On the Evil in our Hearts:

Kants Conception of Original Sin

Jacob A. Swenson Presentation Autumn 2012

Whenever we therefore say, The human being is by nature good, or, He is by nature evil, this only means that he holds within himself a rst ground (to us inscrutable) for the adoption of good or evil (unlawful) maxims, and that he holds this ground qua human, universally in such a way, therefore, that by his maxims he expresses at the same time the character of his species. - Kant, Rel. 6:21 Immanuel Kant, in Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, places the capstone upon his moral theory by providing us with the foundations of a moral religion.1 , 2 In doing so, he both expands upon his conception of moral agency and provides a radical reinterpretation of the central tenants of Christianity. Thus, when Kant sets out to address our natural moral character, his aim is twofold. First, he seeks to ll something of a lacuna in his moral philosophy up to this point. In the ethical works that precede the Religion, Kant is principally
Draft Please do not quote or circulate without permission. As many commentators rightly point out, Kant takes moral religion to be of great importance to his moral theory as a whole. Without the existence of a community in which moral agents may voluntarily cooperate, such agents: (1) are likely to be harmed rather than helped by social interaction and (2) have little hope of actually promoting the highest good.
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concerned with individual actions. He seeks to demonstrate how we can derive ethical principles for action through the process of rational deliberation. Nevertheless, like the ancients, we ordinarily speak of intentional action not merely as the result of some abstract deliberative process, but as owing from the agents overall ethical orientation, or moral character. Thus, Kant seeks to provide a picture of the moral agent that more adequately accounts for our ordinary ways of speaking. The picture of moral character Kant develops, moreover, is clearly a response to the picture set out by his (near) contemporary Rousseau, who Kant believes has an overly optimistic conception of our natural moral disposition (Kant, Rel.: 6:20). Second, he seeks to dramatically revise the traditional account of original sin so as to make it compatible with his account of ethical responsibility. The traditional view, roughly speaking, held one of two things. Either, our rst parents fell from grace and in doing so corrupted our human nature so thoroughly that each human being inherits this corrupted human nature and the guilt that goes with it. Or, all human beings somehow participate in the sin of our rst parents. Thus, all human beings share a corrupted human nature and guilt as a result of the corporate nature of the original act. As Philip Quinn has noted, these views became unacceptable during the enlightenment.3 How could one be held morally responsible for an act that one did not directly commit? To the modern thinker, views that blame the moral agent for acts that he did not commit are antiquated and absurd. Despite the inadequacy of these theological views, Kant obviously saw deep value in the Genesis story on which they are based. Kant recognizes that this story is attempting to explain a fundamental feature not of our ancestral past, but of everyday moral life. We nd ourselves and our fellow man in a constant and undeniable struggle with evil. The question, then, is: why should it be so? Why should a free rational agent, endowed with respect for the moral law, willingly choose to do what he knows to be wrong? Furthermore, how can we explain our struggle with evil without thereby minimizing our responsibility for our own acts? These are dicult questions to answer. Insofar as we take our actions to result from the free power of choice, any explanation of that choice threatens our conception of these actions as free. Yet, Kant claims that all human beings, though free, have a corrupt moral character, for which they themselves are responsible. How, then, can we adequately ground such a claim without
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See his excellent essay, Does Anxiety Explain Original Sin?

oering an explanation that threatens our conception of human freedom? In order to understand Kants answer to this question, I will attempt to explain and evaluate the quote with which I opened this paper.

Kants Conception of Moral Character

Before going on to examine Kants claim that human beings are evil by nature, it will be helpful to get his conception of moral character into view. What follows, however, will be purely expository in nature. Although Kants conception of moral character seems laden with diculties, and may ultimately be unsustainable, a critique of this concept would take us beyond the scope of this paper. As such, we shall simply explore the fundaments of his conception of moral character before moving on. In order to provide a meaningful role for moral character in his practical philosophy, Kant must provide us with an account of how our moral character inuences intentional action. Kant portrays our moral character as the subjective ground that guides our adoption of all our maxims. In other words, our moral character acts as an ever present inuence upon our free power of choice. Since this subjective ground inuences the adoption of all our actions, we can call it the ultimate ground of inuence on the power of choice. Kant even goes so far as to speak of it not merely as a ground, but a characteristic of the power of choice (Kant, Rel.: 6:25, my emp.).4 We might, according to Kant, think about this ground of the power of choice in two ways. On the one hand, we might say this ground is a type of natural impulse. This would be to follow the traditional representation of our moral character as the result, not merely of choice and training, but also of our personal and human nature. It would be say, at some level, that our moral character is something that we did not chose, but that we possess in
Perhaps Kant speaks too strongly here. After all, this comment makes the ground internal to our power of choice. But it seems strange to say that this ground is an attribute of freedom itself. We might, however, read Kant as meaning that our moral character as ever present in our legislation of maxims - is in some sense constitutive of our power of choice. This would lead, unfortunately, to a paradox: if this ground is constitutive of our free power of choice, then it cannot itself be chosen since our power of choice is not yet fully constituted. This result is unacceptable, and furthermore, results from our thinking of this maxim as something chosen in time. Perhaps, it is best to treat this ground (and its precise relationship to the power of choice) as in some sense mysterious, while nevertheless maintaining that it is of central importance for our selection of all other maxims.
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virtue of who we are. This, however, would compromise Kants picture of human freedom. As Kant says: If this ground were ultimately no longer itself a maxim, but merely a natural impulse, the entire exercise of freedom could be traced back to a determination through natural causes and this would contradict freedom (Kant, Rel.: 6:21) On the other hand, we might represent this ultimate ground as freely chosen. Kant argues that we must treat the ultimate ground of our power of choice in this way in order to preserve human freedom as postulate of pure practical reason. Since Kant portrays the power of choice as legislating maxims, Kant treats this ultimate ground as itself maxim, a supreme maxim. Thus, Kant represents our moral character as a freely chosen maxim. According to Kant, we must recognize two particular features of this supreme maxim. First, we must posit the adoption of the supreme maxim as antecedent to every use of freedom given in experience (Kant, Rel.: 6:22). This is a formal restraint on our representation of the supreme maxim. In order for us to conceive of the supreme maxim as the ultimate ground of every exercise of the power of choice, we must represent it as being adopted previous to any exercise of the power of choice given in experience. This requires us to claim that the supreme maxim is adopted outside of time. For, if the supreme maxim were adopted in time, this would itself be an exercise of freedom in experience. For this reason, Kant says, perhaps misleadingly, that we can call the supreme maxim innate,5 since it has been present in the agent always, from his youth on 6 (Kant, Rel.: 6:25). Second, although
I nd this terminology misleading because it has absolutely nothing to do with our ordinary usage of the term innate. 6 When Kant says that we can think of this maxim as present always, from his youth on he seems to be attempting to coordinate an atemporal, noumenal act with a our experience of time. (No doubt, this is an attempt to correlate his story with the traditional theological account.) From my vantage point, this is a mistake. We should simply leave it as an abstract posit: the supreme maxim precedes every use of freedom given in experience. Since we cannot say with any certainty, based on experience, when freedom is rst exercised, only that it is, we should likewise refrain from judging as to when the supreme maxim is rst present in the human being. Other things that Kant says would seem to support this. (See Kant, Rel.: 6:40: To look for the temporal origin of free actions as free (as though they were natural eects) is ... a contradiction; and hence [it is] also a contradiction to look for the temporal origin of the moral constitution of the human being.)
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reason will naturally lead us to inquire into the subjective ground for the supreme maxim, we must treat the supreme maxim as inscrutable. If the supreme maxim is freely chosen, and if the supreme maxim has a ground, then must be grounded by yet another maxim. But if the supreme maxim is grounded upon another maxim, it is not supreme. Furthermore, we would naturally inquire into the ground of this new supreme maxim. Thus, we would be lead into an innite regress without, as Kant says, ever being able to come to the rst ground (Kant, Rel.: 6:21, footnote)7 . In order to forestall such a regress, we are led to posit the supreme maxim as the ultimate and inscrutable ground of our exercise of freedom. So far, we have only dealt with the form that moral character must take, according to Kant, in order to function as the ultimate ground of the power of choice. We shall now discuss Kants conception of the content of moral character. Since human beings possess a nite rational volition, their are two sources for the material that is incorporated their maxims: (1) respect for the moral law and (2) natural inclinations.8 According to Kant, material from either of these sources would be, of itself, sucient for the determination of [our] power of choice. Furthermore, Kant explicitly states that both of these sources are naturally good. Material from the rst source can be attributed to human predisposition to personality, while material from the second source can be attributed to our predisposition to animality. And Kant says that both animality and personality are positive goods for the human being. Nevertheless, the result is that human volition is, as it were, overdetermined. This is the point at which we can see how the supreme maxim serves as the subjective ground of all other maxims. The supreme maxim serves as a general precept regulating how material from these sources should be integrated into maxims. In other words, the supreme maxim is a principle of subordination. As Kant puts it, material from one source must be subordinated to the other as its supreme condition (Kant, Rel.: 6:36). There are, therefore, two possible arrangements for human moral character. Either we choose to subordinate our natural inclinations to our respect for the moral law. In that case, we only pursue the satisfaction of these inclinations insofar as they do not contradict the moral law. Or, we choose to subordinate our respect for the moral law to our natural inclinations. In which case, we
See also Kant, Rel.: 6:25 See Wood (1970: Chp. 2) for an excellent discussion of Kants conception of the nature of nite rational volition.
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only act out of respect for the moral law insofar as this does not prevent us from pursuing the satisfaction of our natural inclinations. Finally, Kant claims that the moral value of our character ultimately rests on the way in which this subordination turns out. In the rst case, Kant says that our moral character is good. In the second, that it is evil.9 There is, however, something peculiar about the relationship between the supreme maxim and the particular maxims we adopt. While particular maxims are entirely determinative of our actions, Kant clearly states that the supreme maxim is not. That is to say, if one has an evil supreme maxim, this does not mean that all ones particular maxims will be morally evil, and, we might suppose, visa versa10 . Kant therefore says: Whatever [a persons] previous behavior may have been ... his action is yet free and not determined through any [external or internal] causes; hence the action can and must always be judged as an original exercise of his power of choice. (Kant, Rel.: 6:41) Kant seems to mean that although our moral character, as a subjective ground of our power of choice, inuences our selection of maxims as a general precept for their selection, it in no way limits the maxims from which we may select. Thus, we are always capable of selecting any maxim, be it good or evil, regardless of our overall moral disposition. Again, Kants focus here is to preserve his conception of human freedom. Furthermore, we can ground this representation of our moral character in two practical considerations. First, and most importantly for Kant, this representation allows us to say that even if human beings have an evil character, they are still entirely responsible for their actions.11 Second, it serves as a warning for us to
One common caricature of Kant, then, turns out to be untrue. Kant does not take our natural inclinations to be evil or detrimental to moral action. Kant claims that the inclinations constitute a positive good for human beings. Moral evil results from our choice to make our obedience to moral law subordinate to the satisfaction of our inclinations. That is to say, moral evil results when we treat something that is conditionally good, as unconditionally good (See Kant, Rel.: 6:42). 10 It is curious to note that although we naturally assume that the inverse holds (namely: that a good supreme maxim does not imply that all ones particular maxims will be morally good) Kant never explicitly states this. We shall return to this point below. 11 See Kant, Rel.: 6:41: However evil a human being has been right up to the moment of an impending free action... his duty to better himself was not just in the past: it is still his duty now ; ... should he not do it, he is at the moment of action just as accountable and stands just as condemned as if, though endowed with a natural predisposition to the
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remain vigilant. No matter how habitually we perform good acts, and even if we were to experience a revolution of our supreme maxim, we are always capable of evil.

Kants Argument About Human Nature

Now that we have some understanding of Kants conception of moral character in general, we are ready to address his remarks as to the original or innate state of our moral character. In other words, we are now in a position to examine Kants conception of human nature. According to Kant, we can arm the proposition human beings are evil by nature where this means that human beings, considered as a species, universally adopt an evil supreme maxim. In other words, human beings choose freely and universally to invert the material they incorporate into their maxims. Thus, they have a propensity to subordinate their respect for the moral law to the satisfaction of their natural inclinations. Kant says of this phenomenon: Since this propensity must itself be considered morally evil, hence not a natural predisposition but something that a human being can be held accountable for, and consequently must consist in maxims of the power of choice contrary to the law and yet, because of freedom, such maxims must be viewed as accidental, a circumstance that would not square with the universality of the evil at issue unless their supreme subjective ground were not in all cases somehow entwined with humanity itself and, as it were, rooted in it: so we can call this ground a natural propensity to evil. (Kant, Rel.: 6:32) So, Kant claims we can only account for the fact that an accidental feature of human life - the adoption of particular evil maxims - simultaneously holds universally - all men adopt particular evil maxims - by supposing that all men have adopted an evil supreme maxim. Hence, that the adoption of this maxim is somehow entwined with humanity itself. The diculty, however, is to understand how the Kants claim could be adequately supported. On the one hand, Kant claims that we must refrain
good (which is inseparable from freedom), he had just stepped out of a state of innocence into evil.

from any explanation of the human propensity to evil. He says: This propensity to evil, remains inexplicable to us, for, since it must itself be imputed to us, this supreme ground of all maxims must in turn require the adoption of an evil maxim. Since the propensity to evil is a free action, it can only be explained by the exercise of our power of choice (See Wood (1970: 224)). Any other explanation threatens the postulate of human freedom. On the other hand, Kant must oer some explanation and support of his claim that such a propensity is to be found universally in human beings and therefore expresses ... the character of his species (Kant, Rel.: 6:21). Kant attempts to do this in the Religion by means of an argument which I shall call the Anthropological Argument. According to this argument, we can adequately support the claim that human beings are evil by nature using evidence drawn from the social sciences. Kant suggests this early on in the Religion when he says that the universal propensity to evil in human nature can only be demonstrated... if it transpires from anthropological research that ... there is no cause for exempting anyone from [an evil character], and that the character therefore applies to the species. Kant claims that on the basis of such empirical evidence can we infer a priori the existence of an evil supreme maxim in all men. Allen Wood oers a superb explanation of how the Anthropological Argument might work. Wood begins with the case of a single individual: If an individual has committed an evil action, then we can rationally infer that he acted upon an evil maxim. While this does not enable us to infer that all of the individuals maxims are therefore evil, it does mean that I may legitimately infer that [his] moral character is such that [he is] liable to the adoption of evil maxims (Wood 1970: 223). According to Wood, Kant thinks that this liability to adopt evil maxims indicates a propensity to evil in the individuals moral character. In other words, we can infer that this man has adopted an evil supreme maxim. Now, Wood believes that Kant wants to generalize the individual case to the species as a whole using anthropological evidence. In other words, we can demonstrate that all men possess a propensity to evil, if the social sciences provide evidence that all men commit evil acts. Wood thus goes on to explain that since Kant thinks that the members of all societies, from the most primitive societies to the most culturally advanced, exhibit evil, we can legitimately infer that all human beings are by nature evil.12
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Kant seems to make an argument of this form at [Kant, Rel.: 6:33-34].

In order to get the entire argument clearly in view, we can schematize the Anthropological Proof as follows: 1. When an individual commits an evil act (or acts), we can infer that he acted upon an evil maxim. 2. If an individual acts upon an evil maxim, he must be liable to the adoption of evil maxims. 3. Individuals who are liable to the adoption of evil maxims possess an evil supreme maxim. 4. These individuals thus have a propensity to evil. 5. Anthropological evidence shows that individuals in all societies, from the most primitive to the most advanced, commit evil acts. 6. If men in all societies commit evil acts, they must (from (1)-(4)) have a propensity to evil. 7. Therefore, all men have a propensity to evil. We should begin by noting that the rst four premises rest on a priori inferences. Inferences, in other word, of pure practical reason. Premise (5), however, is entirely empirical. As such, the Anthropological Proof can be challenged on two ways: conceptually and empirically. I believe, moreover, that signicant challenges can be raised on both fronts. Lets begin with the conceptual problem. Kant insists, as we have seen, that although our moral character serves as the subjective ground of the power of choice, each exercise of freedom is original in the sense that the power of choice remains unconstrained. In other words, our moral character is not entirely determinative of our particular maxims. Only on the basis of this assumption can Kant maintain that all individuals, even those with an evil moral character, are required, and hence capable, of doing good. This seemingly implies, however, that individuals with a good moral character are equally capable of adopting doing evil. This, however, threatens to invalidate premise (3). For if all individuals, be they of good or evil moral character, are capable of doing evil, there is no reason to think that an individual who

adopts an particular evil maxim, even were he to do so habitually13 , possesses an evil supreme maxim. It seems that Kants concern to protect a libertarian conception of human freedom actually cuts against the argument he hopes to make. We can add to this conceptual problem a worry about the empirical component in this argument. As Kant himself must know, we possess an exceedingly limited amount of anthropological evidence when we consider the entire human race over the whole of history. Thus, in order to make a claim about all human beings, we must rely upon some principle of generalization that would allow us to draw a conclusion about the species as a whole from a limited data set. Such a principle is glaringly absent from Kants argument. Without such a principle, premise (5) doesnt support the conclusion that is supposedly reached in (7). At most, premise (5) supports a more modest conclusion, such as: Every man we have encountered demonstrates a propensity to evil. It is important to see that this is not a concern about inductive reasoning in general. The problem is not induction as such, but the basis for a particular inductive judgment. The source of the diculty, once again, appears to be Kants libertarian conception of freedom. In order to ground a generalization from a small data set to the whole of humanity, we would need to show, for example, that all human beings have some fundamental attribute or are subject to certain similar conditions which aect their power of choice. In other words, we would need to concede that the human will is inuenced by certain causal factors. Now in the sciences, there is no problem with explaining natural phenomena by means of natural laws and principles that describe natural causal interactions. Kant, however, maintains that the human will remains uninuenced by such factors. As such, he can oer no principle of generalization that would license his inductive inference. Thus, his claim for the universality of the propensity to evil appears to be inadequately supported. Finally, I think it is important to note that even if Kant could somehow nd some empirical principle to ground this inductive inference, its not clear that this would solve the problem. His claim, human beings are evil by nature, looks like a metaphysical rather than an empirical proposition. If this is the case, then no amount of empirical evidence could support it. The claim would need a dierent sort of justication altogether.
13 Kant says at [Kant, Rel.: 6:47] that even an individual of evil character can be habituated to observe the law and, therefore, to do good. Why shouldnt we suppose then, that someone with a good character might become habituated to evil?

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Rethinking Kants Argument

Although Allen Woods reconstruction of the Anthropological Argument is likely the strongest argument that could be oered on Kants behalf, the argument remains unconvincing. Although Kant hints that he could provide a more formal proof for the human propensity to evil, he ultimately forgoes such a proof in light of what he considers the abundance of evidence from human experience (Kant, Rel.: 6:33). Unfortunately, we cannot know what type of formal proof Kant thought himself capable of giving. Since Kant claims that the propensity to evil is contingent, and therefore cannot be inferred from the concept of [our] species, it would seem that any claim as to the universality of this propensity must be based upon the cognition we have of the human being through experience (Kant, Rel.: 6:32, my emp.). There can thus be no entirely analytic a priori proof of the evil propensity in human beings.14 In the absence of a formal proof of this type, Kants argument ultimately leaves us unable to reconcile the existence of a universal human propensity to evil with the idea of human freedom. If we retain Kants libertarian conception of freedom, our claim that the propensity to evil is universal appears unsubstantiated. We can oer no convincing justication of this conclusion, nor can we oer any explanation of this phenomenon beyond appeals to the power of choice itself. On the other hand, if we want to retain the idea that human beings possess a propensity to evil, we must explain and justify this conclusion, and thereby weaken Kants conception of freedom. While Kants argument for the universality of a human propensity to evil founders due to his insistence on a libertarian conception of freedom, we might wonder if providing an explanation for this propensity might actually provide us with a more phenomenologically adequate account of human freedom. Id like to briey explore what such an account might look like. I shall call my account the Developmental Argument for the human propensity to evil. Now according to this account the human propensity to evil arises as result of our developmental history. Kant identies predispositions to good in the human being: animality, humanity and personality. These correspond to our sensuous, rational and moral nature, respectively. What Kant does not acknowledge, so far as I am aware, is that these pre14 This, of course, leaves open the possibility that Kants claim is a synthetic a priori proposition.

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dispositions manifest themselves at dierent stages in the individuals developmental history. Human beings, unlike other animals, are not born into the world in their fully actualized form: children must grow into adulthood. While the predisposition to animality is present in human beings from the moment of birth, since they have it merely in virtue of being alive, the other two predispositions are evident only at a certain stage of development. Thus, although the infant is predisposed, assuming all goes well, to one day manifest her propensity to humanity and personality, she does not manifest it at the present moment. Only gradually does she develop a capacity to reason and make moral judgments. I want to suggest that we can attribute the human propensity to evil to this developmental history. As infants, our action is directed by our natural sensuous desires. These desires are unrestrained by the moral law, since we are not yet conscious of such a law. Since, we are not conscious of the law, the law has no claim over our behavior. As such, we do nothing wrong in seeking the satisfaction of our desires. The infant is conditioned, however, by the pleasure that comes from the satisfaction of desires and the discomfort that comes with the frustration of these desires. The infant thus becomes habituated to act upon inclination in order to satisfy its desires.15 The infant eventually recognizes herself as one self among others and thus develops a sense of sociality. We can suppose that not long after this the child develops a capacity for instrumental reasoning, as evident, e.g., in play. Thus, the child begins to take on the the principle characteristics of humanity. Adult gures also begin to introduce a second set of incentives for behavior: reward and punishment. These incentive nurture the childs moral nature. During this period of childhood, the childs will rst manifests itself in experience, emerging out of an history of inchoate history of responses to environmental stimuli. As this child exercises this will, she will become aware of yet another motivation for action, respect for the law, which brings about its own type of subtle satisfaction, the satisfaction that comes from being a free, autonomous agent. This new source of motivation for action, however, is a latecomer. By the time the infant is rst capable of moral action, it has already been habituated to pursue the satisfaction of its desires. As such, even from the very rst manifestations of the childs will given in experience, we shall see that the child chooses to subordinate its awareness of the law to its pursuit
Freuds account of development and the pleasure principle could be used to esh out this picture.
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of pleasure. We can schematize the Developmental Argument in order to support the universality of the propensity to evil as follows. 1. All human beings have a developmental history whereby they acquire various capacities incrementally. 2. The capacity that manifests itself earliest in this developmental history is a capacity towards animality: the pursuit of the satisfaction of desires. 3. Only subsequently, however, do human beings develop a capacity for reason and moral judgement. 4. By the time these capacities develop in the human being, however, the individual already has already become habituated to the pursuit of the satisfaction of its desires. 5. As such, when the individual becomes capable of making a free choice, it will have been habituated in such a way that she will choose to subordinate her respect for the moral law to pursuing the satisfaction of her desires. 6. Therefore, since every human being has a developmental history that leads her to choose to subordinate her respect to the moral law to pursuing the satisfaction of her desires, all human beings have a propensity to legislate for themselves an evil supreme maxim. There are several important things to note about the Developmental Argument. First, it is important to see that (1) is not a necessary proposition. That is to say, it is at least possible and likewise conceivable that there could be a human being that did not have a developmental history. Perhaps one day, human society will have the technological capacity to produce human individuals in adult form. These individuals, then, while human, would have no developmental history. Second, this also implies that the human propensity to evil does not result from the mere concept of a human being, but from a fact, learned through experience, about human development. Third, as Kant himself admits, the fact that human beings have been habituated does not negate human freedom. The child, even in his rst act of freedom, could choose to act out of respect for the moral law. We can, as such, be held 13

morally culpable for this rst act of malfeasance. Nevertheless, it appears that although acting morally is indeed possible, no human child actually succeeds in doing this, and thus we have reason to suspect that our childhood habituation to satisfy our desires is exceedingly forceful. Only through extensive training do human beings overcome this habituation. Finally, this argument contradicts Kants claim that the legislation of the supreme maxim is something that we can trace all the way back to a childs birth. Instead, we must represent the supreme maxim as something that can only be legislated when (and along with) the child is rst capable of the power of choice. Even if we nd this a more convincing argument for the human propensity for human evil, worries might remain about how this account alters Kants conception of freedom. What I want to emphasize is that even though this account modies Kants idea of human freedom, such that it is susceptible to external inuence, these changes do not necessarily negate our ordinary conception of human responsibility. Ordinarily, we recognize that young children lack the capacity to act with full autonomy, we therefore hold them to a separate standard. We oer praise and blame as a form of education, which is intended to mold the childs will and character in the proper way. Furthermore, there is no reason to think that because our exercise of freedom is a capacity developed over the course of time that this somehow minimizes our responsibility for our adult acts. At some point, we are capable of taking our moral development into our own hands. Since we have such a capacity, we are responsible for conforming ourselves to the moral law, even if this requires a extensive process of training and habituation in the practice of virtue. Our account merely emphasizes the diculty in becoming virtuous. We should, after all, recognize the diculty of virtue from our ordinary experience. We praise virtue precisely because it is a form of excellence.

Concluding Remarks

Although Kant puts forth an intriguing picture of our moral character and provides us with an Anthropological Argument for our propensity to evil, we found that these were ultimately unable to support the conclusion that human beings have a propensity to evil. We identied the source of the difculty in Kants libertarian conception of freedom. So long as we conceive of the human will as entirely uninuenced by natural causes (i.e. causes in time), we will be unable to adequately justify the claim that human be14

ings have a universal propensity to evil. As an alternative to the account Kant provides, we briey explored a Developmental Argument for the human propensity to evil. This account retained some of the key features of the Kantian account by insisting that the propensity to evil, while universal, was neither necessary nor analytic. As such, we suggested that human beings can still be held responsible for their actions, even this rst act of transgression. The Developmental Argument, however, requires us to admit that the human will is susceptible to inuence from natural causes. As such, we might worry that we will be unable to retain a suitably strong conception of moral responsibility in light of this modied conception of freedom. Thus, although there may be alternatives to the Kantian account of our propensity to evil, these accounts are not without their own diculties. Nevertheless, if we can nd some way to preserve the idea of moral responsibility, even with an altered conception of freedom, we might eventually be able to oer a more satisfying alternative to the Kantian account of our propensity to evil.

References
Immanuel Kant. Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 1998. Philip L. Quinn. Does anxiety explain original sin? No us, 24:227244, 1990. Allen W. Wood. Kants Moral Religion. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY, 1970.

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