KANT (1724-1781)
I. BACKGROUND
A. Awakening by Hume
1. Hume's problem: whether the concept of cause is merely a fiction derived from a subjective instinct
a) Implications of problem: Newtonian science is irrational and unjustified
B. Problem of rationalism
1. Extend ideas beyond experience
a) Hume is correct in limiting investigations to experience
2. All a priori attempts at reaching the external world have failed
C. Critical philosophy
1. Uncover the rational foundation of certain experiences
2. i.e. how are mathematics, natural science, metaphysics, and morality possible
D. General terms
1. Sensibility: passive ability to receive impressions
2. Understanding: active power to form conceptual representations of objects
3. Representations: the contents of our mind (Hume's perceptions)
a) Pure intuitions (from sensibility)
(1) Space and time
b) Empirical intuitions (from sensibility)
(1) Sensations of red, warm, hard
c) Pure concepts (from the understanding)
(1) Straight, cause, substance, God
d) Empirical concepts (from the understanding)
(1) Cherry pie, otter, water, the sun
II. TYPES OF JUDGMENTS (about propositions)
A. Hume's division: matters of fact, and relations of ideas
1. This confuses an epistemological with a semantic issue
B. Epistemological: how we know things
1. a priori: without reference to experience
a) e.g. 7+5=12
b) Test: necessary and universal
2. a posteriori: by means of the senses
a) e.g. the door is brown
C. Semantic: the meaning of terms
1. Analytic: a denial yields a contradiction
a) e.g. all bodies are extended
b) Analytic statements are necessarily true or false (by definition)
2. Synthetic: judgments which do more than explicate a concept, add new knowledge
a) e.g. air has weight
b) e.g. every event has a cause
D. Combinations
1. Analytic a priori:
a) e.g. all bodies are extended, every mother has a child
2. Analytic a posteriori: empty
a) All analytic judgments seem a priori
b) If its truth can be known by seeing if its denial yields a contradiction, then experience does not need to be consulted
3. Synthetic a posteriori: most of our judgments
a) Water boils at 100
4. Synthetic a priori: judgments which add new knowledge without appealing to experience
a) Traditionally impossible: only experience could show that our nonanalytic ideas are true
b) Kant's examples
(1) All judgments of mathematics and geometry
(2) Natural science: every event has a cause
(3) Metaphysics: there is a God, the soul is distinct from the body
(4) Moral imperatives
c) Pure judgments
III. JUDGMENTS OF MATHEMATICS (pure intuitions of space and time)
A. General
1. Space and time represent the form of experience rather than its matter
a) Through them we structure sensory information
b) Space and time are a priori intuitions, or principles of pure sensibility
2. Primacy of space and time to any experience
a) Spacial and temporal predicates apply to all outer experiences
b) We cannot acquire ideas of space and time by reflecting on the given
(1) Any reflection presupposes space and time
B. Space (Euclidian geometry)
1. Geometry is the science of the pure intuition of space
2. Is necessary
3. Is synthetic
C. Mathematical judgments:
1. Are a priori (both necessary and universal)
2. Are synthetic
a) 5+7=12 is not simply a relation of ideas, but new information is added
D. Time:
IV. JUDGMENTS OF NATURAL SCIENCE (Categories)
A. Categories (metaphysical deduction)
1. Judgments of quantity (axioms)
a) Unity
b) Plurality
c) Totality
2. Judgments of quality (anticipations)
a) Reality
b) Negation
c) Limitation
3. Judgments of relation (analogies)
a) Inherence and subsistence (substance and accidents)
b) Causality and Dependence (cause and effect)
c) Community (reciprocity between agent and patient)
4. Judgments of modality (postulates)
a) Possibility-impossibility
b) Existence-non-existence
c) Necessity-contingency
B. Transcendental deduction
C. Schemata
D. Systematic representation of synthetic principles of pure understanding
1. Axioms of intuition
2. Anticipations of perception
3. Analogies of experience
4. Postulates of empirical thought
E. Phenomenal vs. noumenal world
1. Noumenal realm: transcendent, things in themselves
a) God, the free self, external objects
2. Phenomenal realm: immanent, transcendental
a) Consists of our experience: sensations organized by the pure intuitions of space and time and by the categories
V. JUDGMENTS OF METAPHYSICS (antinomies)
A. General
1. Traditional metaphysics attempt to uncover the noumenal
a) The attempt to get at things in themselves is "a natural and inevitable illusion"
B. Paralogisms (logical fallacies regarding the concept of the self)
1. The thinking self is a substance
a) We cannot find the self which is the subject of our experiences
b) There is a linguistic convenience in using the concept of "I" but it is only a formal marker, or indexical
2. The thinking self is simple
3. The thinking self is a person
4. The thinking self is the only reality (idealism)
C. Antinomies
1. Infinity of the world
a) The world has, as to time and space, a beginning
b) The world is, as to time and space, infinite
2. Simplicity vs. plurality of the world
a) Everything in the world consists of simple elements
b) There is nothing simple, but evertyhing is composite
3. Free will
a) There are in the world causes through freedom
(1) e.g. Descartes view that freedom is the exemption from causlaity
b) There is no freedom, but all is nature
(1) e.g. Hume's view that
c) Solution: in the phenomenal world, actions are understood according to the category of causality, but in the noumenal world, the category of causality does not apply
(1) "Causality through freedom is at least no incompatible with nature"
4. Necessary first cause
a) In the series of the world-causes there is some necessary being
b) There is nothing necessary in the world, but in this series all is contingent
VI. GROUNDWORK OF THE METAPHYSICS OF MORALS (judgments of morality)
A. Background
1. Rejection of empirical morality: looking at what people in fact consider good or bad
2. Attempt to find the foundation of morality in the legislation by pure reason
B. Preface
1. Ethical judgments are absolute, and thus imply necessity
2. Only pure reason can produce necessity
3. Therefore, ethics is founded on pure reason
C. Chapter I: Passage from ordinary rational knowledge of morality to philosophical
1. Only the good will (good intentions) is good in itself
2. Does not depend of deliberation
a) Deliberation can characterize good as well as evil people
3. Does not depend on consequences of actions
a) Even if actions are frustrated, it maintains full worth
4. Reason rules the good will
a) Nature made it that way simply to produce a good will
b) Not for adaptation or happiness, since instinct could do that
A. Chapter 2: Passage from popular moral philosophy to a metaphysic of morals
1. Imperatives and the will
a) The imperative is the command of reason which directs the will
(1) The will is determined by reason alone (i.e. the law, objective considerations, objective command), and not by impulses or subjective considerations
b) All imperatives are expressed by an "ought"
(1) Imperatives are only for human (or imperfect) wills
(2) God's will (which is perfect) takes the form "I will do X", not I ought to do X
2. Hypothetical vs. categorical imperatives
a) Hypothetical imperatives: If you want X then you ought to do A
(1) If you want the end, then it follows that you want the means
(a) The action is only a means for something else
(b) Depends on our desire for X
(2) Problematic (where X is a possible end)
(a) Rule of skill
i) Are technical
(b) e.g. being a doctor, being a musician, visiting China
(3) Assertoric (where X is an actual end)
(a) Rules of prudence
i) Are pragmatic
(b) e.g. Happiness (which is an actual end in all rational beings)
b) Categorical imperatives: You ought to do X
(1) May be termed "commands"
(a) Are moral
(2) Does not presume a desire for something else (i.e. are unconditional)
3. Knowledge of imperatives
a) Hypothetical problematic: analytic
(1) e.g. if you want to be a doctor, then one must acquire the skills of a doctor
b) Hypothetical assertoric: synthetic a posteriori
(1) Empirical recommendations of reason
(a) e.g. diet, frugality, politeness, reserve
(2) Experience shows that these contribute most to well-being on the average
c) Categorical: synthetic a priori
(1) Cannot be examined through experience
(a) No experience can show that the will is determined solely by reason, and not by some subjective factor
(2) We know the content of the C.I. before hand:
(a) "Act only on that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law
(b) Duty comes from the categorical imperative
4. [Types of duties]:
a) Perfect duties to oneself
(1) e.g. prohibition against suicide
b) Perfect duties to others
(1) e.g. prohibition false promises
c) Imperfect duties to oneself
(1) e.g. prohibition against neglecting one's talents
d) Imperfect duties to others
(1) e.g. prohibition against neglecting the welfare of others
5. First version: Act as if the maxim of your action were to become through your will a universal law of nature"
a) A procedure
(1) Take an action, and turn it into a rule
(2) See if it can be willed consistently as a universal law of nature
(3) If it can be willed consistently, then the action is moral
(4) If not, then it is immoral
b) Should not be interpreted hypothetically
(1) i.e. what would happen if everyone did that
c) Application to examples of the above four duties
(1) Suicide: a rule allowing suicide through self-love would have us continue and shorten our lives at the same time, which is contradictory
(2) Lying: a rule allowing the intentional violation of a promise would contradict the nature of the promise itself
(3) Squandering talents: a rule allowing us to squander talents could not be rationally willed, since as a rational being we will that our talents be developed
(4) Charity: a rule denying charity would deny love, and would thus be in conflict with our need for love
d) Regarding the possibility of exceptions to the C.I.
(1) To even suggest that there may be exceptions is to acknowledge the universality of the imperative
6. Second version
a) "Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means only"
(1) Based on the principle that rational nature exists as an end in itself
7. Third version
a) "Act always as if you were legislating for a universal realm of ends"
(1) Based on the principle that the will of every rational being is a will which makes universal law
(a) This is based in turn on the principle that only humans have dignity (from autonomy)
8. Motivations of the will
a) Autonomous (categorical), self-legislation
(1) Involves dutiful action which arises rationally
b) Heteronomous (hypothetical), subjective incentives
E. Chapter III: passage from a metaphysic of morals to a critique of pure practical reason
II. SUICIDE
A. Main point
1. Suicide is wrong because it degrades our inner worth below that of animals
B. Common justifications of suicide
1. Suicide is permissible as a matter of freedom, so long as it does not violate the rights of others
a) Based on autonomy
b) Crit: we may treat our body as we please, so long as our actions arise from motives of self-preservation
(1) Self-preservation is our highest duty to ourselves
2. Suicide may be virtuous
a) e.g. Cato, where his suicide is an attempt to preserve a symbol of freedom
(1) Cato, who was a symbol of resistance against Caesar, found he could no longer resist Caesar; to continue living a compromised life would disillusion advocates of freedom
(2) Crit: this is the only example of this sort
b) e.g. Lucretia, kills herself to preserve her chastity
(1) Crit: she should have fought, and died in the process
C. Arguments against suicide
1. Requirement for suicide
a) Intention is required
b) A death because of intemperance is not suicide
2. Consequentialist argument:
a) If a person is capable of suicide, then he is capable of any crime
(1) He who does not respect his own life cannot be restrained from the most dreadful vices
3. Argument from the inner worth of human life
a) People are entrusted with their lives which have a uniquely inherent value
b) The suicide makes himself a thing to be treated like a beast
c) He who is prepared to take his own life is no longer worthy to live at all
4. It is irrelevant to ask whether suicide is heroic or cowardly
a) Suicide has the appearance of virtue
5. Argument from religion
a) Suicide opposes God's purpose which is to preserve life
(1) "We have not right to offer violence to our nature's powers of self-preservation and to upset the wisdom of her arrangements
(2) God is our owner, and we are his property
b) God forbids suicide because it degrades our inner worth