Kant Definitions Flashcards
Importance of freedom or human autonomy with reason
If we are only motivated by our desires, we can never truly be free because our desires are controlling us - only when we act with reason do we act independent of the desires that we share with other creatures
Why does freedom guarantee morality
If we are not free, we cannot be held morally accountable, as you are controlled by your desires
Pietism
Kant parents were Pietists, emphasised moral life rather than rather than beliefs and practices
Deontological
Based on laws and rules
Absolutist
certain actions are always right or wrong irrespective of circumstances
Rationalism
knowledge can be gained from reason
Empiricism
knowledge can be gained from experience and observation
Human reason
a distinct faculty that is independent of the world of experience, and of our desires and nature - innate, filters that help us experience the world
The good will
Only thing in the world that can be taken as good without qualification - 100 percent purely good in and of itself
intrinstic goods
only good will - always good without qualification
‘good through its willing alone’
instrumental/extrinsic goods
good because of the outcome or results it leads to
what does the good will mean in practice
doing your duty - only the action which springs from duty can be classified as a moral act (how to know motive is pure)
in conformity with duty
action is not motivated by duty alone
from duty
when there is no empirical inclination, solely motivated by duty
The categorical imperative
supreme principle of morality - deontological guideline that tells me whether possible actions might be good - expressed by the command ‘i ought’
hypethetical imperatives
these state ‘you ought to do something if…you want to…’ - conditional on own individual self-interest or desires
maxim
underlying principle of action, source of motivation behind every action
formula of nature - first formulation
universability
‘act as if the maxim of your action were to become through your will a universal law’
contradictions of the laws of nature
self contradictory - logical definition ceases to exist
contradictions in the will
not contradictory in themselves, but are contradictory to the formula of nature - because no one could wish to see them universalised
formula of humanity - second formulation
‘act in such a way as you always treat humanity whether in your own person or on the person of any other, never simply as a means, but always at the same time as an end’
holy
moral law is holy - inviolable, cant be violated
humanity in his person must be holy to him
kingdom of ends - third formulation
‘a rational being must always regard himself as making laws in a kingdom of ends which is possible through the freedom of the will’
society crumbles if you treat one person as a means to an end - no longer a kingdom of ends
the summun bonum
the highest good - consists of two parts - virtue and happiness perfectly coincide - perfect state for Kant would be one in which humans are happy to the degree that they deserve to be happy (if all follow duty - reach summun bonum)
Postulates
we can never have knowledge of them, as we only know things through the lens of human experience - as ideas they have a functional and practical use
reasonable presupposition which has a direct impact on our moral choices and decisions
theoretical reason
what we employ to construct philosophical arguments and solve problems
practical reason
what we employ when we live day by day in the world, making practical decisions about how we should live and conduct ourselves
God - first postulate
God as an idea, as opposed to a reality - points towards the necessary compatibility between virtue as a motivating ideal and the practical realisation of the highest possible moral good
Immortality - second postulate
difficult for a man to be righteous without hope - guarantees this hope and ensures that there is a place sufficient for the reckoning of happiness in proportion to worthiness to be happy
all human experience is structured between
a gap between the way the world is, and the way we believe it ought to be
Freedom - third postulate
condition of the moral law which is within us - because of freedom that god and immortality can gain objective reality and legitimacy and subjective necessity
