It is commonly claimed that Kant's critical philosophy aims to limit reason's speculative use and its metaphysical pretensions. This paper argues that such claims should be amended in light of a technical distinction between negative limits and positive boundaries that Kant held throughout his career. Kant's only extended discussion of this distinction appears in §§57–60 of the Prolegomena, a division entitled “On pure reason's boundary-determination”. I examine these sections in detail in order to elucidate the account of the limits and boundaries of the activity of different cognitive faculties in the Critique of Pure Reason. I argue that once we understand a key ambition of the Critique to be the positive determination of the boundary between objects of experience and things in themselves, we gain insight into the essential contribution that Kant's theory of the positive utility of ideas of reason makes to the critical philosophy.

中文翻译：

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康德关于限制、界限和观念的积极作用

人们普遍认为，康德的批判哲学旨在限制理性的思辨用途及其形而上学的主张。本文认为，应根据康德在其整个职业生涯中所持有的负界限和正界限之间的技术区别来修正此类主张。康德对这种区别的唯一扩展讨论出现在Prolegomena的§§57-60 中，该部分的标题是“论纯粹理性的边界确定”。我详细研究了这些部分，以阐明《纯粹理性批判》中不同认知能力活动的限制和界限的说明。我认为，一旦我们了解了《批判》的主要目标作为经验对象与事物本身之间界限的积极规定，我们深入了解了康德关于理性观念的积极效用的理论对批判哲学的本质贡献。