thing-in-itself

American  

[thing-in-it-self] / ˌθɪŋ ɪn ɪtˈsɛlf /

noun

Kantianism.

things-in-themselves plural

1. reality as it is apart from experience; what remains to be postulated after space, time, and all the categories of the understanding are assigned to consciousness.

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thing-in-itself British  

noun

1. (in the philosophy of Kant) an element of the noumenal rather than the phenomenal world, of which the senses give no knowledge but whose bare existence can be inferred from the nature of experience

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thing-in-itself Cultural  

1. A notion in the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. A thing-in-itself is an object as it would appear to us if we did not have to approach it under the conditions of space and time.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• things-in-themselves
  plural

Etymology

Origin of thing-in-itself

1650–60; translation of German Ding an sich

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

thing-in-itself things-in-themselves

Most often we end up smothering the plain eloquence of the thing-in-itself under a pile of metaphors.

From Scientific American ● Oct. 9, 2015

He sees his farm simply as an ideal place to watch life in its essentials and to try a thing-in-itself way of conveying this — which he considers a new kind of realism.

From New York Times ● Jul. 3, 2011

That the will as such is free, follows from the fact that, according to our view, it is the thing-in-itself, the content of all phenomena.

From The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) by Schopenhauer, Arthur

In order to disown these forms Kant has directly expressed them even in abstract terms, and distinctly refused time, space, and causality as mere forms of the phenomenon to the thing-in-itself.

From The World As Will And Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) by Schopenhauer, Arthur

It is true that Kant did in some respects fail to maintain the idealistic position with the clearness of Berkeley; but his shortcoming was not in affirming a thing-in-itself beyond phenomena.

From Schopenhauer by Whittaker, Thomas

They seem to be in a realm of things-in-themselves.

From Creative Intelligence Essays in the Pragmatic Attitude by Bode, Boyd H.

It would still remain possible for other methods of approach than this transcendental pragmatism, for instinct, perhaps, or for revelation, to bring us into contact with things-in-themselves.

From Winds Of Doctrine Studies in Contemporary Opinion by Santayana, George

What things-in-themselves are like we have no means of knowing; we know only things as they appear to us.

From An Introduction to Philosophy by Fullerton, George Stuart

This outside world is constructed by him from the contents of the inside sounds, which differ as widely from things-in-themselves as language, the symbol, must always differ from the thing it symbolizes.

From An Introduction to Philosophy by Fullerton, George Stuart

They are turned from their historical meaning and presented as unalterable and sacred things-in-themselves.

From Dictatorship vs. Democracy (Terrorism and Communism) by Trotzky, Leon Davidovich