Immanuel Kant: Philosophy, Ethics, and Political Theory

Posted on Dec 22, 2024 in Philosophy and ethics

Kant

1. Knowledge

As a modern philosopher, Kant’s fundamental issue is knowledge. His first stage is rationalist metaphysics, which considers knowledge a priori. He “awakens from his dogmatic slumber” (the dream that reason can know everything alone) with Hume’s philosophy.

Critique of Pure Reason

Transcendental Aesthetic: How are synthetic judgments possible a priori in math?

“Copernican revolution”: so far, knowledge was based on the object. Kant regards this as an ill-posed problem since, for him, the true mark is the subject, which is put in the center. Objectivity does not disappear; there are views of the subject, and the structure has a priori, innate ordering information and determines the criterion of what is false and what is true. We never know the thing itself, only familiar phenomena. Here is the “limited knowledge” of the human: this limit is the phenomena. We never know how reality itself is. For Kant, this limit is positive, not a bug. In accepting that the principle of knowledge refers to the phenomena, it never handles things themselves.

A priori structures of feeling: Knowledge is divided into two phases: receiving and ordering information. Sensitivity is the power that is responsible for receiving it. With it, Kant establishes that the Copernican knowledge bases are a priori innate structures in which ordering information. Sensitivity is space and time, which are a priori forms that innately belong to reason and are independent of experience. They are both “pure intuitions of sensibility” that allow the knowledge of phenomena.

Transcendental Analytic: Are synthetic judgments possible a priori in physics?

Ante-structures of understanding: They are pure concepts with which we form normal concepts. These categories are called pure concepts.
Substance: We are born innately with the concept of substance. We join information received on substances, that is, group the objects, and see qualities in ordinary objects. This is innate because we have the concept of substance.
Cause and effect: For Hume, this relationship did not exist, and there is no impression of it. For Kant, it is the pure concept with which certain phenomena are grouped. He resets the principle of causality, considering it a priori.
Inner self, soul, the consciousness of personal identity: This is something we are born with, which is genetic and inborn. We use it to marshal our psychological experiences.

Transcendental deduction of categories

At the end of the transcendental analytic, Kant makes a transcendental deduction of the categories. This is to test that the categories do not represent knowledge by themselves. Thus, rationalist theory is impossible. There are innate conceptual schemes. You can answer the question: Are synthetic judgments possible a priori in math and physics? Physics and math can know a priori because they deal with space and time. As they are a priori, their study is, too. That is, its laws are the laws of pure reason.

Transcendental Dialectic: Are synthetic judgments possible a priori in metaphysics?

Studying the transcendental dialectic of reason or the ability to work with concepts, which is a natural impulse that does not use the concepts as ordering schemes but reasons dialectically and reduces the pure concepts of understanding to a minimum number of principles. It aims to “get in the know” but is lost: it goes beyond experience. Therefore, metaphysics is not true knowledge; philosophical knowledge does not exist. The dialectic creates ideas that are transcendental ideas above the units. The right, pure concepts of reason a priori unify understanding, and knowledge is the limits of our knowledge and the apex of human speculation. They are God (the idea of a higher being speculated on in all cultures), soul, and world (all things in itself, as a unit of everything that exists, or universe).

2. Ethics

Critique of Practical Reason, “the moral practical reason.”

While knowledge is based on causal relations, ethics is based on freedom and the existence of causal relationships. The first thing Kant criticizes is previous ethics, called “materials.”

Criticism:

Content: The above ethics are based on the concept of happiness. For Kant, morality arises from within the individual; therefore, ethics must be disassociated and be a priori, moral, and separate from happiness.
Hypothetical laws: They are not good in themselves but are a means to get something else. For example, being cautious is not a value in itself; it is good if it gives you happiness.

Kant wants to create ethics arising from human reason, a priori, universal. Therefore, it is a formal ethics formula:

Categorical act: It is based on the fact that one must fulfill a law that arises from one’s internal matter, regardless of happiness, by obligation.
Autonomy: It must rely on itself, not be hypothetical. In addition, it is universal and valid for all circumstances and a priori.
Universal: Act so that the rule governing your conduct may be brought as a universal law for all men without contradiction. The criterion is universal: if an act is not generalizable, it is immoral.
Dignity: Act so that you always take humanity as an end and never as a means. Employing a person for something does not respect human dignity; it is amoral.

Dialectic of practical reason

It implies a transition to a mystical, religious world. For duty and happiness to be identified, certain conditions or postulates of human reason are necessary:

There is a God who rewards those who perform well.
The soul is immortal so that if happiness cannot be achieved in this world, there is at least another place where it can be achieved.

3. Politics

Contractualism

This theory explains politics in modern society, the organization, and the origin of the modern state. There are only two political theories. Born in the eighteenth century, contractualism gives more importance to the individual than to society or the state.

Phases to form the state

State of nature: It serves the contractualists to imagine the nature of the individual on which society is built, which must be compatible with nature. For Rousseau, man is good by nature; he has natural piety that leads him to do good. Kant separates from Rousseau. In man, there is unsociable sociability.
Pact or contract: The covenant between citizens leads to a society. For Rousseau, freedom is the end of the pact. Kant is in line with Rousseau; the end of the pact is liberty.
The state: The birth of the state as an institution is not a necessary evil for Kant, but it is the condition for freedom to be effective in society. Its function is to balance individual interests, and outside society, we would destroy each other.

Forms of government

The republic: It is the legitimate form of government; it guarantees freedom. It is based on three characteristics:
1. Separation of powers: legislative, executive, and judicial.
2. Equality before the law: This applies to everyone, even the rulers.
3. Representation of power: The power exercised must be a representative of the people; the people cannot exercise it directly.
Despotism: It does not respect freedom because it does not guarantee any reason; therefore, it is not legitimate.