" A Community of Rational Beings " . Kant's Realm of Ends and the Distinction between Internal and External Freedom (original) (raw)
Related papers
Kant on the doctrines of virtue and right
Con-textos Kantianos: International Journal of Philosophy, 2018
A new book by Jeffrey Edwards Associate Professor of Philosophy, Stony Brook University (State University of New York) entitled Autonomy, in Moral Worth, and Right. Kant on Obligatory Ends, Respect for Law, and Original Acquisition has been published this year in the excellent Kantstudien-Ergänzungshefte series. The book incorporates some published materials from Edwards’ previous articles and anthology chapters but, at the same time, it makes a coherent unity aimed at investigation of the problems related to Kant’s practical philosophy and its relation to the history of modern ethics. The analysis of Kant’s last major work on ethics, Metaphysics of Morals of 1797, which forms the basis of that research, allows Edwards to unveil new implications and consequences of Kant’s theory of practical reason’s obligatory ends and his juridical theories of right and property. The book has got a clear structure of contents and is divided into four main parts: each one has got detailed divisions...
2003
This thesis examines the theoretical foundations of Kant's moral philosophy. I argue that Kant's moral ideal of a kingdom of ends is to be identified with the theoretical idea of a community, and that this idea can be traced back to the category of community introduced in his table of categories. In particular I argue that, for the mature Kant, (a) the only application of the theoretical idea of community is the moral idea of a kingdom of ends, (b) the only way we can conceive of a kingdom of ends is as a political community governed by juridical laws, and (c) the only way we can conceive of a member of a community is as an autonomous agent. To support my interpretation I show how an understanding of Kant's theoretical work on community and interaction helps us understand the motivation behind the theory of property Kant offers in the Metaphysics of Morals. In addition, I trace the development of Kant\u27s ethics back to his reading of Swedenborg in the early 1760s
The Unity of Kant's Practical Philosophy
The Unity of Kant’s Practical Philosophy, in: Beatrix Himmelmann and Camilla Serck-Hanssen (eds.), The Court of Reason. Proceedings of the 13th International Kant Congress, Berlin: de Gruyter 2021, pp. 1843-1852., 2021
This paper argues that Kant’s ethics and Kant’s philosophy of right are linked by a common normative idea. I argue that we find in Kant’s exposition of the basic normative principles in the Groundwork the resources for grounding his philosophy of right. More specifically, my point is that Kant’s conception of a realm of ends, as he develops it in the Groundwork, provides a common normative source for Kant’s ethical Categorical Imperatives, on the one hand, and the Universal Principle of Right, on the other. The agreement on common universal principles, as it is crucial for Kant’s notion of a realm of ends, yields, so my claim, a justification of the ethical Categorical Imperatives and the Universal Principle of Right. I develop this agreement-based justification in the form of a transcendental argument, thus aiming to show that it squares with Kant’s methodological approach in the Groundwork.
Right's Complex Relation to Ethics in Kant
Kant-Studien, 2016
The recent literature on the relation in Kant between duties of right and duties of virtue is dominated by a debate on whether duties of right can be derived from duties of virtue. According to one important argument, there is a tension or even a paradox in Kant between various claims concerning juridical norms, a paradox which can best be solved by assuming an “Independentist” position, that is, the view that the Universal Principle of Right is independent from the Categorical Imperative and, hence, that duties of right are normatively independent from duties of virtue. My claim in this paper is that the paradox which supports the independentist reading affects Kant’s claims only when the focus is on the subjective validity of duties. Once the focus is changed to objectivity validity, with which Kant is actually concerned, the paradox is dissolved and the Universal Principle of Right can appear as normatively dependent on the Categorical Imperative. In other words, in this paper, I argue that the scope of the paradox of juridical norms is confined to a specific focus and independentism (the view that duties of right are independent from duties of virtue) is confined in a similar way. Hence, the complexity of Kant’s account makes it possible for him to accommodate both independentist and dependentist views of the relation between right and virtue.
Right’s Complex Relation to Ethics in Kant: The Limits of Independentism
Kant-Studien, 2016
The recent literature on the relation in Kant between duties of right and duties of virtue is dominated by a debate on whether duties of right can be derived from duties of virtue. According to one important argument, there is a tension or even a paradox in Kant between various claims concerning juridical norms, a paradox which can best be solved by assuming an "Independentist" position, that is, the view that the Universal Principle of Right is independent from the Categorical Imperative and, hence, that duties of right are normatively independent from duties of virtue. My claim in this paper is that the paradox which supports the independentist reading affects Kant's claims only when the focus is on the subjective validity of duties. Once the focus is changed to objective validity, with which Kant is actually concerned, the paradox is dissolved and the Universal Principle of Right can appear as normatively dependent on the Categorical Imperative. In other words, in this paper, I argue that the scope of the paradox of juridical norms is confined to a specific focus and independentism (the view that duties of right are independent from duties of virtue) is confined in a similar way. Hence, the complexity of Kant's account makes it possible for him to accommodate both independentist and dependentist views of the relation between right and virtue. 3 Habermas, Jürgen: Between Facts and Norms. Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy. Cambridge, MS. 1996, 105-106. 4 Henceforth, the CI. I adopt here the increasingly standard convention of using capitals ("Categorical Imperative") to talk about the meta-principle which Kant suggests can test maxims of action and small ("categorical imperative") letter to refer to maxims that have passed the test. 5 Henceforth, the UPR. 6 Habermas, Jürgen: Between Facts and Norms. op. cit., 105-106. 3 | P a g e the application of the CI to actions characterised by free choice, externality and enforceability. On this account, therefore, the UPR depends on the CI. Consider now Paul Guyer's view: Strictly construed, the claim that Kant's principle of right is not derived from the Categorical Imperative, understood as the requirement to act only on maxims that can also serve as universal law, is correct because the principle of right […] does not concern our maxims at all. […] However, any broader claim that the principle of right is not derived from the fundamental principle of morality […] is surely implausible. 7 According to Guyer, a relation of simple dependence (such as that identified in Kant by Habermas) is not an accurate way of characterising Kant's position. For Guyer, the UPR cannot be derived from the CI, since, in addition to a limitation like the threefold qualification suggested by Habermas (free choice, externality and enforceability), in order to derive the UPR and juridical principles, we would need also to extend the CI and maxims so that they would no longer be strictly linked to ethical motivation, but they would allow both ethical and non-ethical motivation. 8 That is, given that the CI is supposed to help us test maxims (which include a principle of action and the motivation with which the action is to be performed), and given that juridical principles are not linked to specific motivations, the CI needs to be both extended and limited, in order to yield juridical norms: extended by having the requirement of ethical motivation removed, and restricted by certain 7 Guyer, Paul: "Kant's Deductions of the Principles of Right". In: Timmons, Mark (ed.), Kant's Metaphysics of Morals. Interpretative Essays. Cambridge. 2002, 26. 8 I am assuming here the limitation is applied to the norm, rather than the motivation with which the norm is acted upon. This is what Kant seems to suggest in places (for instance, MS, AA 06: 220.8-10). If the limitation is applied to both norm and motivation, then the result will not be much different: we end up with a juridical norm and an exclusively non-ethical motive; yet, the UPR and the juridical norms that are justified on its basis are not simply supposed to be acted upon on the basis of non-ethical motives: ethical motives would be equally appropriate. Hence, we would still need an extension of the range of motivations, in addition to the initial limitation, to get to the UPR and juridical giving of norms. For the sake of simplicity, I am going to ignore this additional complication in what follows, given that it is not going to affect my argument here.
2020
Review of: L. Krasnoff, N. Sánchez Madrid, P. Satne (eds), Kant's Doctrine of Right in the Twenty-first Century, Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2018.<br>