Edited by Richard McKeon, with an introduction by C.D.C. Reeve Preserved by Arabic mathematicians and canonized by Christian scholars, Aristotle’s works have shaped Western thought, science, and religion for nearly two thousand years. Richard McKeon’s The Basic Works of Aristotle—constituted out of the definitive Oxford translation and in print as a Random House hardcover for sixty years—has long been considered the best available one-volume Aristotle. Appearing in paperback at long last, this edition includes selections from the Organon, On the Heavens, (...) The Short Physical Treatises, Rhetoric, among others, and On the Soul, On Generation and Corruption, Physics, Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, Politics, and Poetics in their entirety. (shrink)

The Metaphysics of Morals is Kant's major work in applied moral philosophy in which he deals with the basic principles of rights and of virtues. It comprises two parts: the 'Doctrine of Right', which deals with the rights which people have or can acquire, and the 'Doctrine of Virtue', which deals with the virtues they ought to acquire. Mary Gregor's translation, revised for publication in the Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy series, is the only complete translation of the (...) whole text, and includes extensive annotation on Kant's difficult and sometimes unfamiliar vocabulary. A new introduction by Roger Sullivan sets the work in its historical and philosophical context. This volume will be of wide interest to students of ethics and of legal and political philosophy. (shrink)

Lecture notes taken by Kant's students of his university courses in ethics.

Kant's only aesthetic work apart from the Critique of Judgment , Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime gives the reader a sense of the personality and character of its author as he sifts through the range of human responses to the concept of beauty and human manifestations of the beautiful and sublime. Kant was fifty-eight when the first of his great Critical trilogy, the Critique of Pure Reason , was published. Observations offers a view into the mind (...) of the forty-year-old Kant. (shrink)

Hegel's 1821 classic offers a comprehensive view of his influential system, in which he applies his most important concept--the dialectics--to law, rights, morality, the family, economics, and the state. The philosopher defines universal right as the synthesis between the thesis of an individual acting in accordance with the law and the occasional conflict of an antithetical desire to follow private convictions. The state, he declares, must permit individuals to satisfy both demands, thereby realizing social harmony and prosperity--the perfect synthesis. Further, (...) Hegel renounces the French Revolution and republican government in favor of an idealized form of a constitutional monarchy, in which ultimate power rests with the sovereign. (shrink)

Few if any of Kant’s critics were more trenchant than Hegel. Here I reconstruct some objections Hegel makes to Kant in a text that has received insufficient attention, the chapter titled ‘the Moral World View’ in the Phenomenology of Spirit. I show that Kant holds virtually all the tenets Hegel ascribes to ‘the moral world view’. I concentrate on five of Hegel’s main objections to Kant’s practical metaphysics. First, Kant’s problem of coordinating happiness with virtue (as worthiness to be happy) (...) is contrived. Kant denies that there is any inherent connection between acting rightly and being happy, but his denial depends on his defining happiness in terms of satisfying inclinations, rather than in terms of achieving ends in general. Second, Kant’s view of moral motivation is contrived; he ultimately admits that we cannot resolve to act without taking inclinations into account. (We cannot resolve to act apart from the matter of our maxim.) Third, Kant’s idea about perfecting our virtue in an infinite progress is incoherent. Kant defines virtue, and evidence of virtue, in terms of overcoming inclinations. Inclinations die with the body. Therefore there can be neither virtue nor evidence of virtue after death. Fourth, Kant’s view of the autonomy of moral agency is inconsistent with viewing the moral law as a divine command. Fifth, Kant’s moral principles cannot be put into practice in concrete circumstances because he supplies inadequate guidance for classifying acts. I conclude that Hegel’s objections to Kant’s practical metaphysics are sound, and I show that the problems Hegel raised against Kant’s account of autonomy and moral motivation are still current, since they have not been resolved, e.g., by Onora O’Neill’s Constructions of Reason. (shrink)

Kant’s concept of conscience has been largely neglected by scholars and contemporary moral philosophers alike, as has his concept of “indirect” duty. Admittedly, neither of them is foundational within his ethical theory, but a correct account of both in their own right and in combination can shed some new light on Kant’s moral philosophy as a whole. In this paper, I first examine a key passage in which Kant systematically discusses the role of conscience, then give a systematic account of (...) “indirect” duties and the function of hypothetical imperatives in the course of their generation. I then turn to the possibility of moral error and the part “indirect” duty can play in its prevention. In conclusion, I try to show how clarifying the concept of “indirect” duty can help us to shed light on the nature of Kantian ethics as a whole. (shrink)

Translation from German to English by Daniel Fidel Ferrer -/- What Does it Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking? -/- German title: "Was heißt: sich im Denken orientieren?" -/- Published: October 1786, Königsberg in Prussia, Germany. By Immanuel Kant (Born in 1724 and died in 1804) -/- Translation into English by Daniel Fidel Ferrer (March, 17, 2014). The day of Holi in India in 2014. -/- From 1774 to about 1800, there were three intense philosophical and theological controversies underway in (...) Germany, namely: Fragments Controversy, the Pantheism Controversy, and the Atheism Controversy. Kant’s essay translated here is Kant’s respond to the Pantheism Controversy. During this period (1770-1800), there was the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Urge (stress)) movement with thinkers like Johann Hamann, Johann Herder, Friedrich Schiller, and Johann Goethe; who were against the cultural movement of the Enlightenment (Aufklärung). Kant was on the side of Enlightenment (see his Answer the Question: What is Enlightenment? 1784). -/- What Does it Mean to Orient Oneself in Thinking? / By Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). [Was heißt: sich im Denken orientieren? English]. (shrink)

Recent philosophers, political scientists and cultural theorists have suggested that the concept of cosmopolitanism is useful to theorize an ideal relationship between different nations, and to confront the problems faced by asylum-seekers and refugees. Here, La Caze discusses Immanuel Kant's view of cosmopolitanism which occurs in the context of his teleological philosophy of history and his views on politics.

This is the first full-length biography in more than fifty years of Immanuel Kant, one of the giants amongst the pantheon of Western philosophers as well as the one with the most powerful and broad influence on contemporary philosophy. It is well known that Kant spent his entire life in an isolated part of Prussia living the life of a typical university professor. This has given rise to the view that Kant was a pure thinker with no life of his (...) own, or at least none worth considering seriously. In this biography, Manfred Kuehn debunks that myth once and for all. Taking account of the most recent scholarship Professor Kuehn allows the reader to follow the same journey that Kant himself took in emerging as a central figure in modern philosophy. (shrink)

Cosmopolitanism is not a single encompassing idea but rather comes in at least six different varieties, which have often been conflated in previous literature. This is shown on the basis of the discussion in late eighteenth-century Germany (roughly, 1780-1800). The six varieties are: (1) moral cosmopolitanism, the view that all humans belong to a single moral community; political cosmopolitanism, which advocates (2) reform of the international political and legal order or (3) a strong notion of human rights; (4) cultural cosmopolitanism, (...) which emphasizes the value of global cultural pluralism; (5) economic cosmopolitanism, which aims at establishing a global free market; and (6) the romantic ideal of humanity as united by faith and love. These six kinds of cosmopolitanism are not mutually exclusive, and the relationships among them are clarified. (shrink)

During the 1780s, as Kant was developing his universalistic moral theory, he published texts in which he defended the superiority of whites over non-whites. Whether commentators see this as evidence of inconsistent universalism or of consistent inegalitarianism, they generally assume that Kant's position on race remained stable during the 1780s and 1790s. Against this standard view, I argue on the basis of his texts that Kant radically changed his mind. I examine his 1780s race theory and his hierarchical conception of (...) the races, and subsequently address the question of the significance of these views, especially in the light of Kant's own ethical theory. I then show that during the 1790s Kant restricts the role of the concept of race, and drops his hierarchical account of the races in favour of a more genuinely egalitarian and cosmopolitan view. (shrink)

This is the first English translation of all of Kant's writings on moral and political philosophy collected in a single volume. No other collection competes with the comprehensiveness of this one. As well as Kant's most famous moral and political writings, the Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals, the Critique of Practical Reason, the Metaphysics of Morals, and Toward Perpetual Peace, the volume includes shorter essays and reviews, some of which have never been translated before. The volume has been furnished (...) with a substantial editorial apparatus including translator's introductions and explanatory notes to each text by Mary Gregor, and a general introduction to Kant's moral and political philosophy by Allen Wood. There is also an English-German and German-English glossary of key terms. (shrink)

In this classic text, Kant sets out to articulate and defend the Categorical Imperative - the fundamental principle that underlies moral reasoning - and to lay the foundation for a comprehensive account of justice and human virtues. This new edition and translation of Kant's work is designed especially for students. An extensive and comprehensive introduction explains the central concepts of Groundwork and looks at Kant's main lines of argument. Detailed notes aim to clarify Kant's thoughts and to correct some common (...) misunderstandings of his doctrines. (shrink)

One of the cornerstone books of Western philosophy, Critique of Pure Reason is Kant's seminal treatise, where he seeks to define the nature of reason itself and builds his own unique system of philosophical thought with an approach known as transcendental idealism. He argues that human knowledge is limited by the capacity for perception and attempts a logical designation of two varieties of knowledge: a posteriori, the knowledge acquired through experience; and a priori, knowledge not derived through experience. This accurate (...) translation by J. M. D. Meiklejohn offers a simple and direct rendering of Kant's work that is suitable for readers at all levels. (shrink)

In his Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals , Kant explains that ethics, like physics, ‘will have its empirical part, but it will also have a rational part, … though here [in ethics] the empirical part might be given the special name practical anthropology’ . In the Groundwork, Kant suggests that anthropology, or the ‘power of judgment sharpened by experience’, has two roles, ‘to distinguish in what cases [moral laws] are applicable’ and ‘to gain for [moral laws] access to the (...) human will’ . Twelve years later, the first function, of applying the categorical imperative to specifically human situations, is incorporated into Kant's Metaphysics of Morals. (shrink)

In ‘Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason’ Kant presents his thesis that human nature is ‘radically evil’. To be radically evil is to have a propensity toward moral frailty, impurity and even perversity. Kant claims that all humans are ‘by nature’ radically evil. By presenting counter-examples of moral saints, I argue that not all humans are morally corrupt, even if most are. Even so, the possibility of moral failure is central to what makes us human.

Kant has often been accused of being far too “optimistic” when it comes to the extremes of evil that humans can perpetrate upon one another. In particular, Kant’s supposed claim that humans cannot choose evil qua evil has struck many people as simply false. Another problem for Kant, or perhaps the same problem in another guise, is his supposed claim that all evil is done for the sake of self-love. While self-love might be a plausible way to explain some instances (...) of evil, it seems to be an implausible way to explain instances where people imprudently act in senselessly destructive and even self-destructive ways. Can Kant handle such extreme cases of moral evil? I shall argue that Kant can handle such cases by: (1) defending Kant’s denial of the possibility of a devilish human being; (2) showing how Kant can conceptually account for agents who choose evil qua evil, and (3) putting Kant’s account of passions to work inorder to understand self-destructive evil. (shrink)

Kant claims that the concept of the highest good, the idea of happiness in proportion to virtue, is grounded in the moral law. But this claim has often been challenged. How can Kant justify including happiness in the highest good? Why should only the virtuous be worthy of happiness? This paper argues that when the moral law is interpreted as the criterion for valid application of the concept of the good, the concept of the highest good does indeed follow from (...) the moral law. It also argues that the duty to promote the highest good harmonizes with other duties. (shrink)

S. 39: "My project in this paper is to develop the initial distinction which I have drawn between recognition and appraisal respect into a more detailed and specific account of each. These accounts will not merely be of intrinsic interest. Ultimately I will use them to illuminate the puzzles with which this paper began and to understand the idea of self-respect." 42 " Thus, insofar as respect within such a pursuit will depend on an appraisal of the participant from the (...) perspective of whatever standards are held to be appropriate to the pursuit, such respect will depend on a judgement to which excellences of character are thought relevant. Note that exactly what aspect of the person's character is thought to be relevant in this instance is his recognition respect (or lack of it) for the standards of the pursuit." 44 "This attitude fails of being appraisal respect in that my having it toward the person is conditional on those traits being such as to make him server a particular purpose that I happen to have" 44 - 45 "To sum up: Appraisal respect is an attitude of positibe appraisal of a person either judged as a person or as engaged in some more specific pursuit. In the first case, the appropriate grounds are features of the person's character: dispositions to act for particular reasons or a higher-level disposition to act for the best reasons. In the second case, though features of character do not exhaust the appropriate grounds for appraisal respect, some such character traits will be relevant (recognition respect for the standards of a particular pursuit). Also, the other features which constitute the appoprate excellences of the pursuit must be related to traits of character in the way specified. In both cases, the positive appraisal of the person, and of his traits, must be categorical. It cannot depend on the fact that the person, because of his traits, serves an interest or purpose of one's own." 45 "To have recognition respect for someone as a person is to give appropriate weight to the fact that he or she is a person by being willing to constrain one's behaviour in ways required by that fact." 45 "This is rather different from having an attitude of appraisal respect for someone as a person. The latter is a positive appraisal oif an individual made with regard ti those features which are excellences of persons. As such, it is not owed to everone, for it may or may not be merited. When it is, what is merited is just the positive appraisal itself." 47 "Second, the only beings who are approriate objects of appraisal respect are those who are capable of acting for reasons and hence capable of conceiving of various facts as meriting more or less consideration in deliberation.". (shrink)

Early in the Preface to Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone, Kant claims that “morality leads ineluctably to religion”. This thesis is hardly an innovation of the Religion. Again and again throughout the critical corpus, Kant argues that religious belief is ethically significant, that it makes a morally meaningful difference whether an agent believes or disbelieves. And yet these claims are surely among the most doubted of Kant's positions – and they are often especially doubted by readers who consider (...) themselves Kantians. That Kant of all people should have so cherished religion is perhaps surprising: his moral view enshrines the notion that moral worth arises solely form the “good will”, that is, from a will determined by the moral law. Kant claims to be able to deduce this law and to account for how it motivates without ever relying on religious propositions. Rather, he grounds morality in the conception of autonomy, in the absolutely free self-legislation of the moral principle. So why, after effecting this dramatic Copernican revolution in ethics, does Kant appear to backslide, insisting on the moral necessity of religious belief? (shrink)

The present volume brings Arendt's notes for these lectures together with other of her texts on the topic of judging and provides important clues to the likely direction of Arendt's thinking in this area.

In this book, Allen Wood investigates Kant's conception of ethical theory, using it to develop a viable approach to the rights and moral duties of human beings. By remaining closer to Kant's own view of the aims of ethics, Wood's understanding of Kantian ethics differs from the received 'constructivist' interpretation, especially on such matters as the ground and function of ethical principles, the nature of ethical reasoning and autonomy as the ground of ethics. Wood does not hesitate to criticize and (...) modify Kant's conclusions when they seem inconsistent with his basic principles or fail to make the best use of the resources Kantian principles make available. Of special interest are the book's treatment of such topics as freedom of the will, the state's role in securing economic justice, sexual morality, the justification of punishment, and the prohibition on lying. (shrink)

Christine Korsgaard has become one of the leading interpreters of Kant's moral philosophy. She is identified with a small group of philosophers who are intent on producing a version of Kant's moral philosophy that is at once sensitive to its historical roots while revealing its particular relevance to contemporary problems. She rejects the traditional picture of Kant's ethics as a cold vision of the moral life which emphasises duty at the expense of love and value. Rather, Kant's work is seen (...) as providing a resource for addressing not only the metaphysics of morals, but also for tackling practical questions about personal relations, politics, and everyday human interaction. This collection contains some of the finest current work on Kant's ethics and will command the attention of all those involved in teaching and studying moral theory. (shrink)

Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View essentially reflects the last lectures Kant gave for his annual course in anthropology, which he taught from 1772 until his retirement in 1796. The lectures were published in 1798, with the largest first printing of any of Kant's works. Intended for a broad audience, they reveal not only Kant's unique contribution to the newly emerging discipline of anthropology, but also his desire to offer students a practical view of the world and of humanity's (...) place in it. With its focus on what the human being 'as a free-acting being makes of himself or can and should make of himself,' the Anthropology also offers readers an application of some central elements of Kant's philosophy. This volume offers a new annotated translation of the text by Robert B. Louden, together with an introduction by Manfred Kuehn that explores the context and themes of the lectures. (shrink)

This volume collects for the first time in a single volume all of Kant's writings on religion and rational theology. These works were written during a period of conflict between Kant and the Prussian authorities over his religious teachings. His final statement of religion was made after the death of King Frederick William II in 1797. The historical context and progression of this conflict are charted in the general introduction to the volume and in the translators' introductions to particular texts. (...) All the translations are new with the exception of The Conflict of the Faculties, where the translation has been revised and re-edited to conform to the guidelines of the Cambridge Edition. As is standard with all the volumes in this edition, there are copious linguistic and explanatory notes, and a glossary of key terms. (shrink)

It is in the interest of the totalitarian state that subjects not think for themselves, much less confer about their thinking. Writing under the hostile watch of the Prussian censorship, Immanuel Kant dared to argue the need for open argument, in the university if nowhere else. In this heroic criticism of repression, first published in 1798, he anticipated the crises that endanger the free expression of ideas in the name of national policy. Composed of three sections written at different times, (...) The Conflict of the Faculties dwells on the eternal combat between the "lower" faculty of philosophy, which is answerable only to individual reason, and the faculties of theology, law, and medicine, which get "higher" precedence in the world of affairs and whose teachings and practices are of interest to the government. Kant makes clear, for example, the close alliance between the theological faculty and the government that sanctions its teachings and can resort to force and censorship. All the more vital and precious, then, the faculty of philosophy, which encourages independent thought before action. The first section, "The Conflict of the Philosophy Faculty with the Theology Faculty," is essentially a vindication of the right of the philosophical faculty to freedom of expression. In the other sections the philosopher takes a long and penetrating look at medicine and law, the one preserving the physical "temple" and the other regulating its actions. (shrink)

This is the first book-length study in any language to examine in detail and critically assess the second part of Kant's ethics- -an empirical, impure part, which determines how best to apply pure principles to the human situation. Drawing attention to Kant's under-explored impure ethics, this revealing investigation refutes the common and long-standing misperception that Kants ethics advocates empty formalism. Making detailed use of a variety of Kantian texts never before translated into English, author Robert B. Louden reassesses the strengths (...) and weaknesses of Kantian ethics as a whole, once the second part is re-admitted to its rightful place within Kant's practical philosophy. (shrink)

In Between Facts and Norms, Jürgen Habermas works out the legal and political implications of his Theory of Communicative Action (1981), bringing to fruition the project announced with his publication of The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere in 1962. This new work is a major contribution to recent debates on the rule of law and the possibilities of democracy in postindustrial societies, but it is much more. The introduction by William Rehg succinctly captures the special nature of the work, (...) noting that it offers a sweeping, sociologically informed conceptualization of law and basic rights, a normative account of the rule of law and the constitutional state, an attempt to bridge normative and empirical approaches to democracy, and an account of the social context required for democracy. Finally, the work frames and caps these arguments with a bold proposal for a new paradigm of law that goes beyond the dichotomies that have afflicted modern political theory from its inception and that still underlie current controversies between so-called liberals and civic republicans. The book includes a postscript written in 1994, which restates the argument in light of its initial reception, and two appendixes, which cover key developments that preceded the book. Habermas himself was actively involved in the translation, adapting the text as necessary to make it more accessible to English-speaking readers. (shrink)

One of the world's most famous philosophers, Jacques Derrida, explores difficult questions in this important and engaging book. Is it still possible to uphold international hospitality and justice in the face of increasing nationalism and civil strife in so many countries? Drawing on examples of treatment of minority groups in Europe, he skilfully and accessibly probes the thinking that underlies much of the practice, and rhetoric, that informs cosmopolitanism. What have duties and rights to do with hospitality? Should hospitality be (...) grounded on a private or public ethic, or even a religious one? This fascinating book will be illuminating reading for all. (shrink)

This is the first English scholarly edition of this pivotal essay, accompanied by the first comprehensive commentary on it.