Kant's Metaphysics of Morals

Yakın çağa damgasını vuran bir düşünür olarak Kant'ın ortaya koyduğu görüşlerin hukuksal anlamda batıda yükselerek dünyaya yaptığı etkilerin bir değerlendirmesi denemesidir.
Kısıtlı süre içinde hazırlanmasından ve yeterli geri dönüşle karşılamamasından ötürü eksik bir yazıdır.
Okuyucuların yapacağı eleştiriler doğrultusunda geliştirilecektir.

There has been a real Kant-Renaissance starting from the 1960s, especially regarding Kant's ethics. In particular, a raised interest in Kant's normative ethics , rather than just in the foundations, has generated not only a number of interesting interpretations but various new perspectives inspired by Kant's approach to practical reason, motivation, normativity and freedom. The paper illustrates this debate and deals with some problems which have been detected in Kant's theory by the interpreters.

This paper argues that Kant’s project of a metaphysics of morals represents a normative ideal grounded on the core ideas of Enlightenment. In the first section, it analyzes Kant’s concept of metaphysical principles of morals by establishing a connection between a metaphysics of morals and Kant’s concept of metaphysics in general and of metaphysics of nature in particular. It then discusses what is meta-physical in the Doctrine of Right and the Doctrine of Virtue. In its last section, it tackles the question of whether a non-metaphysical reading of Kant’s doctrines of right and of virtue is desirable if we want to remain faithful to Kant’s Enlightenment project.

En este artículo intervengo en la discusión sobre si es posible encontrar en la filosofía política de Kant una fundamentación de los derechos sociales básicos. Me centraré en primer lugar en dar sentido a la idea de una doctrina metafísica del derecho. En segundo lugar, trataré de mostrar dónde se encuentran los límites de la doctrina metafísica del derecho de Kant a la hora de debatir sobre la forma en que la sociedad debe o debía organizarse (en los tiempos actuales, pero también en la época de Kant). Por último, esbozaré rutas alternativas para usar el enfoque metafísico de Kant con el fin de abordar cuestiones de justicia social, en particular, el tema de la pobreza.

Kant’s legal thought has long been ignored in debates on global justice. Kantian theories tend to focus mainly on Kant’s moral philosophy and on moral concepts such as dignity and autonomy to provide arguments for global justice and other political problems.
Is Kant’s legal theory still pertinent today? How can Kant’s legal philosophy be applied to current global challenges such as climate change, refugees, migration, growing populism and nationalist movements, and threats to international peace?

La amistad es un tema habitualmente asociado a las éticas llamadas “teleológicas”. Sin embargo, ella ha recibido atención por parte de Kant y de manera preferente. Si ya había dado clases sobre la amistad hacia la década de 1780, en la Doctrina de la Virtud (Tugendlehre) de la Metafísica de las Costumbres, publicada hacia fines del siglo XVIII, el tema adquiere un lugar sistemático y conclusivo de la Doctrina de los Elementos. En este trabajo se explora la significación de este lugar para la noción kantiana de amistad (Freundschaft), significación que no se agota en razones de orden expositivo. Esto vale en general para todos los elementos del sistema kantiano; pero aquí, en particular, sostengo que la amistad, en cuanto Conclusión de la Doctrina de los Elementos, recoge en términos deontológicos, pero a su vez ideales, toda la tensión ética que proviene de esta Doctrina.

In this paper I argue that we find in Kant a more plausible alternative to his transcendental conception of freedom. In the Metaphysics of Morals in particular, we find a naturalistic conception of freedom premised upon a theory of rational self-cultivation. The motivation for a naturalising reading of Kant is twofold. On the one hand, a naturalistic conception of freedom avoids the charges levelled against Kant's " panicky metaphysics " , which both forces us to accept an ontologically extravagant picture of the world and the self, and also commits us to understanding freedom in non-spatiotemporal terms, thus excluding the possibility that the process of becoming free is progressive. And second, on a naturalistic reading we can repackage normativity back into Kant's account of freedom, which has seemed to scholars unacceptably absent. I explain how the process of becoming free, on the naturalistic view, involves cultivating certain " aesthetic preconditions of the mind's receptivity to concepts of duty ". 1 Happily, these conditions incur no unpalatable ontological penalties; rather, they constitute an achievement of the rational aspect of the self. Pointedly, this is not a self who is free only in virtue of having membership in the noumenal realm. Rather, effortful self-development entails a battle to become practically free, and thereby moral. The primary attraction to this reading of Kant is that it describes freedom as a naturalistic achievement, rather than a metaphysical given. Thus I show that by jettisoning, or at least naturalising, the picture of noumenal selfhood we not only find a theory that is poorer in panicky metaphysics, but much richer in normative force.

In contemporary debates about republicanism Kant’s republican political theory is normally neglected, in part because in it the notion of sovereignty is too much emphasized  and in part because Kant is held to be a liberal thinker. However, I shall contend in this paper that Kant's rejection of a “right to Revolution” –rejection that is uncomfortable for liberals, since includes pacific civil disobedience too– could be made coherent with his political theory only if we look at it with his notion of republicanism in mind. For Kant, republicanism has two particular features: first, the sub- jection of citizens and the State to the law –a Law that they imposed on themselves–, and second, that the self–government of the people should be exercised only through representatives and never directly. Both are conditions of political freedom, according to Kant. The despotic regime infringes both conditions; Revolution, on the contrary, challenges State and Law altogether. But for Kant only in the frame formed by State and Law is political free- dom possible. Keywords: political freedom, state, Kant, law, despotic government, republi- can government, sovereign, representation, revolution

EDITION 19-2 Anfangsgründe der praktischen Metaphysik : Vorlesung ; Lateinisch-Deutsch = [Initia philosophiae practicae primae acro-amatice] / Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten. Übers. und hrsg. von Alexander Aichele.-Hamburg : Meiner, 2019.-LXVIII, 354 S. ; 20 cm.-(Philosophische Bibliothek ; 709).-ISBN 978-3-7873-3182-6 : EUR 68.00 [#6427] Der Philosoph Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (1714-1762) gehört zu den wichtigen Autoren des 18. Jahrhunderts, die ihre Schriften noch in lateini-scher Sprache abfaßten. 1 Am berühmtesten ist seine Schrift über die Äs-thetik, die ebenfalls bei Meiner in einer soliden Ausgabe vorliegt. 2 Baumgarten gehört wegen seiner Studien-und ersten Dozentenzeit in Halle in den Umkreis der mitteldeutschen Aufklärung. 3 Auch studierte er durch 1 Themenschwerpunkt: Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten : sinnliche Erkenntnis in der Philosophie des Rationalismus / hrsg. von Alexander Aichele und Dagmar Mirbach.

Ziel des vorgeschlagenen Kurses ist es, den Studenten ein vollständiges Bild davon zu bieten, wie die moderne philosophische Tradition sich mit einigen der aktuellsten und brennendsten Themen der zeitgenössischen politischen Debatte – z.B. der Grundlage der Souveränität, dem Verhältnis zwischen Staat und Bürger, der Rolle des Staats in der Förderung der öffentlichen Moralität – auseinandergesetzt hat. Die Grundtexte für diesen Unterricht sind Kants " Zum ewigen Frieden " und " Metaphysik der Sitten ". Durch die Analyse und Diskussion dieser Texte kann man sowohl eine entscheidende innere Entwicklung von Kants Denken rekonstruieren, als auch den Ursprung einiger späteren im deutschen Idealismus aufgetretenen Diskussionen aufzuspüren. Es handelt sich z.B. um die problematische Rolle der Religion innerhalb der Staatwissenschaft, die mit ganz verschiedenen Akzenten von Fichte und Hegel rezipiert und überarbeitet wird. Infolgedessen besteht ein weiteres Ziel des Kurses in der Erwerbung eines kritischen Standpunkts über die verschiedenen Perspektiven zum Verhältnis zwischen der individuellen Moralität und dem ethischen Wert des Staats. Es geht hier um ein Thema, das zwischen dem Ende des 18. und dem Beginn des 19. Jahrhunderts die deutsche philosophische Debatte geprägt hat.

Kant’s brilliant original contributions to political thought cannot be understood without attention to his dynamic concept of provisional right, argues Elisabeth Ellis in this book—the first comprehensive interpretation of Kant’s political theory. Kant’s notion of provisional right applies to existing institutions and practices that are consistent with the possibility of progress. Ellis traces this idea through Kant’s works and demonstrates that the concept of provisional right can be used both to illuminate contemporary theoretical debates and to generate policy implications.

In this new interpretation, Kant’s provisionalism provides a broad standard for political right that remains deeply responsive to historical and geographical particulars, directing our attention to the dynamism between our world and our ideals. Ellis offers us Kant for our time—worldly, pragmatic, and intensely committed to the everyday pursuit of human freedom.