Hilary Putnam and Immanuel Kant: Two 'Internal realists'?

Since 1976 Hilary Putnam has drawn parallels between his 'internal', 'pragm atic', 'natural' or 'common-sense' realism and Kant's transcendental ideali sm. Putnam reads Kant as rejecting the then current metaphysical picture wi th its in-built assumptions of a unique, mind-independent world, and truth understood as correspondence between the mind and that ready-made world. Pu tnam reads Kant as overcoming the false dichotomies inherent in that pictur e and even finds some glimmerings of conceptual relativity in Kant's propos ed solution. Furthermore, Putnam reads Kant as overcoming the pernicious sc ientific realist distinction between primary and secondary qualities, betwe en things that really exist and their projections, a distinction that haunt s modern philosophy. Putnam's revitalisation of Kant is not just of histori cal interest, but challenges contemporary versions of scientific realism. F urthermore, Putnam has highlighted themes which have not received the atten tion they deserve in Kantian exegesis, namely, the problematic role of prim ary and secondary qualities in Kant's empirical realism, and the extent of Kant's commitment to conceptual pluralism. However, I argue that Putnam's q ualified allegiance to Kant exposes him to some of the same metaphysical pr oblems that affected Kant, namely, the familiar problem of postulating an a bsolute reality (Ding an sich), while at the same time disavowing the meani ngfulness of so doing. In conclusion I suggest that Putnam might consider H egel's attempts to solve this problem in Kant as a way of furthering his ow n natural realism.