Evolution of V. N. Karpov’s philosophical ideas in the context of his critique of Kant’s “Pure rationalism”

The philosophy of Vasily Nikolaevich Karpov, Professor of St. Petersburg Theological Academy, is still insufficiently studied, as evidenced by ambiguous and sometimes contradictory research assessments. This observation, in particular, concerns the connection between Karpov’s philosophical ideas and Kant’s transcendental idealism. In addition, Karpov’s philosophy in the historic-philosophical resources is most often presented as a static system. The aim of the article is to demonstrate the evolution of the Russian philosopher’s gnoseological views drawing on the study of the degree of influence of Kant’s cognition theory on Karpov in different periods of his career. The methods used are conceptual analysis, historical reconstruction, asynchronous comparison and the hermeneutical method. Drawing on the analysis of Karpov’s works “Introduction to Philosophy” (1840), “Systematic Presentation of Logic” (1856) and “Philosophical Rationalism of Modern Times” (1860), it is shown that during his intellectual history starting in 1840, Karpov changed his attitude towards Kant from sympathy including elements of criticism to acute criticism and rejection. The discovered fact of evolution in Karpov’s views with respect to Kant not only reveals the dynamics of the Russian philosopher’s views in the theory of cognition and their historical conditionality, but also opens the perspective of further research of Karpov’s all philosophical heritage in an evolutionary perspective.