Person attributes
Other attributes
Martin Knutzen (14 December 1713 – 29 January 1751) was a German philosopher, a follower of Christian Wolff and teacher of Immanuel Kant, to whom he introduced the physics of Isaac Newton. Biography
Martin Knutzen was born in Königsberg (the present Kaliningrad) in 1713.
Knutzen studied philosophy, mathematics and physics at the University of Königsberg (the present Kaliningrad), gaining his M.A. degree in 1733 with Dissertatio metaphysica de aeternitate mundi impossibili[3] and becoming a Professor Extraordinary of logic and metaphysics there in 1735 on the basis of his 1734 doctoral thesis Commentatio de commercio mentis et corporis per influxum physicum.[4] A follower of Christian Wolff, in the rationalist school, Knutzen was also interested in natural sciences, and taught physics, astronomy and mathematics, besides philosophy. The study of the doctrines of Newton induced him to question Leibniz' and Wolff's theory of pre-established harmony, defending the concept of mechanical causality in the movement of physical objects; his lessons on the matter would influence the later work of Kant, who sought to reconcile the autonomy of the spiritual with the reality of the mechanical in the Critique of Judgement.
Knutzen would be an important figure in the formation of his Königsberg University students Immanuel Kant and Johann Georg Hamann[2] (proponent of the Sturm und Drang literary movement).
Knutzen died in Königsberg in 1751.
