| Description |
1 online resource (192 pages) |
| Contents |
Preface -- A Note on Texts and Translations -- Abbreviations Used for Kant's Works, Handwritten Notes, and Lectures -- 1. Introduction -- 1. Two models of practical failure -- 2. Kant's gallows cases -- 3. Sources of practical interest -- 4. A hybrid theory? -- 2. Happiness -- 5. The nature of human happiness -- 6. State vs conception: Happiness as an ideal -- 7. The problem of uncertainty -- 8. The 'nominal' or 'titular' desire to be happy -- 9. The stochastic nature of prudence: Setting felicific ends -- 10. Kant's rejection of qualitative distinctions: The gold analogy -- 3. The Law and the Good -- 11. Pistorius' challenge -- 12. The 'paradox of method' -- 13. The meaning of 'good' and 'evil' -- 14. The object of the will -- 15. Kant's reductio: Setting the stage -- 16. Kant's reductio: The argument against hedonism -- 17. Kant's reductio: The argument against instrumentalism -- 4. Instrumental Imperatives -- 18. Instrumental reason as the servant of inclination -- 19. The plurality of hypothetical imperatives -- 20. Is 'true' means-ends irrationality possible? -- 21. Practical analyticity: Covert containment and explication -- 22. Practical analyticity: Identity and non-contradiction -- 23. The limitations of instrumental reason -- 24. Scepticism about practical reason(s) -- 25. Instrumental reason as the servant of morality -- 5. The Emergence of Practical Reason -- 26. The original practical assignment of reason -- 27. From prudential deliberation to moral choice -- 28. Two 'perfectly legal constitutional transitions' -- 29. The necessities of happiness and duty -- 30. The will on its way to the crossroads -- 6. Incentives, Maxims, and Freedom -- 31. Intellectualist interpretations -- 32. The 'incorporation thesis' -- 33. Freedom, sensibility, and the contribution of reason -- 34. Non-prudential intellectualism rejected -- 35. Legislation and choice: Wille and Willkür -- 7. Two Types of Practical Failure -- 36. Prudential failure -- 37. Moral failure -- 38. Do we ever choose the lesser good? -- 39. The guise of the good -- 8. Conclusions and Implications -- 40. Silencing as non-enabling: Kant's 'dualistic monism' of practical reason -- 41. Trading happiness for hope -- 42. Moral progress and human frailty -- 43. The language of 'reasons' -- 44. A new constitutivism? -- Kant's Practical Dualisms: A Fifteen-point Summary -- Bibliography -- Index |
| Summary |
What happens when human beings fail to do as reason bids? This book is an attempt to address this age-old question within Kant's mature practical philosophy, i.e. the practical philosophy that emerged with the watershed discovery of autonomy in the mid-1780s. As always, Kant is good for a surprise. There is, it is argued, not one answer but two: he advocates Socratic intellectualism in the realm of prudence whilst defending an anti-intellectualist or volitional account of immoral action. This 'hybrid' theory of practical failure is more than a philosophical curiosity. There are ramifications for Kant's theory of practical reason as a whole. In particular, the hybrid account emphasizes the divide between pure and empirical practical rationality to the extent that the latter, while containing practically relevant propositions, no longer counts as a branch of practical reason at all. Hypothetical and categorical imperatives exemplify two entirely distinct kinds of normativity. In fact, the dichotomy between pure and empirical determining grounds of the will goes hand in hand with many other dualisms and dichotomies that, whether we like them or not, continue to define Kant's mature ethical thought |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Description based on online resource; title from home page (Oxford Academic, viewed June 30, 2023) |
| Subject |
Kant, Immanuel, 1724-1804.
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| SUBJECT |
Kant, Immanuel, 1724-1804 fast |
| Subject |
Philosophy.
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Practice (Philosophy)
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Practical reason.
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Philosophy of mind.
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philosophy.
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Philosophy
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Philosophy of mind
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Practical reason
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Practice (Philosophy)
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| ISBN |
9780191918520 |
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0191918520 |
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9780192649348 |
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0192649345 |
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