ETH ICS O F

IMMANUEL KANT
GROUP 2
Allan Navales
Raissa Rosalind Ko
Sara Jane Nimo
Clover Jane Sabornido
Seth Davis
Alaramanav Arban
Kantian Ethics | HISTORY
18th Century: Age of Enlightenment

AGE OF REASON
an era in which cultural and intellectual forces in Western
Europe emphasized reason, analysis, and individualism rather
than traditional lines of authority
Kantian Ethics | HISTORY
18th Century: Age of Enlightenment
That men's minds should be freed from
ignorance, from superstition
and from the arbitrary powers of
the State, in order to allow mankind
to achieve progress and perfection.

SOCIAL & POLITICAL

Decline in the influence of the church, governmental
consolidation and greater rights for the common people

Time of revolutions and turmoil and of the overturning

of established traditions.
Kantian Ethics | HISTORY
18th Century: Age of Enlightenment

1. British Empiricism the

idea that the origin of all
knowledge is sense experience

2. Rationalism which held

that knowledge could be
attained by reason alone

3. Kantianism
Kantian Ethics | HISTORY
MAJOR PHILOSOPHERS

George Berkeley David Hume EDMUND BURKE

ADAM SMITH
(1685-1753) (1711-1776) (1729-1797)
(1723-1790)

JEAN-JACQUES
FRANCOIS-MARIE ROUSSEAU Immanuel Kant
AROUET (1694- 1778) (1712-1778) (1724-1804)
Kantian Ethics | Immanuel “Emanuel” Kant

•Born in Konigsberg, Prussia on

April 22, 1724

•Fourth of Nine children-Brought

up in Pietest household

•He never married

•Never travelled 10 miles from

Konigberg
Kantian Ethics | Immanuel “Emanuel” Kant

YOUNG SCHOLAR

•1740 enrolled in University of Konigberg

•Study Philosophy under the tutelage of

Martin Knutsen

•1746 became a private tutor

•1747 published "Thoughts on the True

Estimation of Living Forces“

•1755 became lecturer for Metaphysics

Kantian Ethics | Immanuel “Emanuel” Kant
NOTABLE WORKS

• Nebular Hypothesis (Solar System & Milky

Way)

MARKUS HERZ "How we combine sensory

knowledge with reasoned knowledge"

DAVID HUMES's radical philosophical

empiricism & skepticism

IMPORTANT WORKS
(1) CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON
(2) METAPHYSICS OF MORALS
(3) CRITIQUE OF JUDGEMENT
 WH AT IS
KANTIAN ETHICS?
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Critique on Rationalism
• Rationalists held that by sheer a priori reason,
independent of experience and unfalsifiable by
experience.

• Reason was in fact both lauded and debased by Kant.

• It is so to the credit of the intellect that it can prove

to opposite theses with equal facility.

• But he himself says, “IT IS COMMON FATE OF

REASON TO RUSH ITS SPECULATIVE EDIFICE AND
THEN TO INQUIRE LATER WHETHER THE
FOUNDATION IS SURE.”
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Critique on Empiricism?
• Knowledge can only come from experience
of the senses. (Berkeley, esse est percipi)
• The inquiry into the nature, sources, and
validity of knowledge had ceased to be a
support to religion
• The sword with which Berkeley had slain the
dragon of materialism had turned against the
immaterial mind and the immortal soul
• In the turmoil science itself had suffered
severe injury.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Critique on Empiricism?
• Shocked by the implications of the thoughts
of David Hume, Kant was roused from the
“DOGMATIC SLUMBER” to which he had
assumed without question the essentials of
religion and the bases of science.
Kantian Ethics | From Sensation to Perception—Kantian Model
Mind
• Directing &
coordinating
Perception sensations &
moulds them
• Sensations group into sense
Sensation themselves about Sense of space &
an object in space sense of time method
• Awareness of a for classification of an
stimulus & time
object being
Taste on the tongue; an presented; MODES
odor in the nostrils; a OF PERCEPTION
sound in the ears; etc
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s View on Subject & Object
• Kant, however, pointed out, and with good
reason, that when we see objects or hear
objects, these are always situated in SPACE.
• When we imagine or remember things, these
are always situated in TIME.
• SPACE & TIME, thought Kant, were built-in
forms in the human intellect—they were not
perceived since perception already implied
time and space.
• These two are not concepts; they are FORMS
OF “INTUITION” (Anschauung).
Kantian Ethics | The Transcendental Method
• Kant’s Main Contention: Man as
REASON, as UNITY of Consciousness, as
the “I think” (Cogito)
• Man is not subjected to some object but
that he who constitutes the subjective
conditions which make possible the
object of experience.
• The Kantian subject is one that
“legislates,” sets the rules and boundaries
for the emergence of the object.
Kantian Ethics | The Kantian Questions

QUESTIONS:
1. What can I know?
2. What ought I to do?
3. What may I hope for?
Kantian Ethics | Transcendental Method Application
Applied to knowledge: Man is viewed as both
passive and active knower—as a being of sense, he
is dependent on sense experience.
• Human knowledge begins with sense
experience.
• Sense experience by itself, however, does not
give man knowledge, but only a kind of
FORMLESS DIVERSITY or MANIFOLD OF
SENSIBILITY.
• Hence, in order to become knowledge, sense
experience must be received by a series of
rational forms coming from the human subject.
Kantian Ethics | The Transcendental Method
Applied to knowledge: Man is viewed as both
passive and active knower—as a being of sense, he
is dependent on sense experience.
• Human knowledge furthermore, is composed of
matter and a set of forms, matter provided by
sense experience which is a posteriori (posterior
to or dependent on sense experience)
• And a set of forms coming from the human
subject or knower which are a priori (prior to or
independent of sense experience)
• The a priori forms are transcendental conditions
of knowledge
Kantian Ethics | The Transcendental Method
The a priori transcendental conditions of knowledge are the
following:
•Space and Time – they are inherent in things as such; they are
part and parcel of man’s condition insofar as he is material or
physical being. Thus, things cannot appear to man except in
terms of temporal succession and external, spatial relations
•Hence, man can only know things as they appear as
PHENOMENA, under the conditions of space and time.
•Man cannot know the things in themselves, independently of
space and time.
•At best, man can think of them as such, as NOUMENA.
Kantian Ethics | Transcendental Method Application
The a priori forms of Understanding:
• These are the CATEGORIES & PRINCIPLES which
elevate the spatio-temporal sense experience to the
level of communicable, objective experience.
• This function is seen in the act of judgment or
predication, whereby a subject-matter or spatio-
temporal sense is classified or “categorized”.
• Before categorization or predication, the spatio-temporal
sense experience remains a purely visceral or subjective
impression.
• Upon categorization sense experience attains the level of
objectivity or intersubjectivity which is valid for all
human subjects.
Kantian Ethics | Transcendental Method Application
The a priori ideas of REASON
• These are the principles of TOTALITY, PRINCIPLES OF
MAXIMUM, UNCONDITIONED GROUND, which of
themselves transcend our experience, but which, posed
by our reason, serve as ideals to regulate knowledge
toward greater and greater unity.
• These ideas of reason are the originating cause or
freedom, personal immortality or soul, and God.
• On the level of theoretical knowledge, ideas of reason
remain purely regulative ideals.
• But, in so far as the they are necessarily demanded by
morality, they acquire moral or practical certitude.
Kantian Ethics | Transcendental Method Application
The transcendental a priori unity of CONSCIOUSNESS
• It unifies the whole RATIONAL STRUCTURE.
• Kant says that in the end, there must be an overall
condition of possibility of experience in general—an
underlying a priori consciousness, an “I think,” to connect
all the elements into one coherent unity.
• Since there is no access to the thing in itself by the
transcendental method, Kant instead postulates the
transcendental unity of consciousness as the criterion
and norm of truth.
• An experience is ultimately validated and judged to be
true insofar as it fits in with all other experiences into
one coherent unity of experience and one unity of
consciousness.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
Applied to Ethics:
• Man is a SELF-GOVERNING, RATIONAL
WILL, conforming to the peremptory but
internal exigencies immanent in himself as
rational will.
• Hence, he is not subject to external
impositions coming from some external
condition or object, such as pleasure,
happiness, some utilitarian advantage or
God himself.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
Applied to Ethics:
• Man arrives at some valid idea of God
by way of moral experience, by way of
the experience the demands of
morality.
• Belief in God might very well provide
support for a good moral life, but
morality that is primarily based on
God’s authority is basically arbitrary
for Kant.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
Applied to Ethics:
• Kant rejects an empirically based morality,
which grounds morality on some sense
object or experience, such as pleasure,
happiness, utilitarian advantage, moral
feeling or sympathy.
• This approach only reduces morality to a
purely contingent and relative affair,
depriving it of its universal and obligatory
sublimeness.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
How does Kant view morality?
•There is nothing in this world that can
be considered without qualification as
morally good except a “GOOD WILL”.
•The good will is the indispensable
condition for something to be morally
good.
•The good will alone seems to constitute
that which is good unconditionally.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
How does Kant view morality?
• By good will Kant shows that the will is
considered to be good WHEN IT
ACTS SO THAT IT CONFORMS TO
WHAT DUTY DEMANDS
• Conformity to duty does not mean
simply external conformity, but TRUE
FIDELITY TO WHAT DUTY
DEMANDS
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Ethics
How does Kant view morality?
• But what precisely is duty?
• For Kant, it means that which ought to be
done.
• A man of good will is therefore, one who
acts in obedience to duty, not necessarily
against his feelings and inclinations.
• But, whether with or against his feelings
and inclinations, man ACTS in accordance
with the DEMANDS of his RATIONAL
WILL.
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Moral Autonomy
• Humans are autonomous beings. For Kant, a
moral judgment should be free from the dictates
of outside factors or influences.
• Moral autonomy for him means self-rule. That is,
the self, being autonomous, decides for its own
good.
• “Autonomy then is the basis for the
dignity of the human and of every rational
nature…although the conception of duty
implies subjection to the law, we yet
ascribe a certain dignity and sublimity to
the person who fulfills all his duties.”
Kantian Ethics | Kant’s Categorical Imperative
• The categorical imperative promulgates the absolute
moral obligation.
• It is a principle that autonomous moral subjects are
commanded to obey.
• Otherwise, one would violate his own nature.
The Ethics of duty:
1. “Act as if the maxim from which you act where
to become through your will a universal law of
nature.”
2. “Act so as to use humanity, whether in your own
person or in the person of another, always as an
end, never merely as a means.”
Kantian Ethics | The Hypothetical Imperative
• The external incentives of a reward or one’s skill in
doing things do not qualify for the requirements Kant
set for a good will.
• Kant says:
“An imperative which relates merely to the choice
of means to one’s own happiness…must be
hypothetical; it commands an action, not
absolutely, but only as a means to another end.”
Kantian Ethics | PRACTICAL APPLICATION
“THE DILEMMA OF A YOUNG SOLDIER”
A young man is to be sent to war after being chosen in a draft. His
mother, however, disapproves of such. The young man, of course, does
not want to hurt the feelings of his mother. However, he has strong
feelings to serve his country. The country’s newly elected President
has called upon its young men and women to defend the country. He
argues that there can be no future unless they protect the honor and
freedom of their country. Now, the young man remembers the
decorated heroes of the past. He is inspired by their wartime acts of
courage. The honor to serve one’s country, the young man thinks, is
the greatest value of all. It is an opportunity that comes only once in a
lifetime. But this young man is an only child. And surely, his mother
will be devastated if he dies while serving at the war front. What
must the young man do? What is the importance of moral
duty in this case? What should be the basis of the young
man’s decision?
Kantian Ethics | Summing up
1. What can I know?
According to Kant:
• Within the limitation of man’s finite
knowledge, I can know the phenomenal
world circumscribed by the conditions
of space and time.
Kantian Ethics | Summing up
1. What ought I to do?
According to Kant:
• I ought to obey the absolute commands
of the categorical imperative in view of
the implied noumenal community of
human persons of which I am a
member.
Kantian Ethics | Summing up
1. What ought I to do?
According to Kant:
• I ought to obey the absolute commands
of the categorical imperative in view of
the implied noumenal community of
human persons of which I am a
member.
Kantian Ethics | Summing up
1. What may I hope for?
According to Kant:
• With faith in man’s capacity and freedom to act in the
empirical world and in history as demanded by morality,
and with faith in the existence of God, Who is all good
and the author of all nature, with faith in personal
immortality and a future life, I may hope for a future
world of perpetual peace and happiness where, under
the spirit of the moral law, a system of just laws will
govern relations among men and the use of the goods of
nature, and there shall be a community of freedom and
reciprocity which includes all men and all nations.
Kantian Ethics | Summing up
1. What can I know?
According to Kant:
• Within the limitation of man’s finite
knowledge, I can know the phenomenal
world circumscribed by the conditions
of space and time.
THANK YO U!