Kant and the Categories of Modality

The aim of this article is to analyse the theme of modality as a problem concerning the formation of judgments and categories. According to Kant’s Critique, every judgement is modal because in modality it is not the object to be judged, but a function, the judgment itself, its meaning, its value for the subject in the act of judging; thus, the modal judgment is not impure. The modal logical forms represent a eflection on the constituent functions of objectivity: the validity of the knowledge of the experience depends on this previous transcendental foundation. In this sense, the judgements of the class of modality have a gnoseological-epistemological function, namely a transcendental function. Modality (judgments, categories, schemas, postulates) attests how the composition of subject-predicate, their specific connection, is realized. The modal moment is thus a foundational moment in comparison with the other classes of judgment and with the conditions of experience in general. Kant gives the transcendental logic a foundational turn, which had not been recognized by formal logic. Critical ontology means namely to emphasizing the «relationship», that is the different way in which the same thing (phenomenon or noumenon) relates to the subject.