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65
AUTONOMY, HETERONOMY,
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necessary and, further, that moral duty alonie represents duty ini
its pure form. The implieation is that moral duty is different
in kind from all other types of duty and logically prior to each
of them. Moral rules take precedence over social, political, familial, or religious claims; the latter are related to the former as the
contingent to the necessary, the hypothetical to the categorical.
Not only are all alleged duties subject to the canons of morality
-not excepting duties to God-but they have their ultiinate foundation in the moral will. This is not to say that every specific
duty is ipso facto a moral duty; it is to assert that since everv duty
of whatever sort derives ultimately from the will of the individual,
even hypothetical duties have a moral significance. Although
hypothetical imperatives have a proximate lieteronomous ground,
they originate in the autonomous will and owe their necessity to
the same wvill which coinmands categorically. There is one and
only one will, even as there is only one self; it is the source ol the
necessity of all imperatives, whether hypothetical or categorical.
Kant assumed from the first that duty is essentially a phenomenon of volition. Duty expresses a command and implies a
being capable of issuing such a command. From his meticulous
analysis of the nature of imperatives Kant became convinced that
no command issuing from an external source could be uniconditionally binding upon the human will. It is this claim, whicil has
been so influential for subsequent moralists, that I propose to
examine.
The first step in Kant's argument is to show that duty is the
central concept of morality and that moral duty is distinguished
from other forms of duty by the fact that it is categorical. If
there were no categorical imperative there would be, on Kant 's
view, no such thing as morality. We need not concern ourselves
here with the possible circularity of Kant 's reasoning. He clearly
regarded the claim as a synthetic rather than an analytic proposition. He intended his analysis to clarify and purify the ideal of
duty found in "popular moral philosophy. " But, at the same
time, Kant sought to improve upon popular moral philosophy by
stating the principle of duty in the purest possible form.
The language of duty is, as Kant analyzes it, the language of
imperatives. Since duty expresses a necessary relationship between a moral subject and an object of his volition, it represents
a necessity of freedonmrather than of nature. An imperative may
be hypothetical or categorical. If hypothetical, the necessity it
expresses is only relative; if categorical, it asserts an unconditional necessity. Since duty involves a practical necessity and
pertains only to the volition of free subjects, Kant concluded that
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67
it is fundamentally reflexive in character. It is the essential reflexivity of duty to wlhich Kant appeals in arguing that duty
iiiplies
autonomy.
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68
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as necessarily hypothetical. It is rather because, on Kant's analysis, a divine imperative depends for its validity upon our free
response that it cannot be credited with unconditional necessity.
But doesn't this argument beg the question? Isn't the hypothetical character of the divine imperative predicated on our
presumed freedom to accept or reject it? And, if so, doesn't this
assume the poilnt at issue? Our response to a possible divine
command might be optional in at least two respects: (a) it might
be our decision whether to acknowledge the sovereignty of God;
or (b) it might be our option whether or not to honor God's commands. Since the latter option would hold independently of the
first, our freedom to repudiate possible divine commands does xiot
in and of itself make their validity problematic. Nor does our
acceptance of them necessarily establish this validity.
We have now reached a point where we must be clear as to
just what Kant means by 'objective necessity'. In what sense and
for what reason is it impossible for a divine command to be objectively necessary? In referring to the unconditional necessity
of the moral imperative it is clear that Kant meant to emphasize
its status as an objective limitation on our freedom. The categorical imperative is unconditional in that it is inescapable; it
expresses the law of our being as free subjects. To violate the
imperative is to set ourselves in opposition to the law of our own
freedom. As an a priori condition of our freedom, the law is not
itself subject to free choice. We have no more option whether to
be subject to the moral law than whether we are to be human subjects. As rational and responsible beings we are liable before the
moral law as the inexorable demand of our own rationally informed wills.
The categorical imperative must have a metaphysical foundation. As the supreme law of freedom it conditions all choice and,
thus, is objectively necessary. There is more than a tinge of the
elassical view that rationality is intrinsically good and to be followed for its own sake, ill Kant 's position. The fact remains,
however, that on Kant's view man is a creature under law. The
moral imperative is not that which should obtain but which does
obtain; it is the de facto 'ought' governing all human actions. All
men are subject to the moral law willy nilly. If this were not so,
the moral imperative would be hypothetical rather than categorical.
If our analysis is correct, the moral imperative derives its
authority from man's nature as a sensuous though rational being.
It is objectively necessary in that it is a condition of man's existence as a free subject. Moreover, the primary condition of its
validity is metaphysical rather thlan axiological. It is not the
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case that man shoutldbe a moral being but that he is a moral being.
Either the moral law is not valid or it is in fact a condition of all
human volition.
Although Kant was primarily concerned to delineate the conlditions of responsible existence and tended to look upon the moral
life as essentially the responsible life, his rationalistic predilectionis
sometimes prompted him to equate responsibility with rationality.
The fact that reason is anl essential vehicle for the discovery anld
promulgation of the moral law does not mean-as Kant sometimes
suggests-that it is the sole author of the law. If the primary requirement of the moral life is to be responsible, rationality is
neither the sole nior the decisive ethical category. In fact, an
excessive stress on rationality can lead to irresponsible conduct.
It is a serious limitation in Kant's ethical theory that he did niot
recognize adequatelv the positive significance of impulse and emotion for the moral life. As Kantt's critics have not been hesitant
to point out, too rigid aln adherence to a formal principle can lead
to disastrous results. If one must heed the voice of reason, one
must be sensitive, also, to the dictates of impulse, else human life
becomes sterile. In this respect Kant failed to carry out a Critique
of Practical Reason on a par with his Critique of Theoretical Reason. So firm was his confidence in the power of reason to governi
human action that he thought it unnecessary to determine "its
scope and limits" in moral affairs.
Kant allowed the more basic question: What are the conditions
of responsible action? to be supplanted by the quite different questioni: What are the conditions of rational action? Whereas tlle
first question leaves open the role of reason, feeling, and impulse
in the moral life, the latter assumes that reason is the decisive
factor in constituting the morally good life. Although Kant reeognized that the relation between responsibility and rationality is
synthetic, he tenided, at times, to treat it as analytic, e.g., in beginning with the idea of a rational will. If, as I believe, the fulndamental question of Kanti's ethics-as of any ethics, for that matter
is: What are the conditions of responsible action?, it must not
be assumed that rationality is equivalent to responsibility. Kant's
tendency at times to fuse these questions prompted him to assign
unidue prominence to the role of reason in the moral life. For one
thing it led him to place too great an emphasis upon the autonomyof reason at the expenise of inclination. Anid, in the second place.
it occasioned his unidue stress upon universality as the criterioni
of morally good action. The supreme imiiperative of morality is
not, I would argue: Be rational! but rather: Be responsible! The
validity of the moral law depends uponi the fact that it specifies
the fundamental eoInditionis of responisible existence.
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COMMIMENTS
AND CRITICISM
71
72
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COMMENTSAND CRITICISM
73
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argument runs, we are committed to pay tribute to rational selfhood in whatever form we may meet it, our neighbor or a resident
of Chinia, we are morally obligated to treat any particular personi
we happen to meet in accordance with this abstract and universal
obligation. Not only is this a highly artificial way of establishing
miioral duties toward others, but it has certain rather perverse
imiiplications for morality.
To see the force of this objection, which has been voiced in one
wvayor another by a good many critics of Kaint, we need only to
consider that our duties to another person presuppose his existence.
If there were no otlher persons, we would have no social obligations.
It is, thus, the slieer fact of the other's existenee in all its conereteness that constitutes the initial ground of our obligation to him.
Indeed, the situationi with respect to another person is analogous
if lnot strictly parallel to our relation to ourselves. Even as we
lhave an originial existential liability to ourselves-of which moral
liability is a special case-so, too, we have an original liabilitytoward the other person. He is an item in our world waiting to
be acknowledged, capable of judging and acting toward us. If
we refuse to ackniowledge him, the price may be our own demise.
Or, if we refuse to recogrnize his actual nature, his powers and
capacities, it may be to our distress. His claim upon us derives
frolmihis totality as a person confronting us in our world. It constitutes a responsibility in the most literal meaning of that term,
namely, as a liability for answering or responding to the reality
of the other. At the poinit where moral reflection arises we begin
of claims which we attribute to the other
to evaluate the legritiiimacy
or which he asserts for himself. We should not lose sight of the
fact, however, that any possibility of a valid assessment of putative
moral claims requires a reference to the concrete reality of the
other in the conitext of our initial relatedness to him. If he is, in
fact, a human subject, we are obligated to treat Ilim as such and.
lhenice,not "as a miieansmerely." But, if so, the primary ground
of the obligation lies in his person rather than in our own moral
w ill. If so, it is hleteronzomoutslyrather than auttonomoutsly
grounded.
If anyone thinlks fit to spare Kant this criticism, let him reflect
oiiee more upon tlle iimiplicationsof Kant's rejection of a theocentric
ethics. If his artumeent agrainst a theologically determined ethics
is sound, it militates with equal force agrainsta heteronomous ethics
of a huiimanisticsort. The other person makes a claim upon us bv-irtue of his existence. This claim is not ipso facto a moral claim,
anid, in this respect, Kant's argument is sound. But he was mistakein in believinlg that it is not a binding claim and, further, that
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COMMHENTSAND CRITICISM
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NEW BOOKS
77
NEW BOOKS
ALFARABI:
Philosophy of Plata and Aristotle. Translated with an
introduction by Mluhsin Mahdi. New York: The Free Press
of Glencoe, 1962. xi, 158 p. (Agora Editions.) $4.75.
A. BEARDSLEE, J. HARVEY YOUNG,
ALTIZER, THOMAS J. J., AV,ILLiAM
eds: Truth, Mytht, and Symbol. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1962. x, 170 p. (A Spectrum Book, S-40.)
$1.95.
Anniual Report of the Duins Scotts Philosophical Association.
Cleveland, Ohio: Our Lady of Angels Franciscan Seminary,
1962. vii, 256 p.
ARISTOTLE:
On Interpretation. Commentary by St. Thomas and
Cajetan (Peri Hermeneias). Translated from the Latin, with
an introduction by Jean T. Oesterle. Milwaukee, Wise.: Marquette University Press, 1962. xiii, 271 p. (Mediaeval Philosophical Texts in Translation, No. 11.) $6.50.
ARMIOUR, LESLIE: The Rational and the Real: An Essay in Metaphysics. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1962. vi, 97 p. 8.25 fl.
New York: The HumaniARMSTRONG, D. M.: Bodily Sensations.
ties Press, 1962. vii, 132 p. (Studies in Philosophical Psychology.) $2.50.
Exploring the Logic of
BENDALL, KENT, and FREDERICK FERR9:
Faith: A Dialogue on the Relation of Modern Philosophy to
Christian Faith. New York: Association Press, 1962. 219 p.
(A Haddam House Book.) $4.50.
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