic connection with his science of knowledge and its development. The papers focus on the topics of image, imagination and self-consciousness both from the perspective of transcendental philosophy and from the perspective of the philosophy of the absolute.

(Ludwig Wittgenstein. Philosophical notes)

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A commented Czech translation of the key text of Wittgenstein's 'middle' period introducing discussions of his post-Tractarian conception of language, his project of 'phenomenology' and philosophy of mathematics.

(The Spirit of the Laws II. The Defence of the Spirit of the Law)

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The volume contains the translation of the second part of the Spirit of the Laws (1748, books XX-XXXI), summary of the book from the jansenist magazine Nouvelles ecclésiastiques (1749), Montesquieu's Defence of the Spirit of the Laws (1750), Censorship proposition of Sorbonne's Theological Faculty (1752) and Montesquieu's Answers and Explications for the Sorbonne Theological Faculty (1753). The second part of the Spirit of the Laws is translated from the post-mortem edition of the Spirit of the laws (1757), all other texts follow the new edition of Montesquieu’s complete works. Translation is accompanied by translator's note, explanatory notes and index. None of these texts was ever published in Czech language.

(Thomas Reid. A short Companion)

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The book presents a short introduction into few selected points of Reid's philosophy as a first attempt at a standalone book on Reid in Czech. After brief summary of his life and work it examines Reid's critique of Hume. The third chapter considers the central concept of Reid's philosophy: common sense. The last chapter presents Reid's aesthetics in its immediate historical and systematic context. Reid's philosophical system includes surprisingly sophisticated aesthetic theory as an integral part of his epistemology.

(Modern University. Ideal and Reality)

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The present publication contains contemporary studies as well as classical texts on the idea of the University in German philosophy. The individual chapters deal with the birth of Humboldt’s ideal of university in the 19th century, the politisation of universities in Germany during the Nazi era, and their later democratisation after the Second World War. The studies and the texts defend the basic assumption of the institution of university, viz. the idea that education should serve primarily the spiritual development of individual understood in terms of humanist ideals.

(Realism and Relativism)

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The book tracks the tensions between realism and constructivism in the works of Willard Quine, Hilary Putnam, Donald Davidson, Nelson Goodman and Richard Rorty. Although the author favors realism, the arguments of the aforementioned philosophers provoke him to take anti-realist stance seriously, though he ultimately rejects it. As the book unfolds, the following questions, amongst others, are raised: Depends the existence of giraffes on people? Created Goodman the "worst argument in the world"? Can we observe the world from the perspective of the God's eye? Can we put off all concepts and words? Is one capable of mapping the surrounding world exactly?

(The "Middle" Wittgenstein: the way to phenomenology and back again.)

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The book examines some of the key issues which exercised Wittgenstein during his 'transitory period', and tracks their transformation so as to find the roots of the pragmatic and holistic turning away from the Tractarian philosophy of language.

(Freedom and Cultivation in Hegel)

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Chotaš co-edited the volume and prepared it for publication. Karásek contributed to it.

For Hegel, the term 'Bildung' (culture/cultivation) refers to the formative self-develop ment of mind or spirit (Geist), regarded as a social and historical process. Bildung is part of the life process of a spiritual entity: a human being, a society, a historical tradition. As such it is therefore also a process of liberation, in which the freedom of spirit is vindicated over the mere positivity of what is given in nature.