CHAPTER ONE
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the study
There was this case that happened in my village between two elderly men: Okoro and Okafor. In their previous quarrel some weeks ago concerning Okoro’s cassava that was eaten by Okafor’s goat. Okoro had told Okafor that he will see what will happen to that goat. After some days had past, Okoro passed through Okafor’s house and when Okafor learnt that Okoro passed though his backyard some hours ago, he rush to check his goat pen and saw that his goat was not there anymore. However, Okafor confronted Okoro and Okoro sworn that he didn’t even know what he was talking about. Meanwhile, when Okafor reported the case to the entire kindred, two persons came out as witness that they knew Okoro as someone who never fails to accomplish what he has threatened. Nevertheless, the person that stole the goat later confessed because there was a treat of laying a cause on whosoever that did it. So Okoro was vindicated. Thus, what actually struck about this case is where the problem of knowledge was demonstrated. What does it mean for someone to say that he knows and does he actually knows that what he thinks he knows? From where does that which he thinks he knows come from? Perhaps, this was the kind of problem philosophers actually encountered that lead some of them (Scepticism) to deny all forms of knowledge, some who accepted it said that it comes to us through reason (rationalism), while some as well hold that it comes to us through experience alone (empiricism).
Thus, against this background, this work aims at forming a balance between the rationalists and empiricists using Kant’s critical philosophy as a case study. However, still living in the tradition of the Philosophy of Consciousness since Descartes, Immanuel Kant was quite unique in that he attempted to synthesize the Continental Rationalism of Descartes-Spinoza-Leibniz and the British Empiricism...