Kant's 'practical philosophy' comprehends a diverse group of his writings on ethics, politics, law, religion, and the philosophy of history and culture. Kristi E. Sweet demonstrates the unity and ...interdependence of these writings by showing how they take as their animating principle the human desire for what Kant calls the unconditioned - understood in the context of his practical thought as human freedom. She traces the relationship between this desire for freedom and the multiple forms of finitude that confront human beings in different aspects of practical life, and stresses the interdependence of the pursuit of individual moral goodness and the formation of community through the state, religion, culture and history. This study of Kant's approach to practical life discovers that doing our duty, itself the realization of our individual freedom, requires that we set for ourselves and pursue a whole constellation of social, political and other communal ends.
Late Kant Fenves, Peter
2003, 20040802, 2004, 2003-07-10, 2004-08-02, 20030101
eBook
Immanuel Kant spent many of his younger years working on what are generally considered his masterpieces: the three Critiques. But his work did not stop there: in later life he began to reconsider ...subjects such as anthropology, and topics including colonialism, race and peace. In Late Kant, Peter Fenves becomes one of the first to thoroughly explore Kant's later writings and give them the detailed scholarly attention they deserve. In his opening chapters, Fenves examines in detail the various essays in which Kant invents, formulates and complicates the thesis of 'radical evil' - a thesis which serves as the point of departure for all his later writings. Late Kant then turns towards the counter-thesis of 'radical mean-ness', which states that human beings exist on earth for the sake of another species or race of human beings. The consequences of this startling thesis are that human beings cannot claim possession of the earth, but must rather prepare the earth for its rightful owners.Late Kant is the first book to develop the 'geo-ethics' of Kant's thought, and the idea that human beings must be prepared to concede their space for another kind of human. It is essential reading for anyone interested in the later works of Immanuel Kant.
Kant's lectures on anthropology capture him at the height of his intellectual power. They are immensely important for advancing our understanding of Kant's conception of anthropology, its ...development, and the notoriously difficult relationship between it and the critical philosophy. This 2003 collection of essays by some of the leading commentators on Kant offers a systematic account of the philosophical importance of this material that should nevertheless prove of interest to historians of ideas and political theorists. There are two broad approaches adopted: a number of the essays consider the systematic relations of the anthropology to critical philosophy, especially speculative knowledge and ethics. Other essays focus on the anthropology as a major source for the clarification of both the content and development of Kant's work. The volume also serves as an interpretative complement to the translation of the lectures in the Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant.
Throughout his life, Kant was concerned with questions about empirical psychology. He aimed to develop an empirical account of human beings, and his lectures and writings on the topic are ...recognizable today as properly 'psychological' treatments of human thought and behavior. In this book Patrick R. Frierson uses close analysis of relevant texts, including unpublished lectures and notes, to study Kant's account. He shows in detail how Kant explains human action, choice, and thought in empirical terms, and how a better understanding of Kant's psychology can shed light on major concepts in his philosophy, including the moral law, moral responsibility, weakness of will, and cognitive error. Frierson also applies Kant's accounts of mental illness to contemporary philosophical issues. His book will interest students and scholars of Kant, the history of psychology, philosophy of psychology, and philosophy of action.
At the core of Kant's ethics lies the claim that if there is a supreme principle of morality then it cannot be a principle based on utilitarianism or Aristotelian perfectionism or the Ten ...Commandments. The only viable candidate for such a principle is the categorical imperative. This book is the most detailed investigation of this claim. It constructs a new, criterial reading of Kant's derivation of one version of the categorical imperative: the Formula of Universal Law. This reading shows this derivation to be far more compelling than contemporary philosophers tend to believe. It also reveals a novel approach to deriving another version of the categorical imperative, the Formula of Humanity, a principle widely considered to be the most attractive Kantian candidate for the supreme principle of morality. This book will be important not just for Kant scholars but for a broad swathe of students of philosophy.
Freiheit nach Kant analyzes Kant's conception of freedom from a historical and systematic point of view. It considers its position in the history of philosophy, its impact on German Idealism, and ...finally discusses the systematic relevance of Kant's theory.
Starting from Kant's striking question 'What is orientation in thinking?', this book argues that the main challenge facing global normative theorising lies in its failure to acknowledge its ...conceptual inadequacies. We do not know how to reason globally; instead, we tend to apply our domestic political experiences to the global context. Katrin Flikschuh argues that we must develop a form of global reasoning that is sensitive to the variability of contexts: rather than trying to identify a uniquely shareable set of substantive principles, we need to appreciate and understand local reasons for action. Her original and incisive study shows how such reasoning can benefit from the open-ended nature of Kant's systematic but non-dogmatic philosophical thinking, and from reorientation from a domestic to a non-domestic frame of thought. It will appeal to all those interested in global moral issues, as well as to Kant scholars.
