In the preface to the second edition of the Critique of Pure Reason (B xvi), Immanuel Kant compares himself to Copernicus, who, failing to explain the heavens by assuming the stars revolve around the observer, tried making the observer revolve instead. Kant’s analogue: assume that objects conform to our cognition, and a priori knowledge becomes explicable.
The irony often noted: Copernicus displaced humanity from the centre; Kant’s “Copernican” turn puts the knowing subject back at the centre.
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