11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 1 of 6

Read What is Enlightenment for next time. With Kant we move into the enlightenment, the enlightenment was a movement of thought from 1689 to 1789 roughly. A century or so in which England, Scotland, Germany, and France thanks to the rise of modern science there was a new found trust in the power of reason to examine everything. In order to examine politics, religion, etc to see that they pass or fail the test of reason. The test of what human reason decrees to be true or false, right or wrong. This means that all beliefs, values, practices, institutions, must be subject to the test of reason. Reason you might say is the ultimate court passing judgment on all the sciences, arts, humanities, everything human beings think about without exception. This means trying to find universally acceptable principles on thought, values, and conduct. The principles which are valid everywhere, in all human societies, across time, pass, present, and future. Along with the desire to find universal values, and principles we also have skepticism of all things currently accepted. Nothing is sacred. Another principle is the belief in the possibility of progress, progress in the use of nature to learn more about all workings of societies. There was also belief in intellectual and material progress, the elevation of mankinds physical being through improved diets, medicine, laws, and the like. Over the course of time human beings learn more and are able to live better lives than they could in the past. The beginning of the development of a new ideal for society and for politics. The rearrangement of all social, and political institutions according to rational principles, not church, or political authority, but only reason. The goal of this rearrangement the creation of a secular society and with it a secular political order based on individual rights and freedoms, along with the assumption of moral equality for all human beings. With Kant we have the pinnacle of enlightenment thinking. Kants philosophical work comprises a complete system. The core of his system which is called the critical philosophy contains the following elements. 1. An account of knowledge, truth, and justification or epistemology. 2. A metaphysics, an account of the nature of reality. 3. An ethics, or a moral theory. All of these comprise the core of Kants system so that what we will be discussing is at the peripheral of the system, Kants political theory, and as we will see his philosophy of history. We will be discussing essays which do not explain the background, so you have to keep in mind that you are not being given enough explanation for the principles Kant endorses.

11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 2 of 6 What Kant claims in his political theory is that politics in terms of theory and practice must depend upon morality, or ethics. There can be no valid political theory without a valid moral theory behind it. Moral theory must come first then you can formulate a political theory. All conduct and values that a society must hold can be found in the moral moral theory. If you try to separate one from the other you will be doing moral and political harm to ones self. Kants claim is that the only valid moral theory is the correct one. In effect there must be moral foundations to politics. - We must determine which principles a political system should value in the eyes of reason. - According to Kant only in the modern age are people constructing political theories that are legitimate in the eyes of reason. Only in the modern age are these things be based on universally valued principles. - Earlier forms of political thought were particularistic, they accepted only particular features in deciding right to participate in politics, and be a member of a polis. Kant argues this method is wrong because it cannot pass the test of reason. Only one type of principle can, this is a universal principle. i. This is the basis for Kants moral universalism. What matters only is that the being in question has the power to reason. All empirical traits are morally irrelevant. The power to reason plus the power to choose gives us all we need in terms of a universal moral theory. The modern age is legitimate because it accepts the absolute value, or worth of each and every individual in respect to the ability to reason and free will. So Kant constructs a political theory based on this moral universalism. The only right government is one that recognizes the equal worth, or equality of all human beings. 2 Key elements 1. Human beings have equal value or worth. 2. Each rational being ought to be recognized of having equal value and worth. a. It is always wrong to treat a rational being as a tool or a means. Example of this would be slavery being wrong because it treats a person as only a means to an end. - Kant argues in his moral theory that no one can be excluded from his moral theory. Even those who commit crimes maintain certain rights because they have reason. This means someone can be punished but the punishment must not be excessive.

11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 3 of 6 3. Moral rights as in freedoms of thoughts and action. By granting these freedoms one has a right to pursue what he would like to pursue. What Kant explains is why the modern age deserves our attention and acceptance. Why would ought to accept reason and how we ought to construct the modern state. What laws we ought to enact in order promote these key elements. Happiness for a person is relative, people should be able to pursue whatever it is that makes them happy, providing it does not interfere with the rights of anyone else to do the same. A just state recognizes a persons freedoms. The only test for a valid political system is moral universalism. Kant defends the modern age on the grounds that we have got to recognize the only valid morality is a universal one. Governments have begun to recognize that all citizens are to be treated as bearers of absolute value. The state exists to satisfy their demands for just laws. Also that states rule with the consent of the governed. As Reiss explains there are certain requirements which Kant claims reason must recognize. These requirements are at the foundation of his moral universalism. His critical philosophy is based on his epistemology, metaphysics, and also his ethics. Kant develops his philosophy much in the way Euclidean geometry is developed. 1. Universally valid principles. 2. Principles are necessarily true, they are not true contingently. a. Two kinds of truth contingent and necessary. The arrangement of the solar system is contingent or it could have been otherwise. We can identify truths that need not be true, these are contingent truths. b. Necessary truths cannot be otherwise, such as the sum of the angles of a triangle, or the laws of nature. 3. Un-conditionality The truths of mathematics for example are unconditionally true. 4. The truths of math or physics transcend experience. They are what Kant calls apriori. Apriori means what is independent of experience, this means independent of any sensory experience of any individual. Apriori reason strips away all contingent features, and uses only pure concepts. - Take for example four raindrops, two raindrops and two raindrops would be one raindrop, but we have to strip away what is observable through experience. 2 + 2 will always equal 4, and experiences will vary from person to person and culture to culture. This means experience can never give us what is necessarily true, universally true, or true unconditionally. - Kant claims that his moral theory gives us unconditional truths about values and conduct. The same truths we can get for math or physics we can get for morality. - This means we can get these unconditional truths for politics also because politics is based on morality.

11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 4 of 6 5. The principles of math or physics are objective, they are not relative to the individual. Because we have reason we can all share the understanding of these abstract truths no matter what our personal situations may be no matter what we want to be true, or our emotional makeup and the like. The idea is that the only thing we can share is reason. We cannot share emotions because those vary from person to person and mood to mood. Intuitions also vary. Experiences have the same problems, we dont all share the same experiences. We must look to something objective and only reason can do that. Kants works are written for the general educated public and not other philosophers. What Kant does is reach out to the public to try and explain some of the consequences of his critical philosophy. In the first essay Idea for Universal History what Kant is doing is adding to the Newtonian framework. Nature consists of two substances, matter and energy. Similar to Hobbes understanding. There is nothing divine or supernatural within nature as a whole. It contains only matter and energy. All the phenomenon of nature are governed by the same necessary universal laws. The Newtonian world view is anti teleological. We have the rejection of teleology. There are no meanings or values within nature, there is only matter and energy. i. This means that we cannot derive any value system from nature itself. Moreover because the laws of nature have no exceptions or counterexamples, the laws of nature cover all of nature from the big bang to the end of the universe. This means we have determinism, there is only causality. Every cause has an effect and every effect has a cause without exception. ii. Humans are only matter and energy. Our behavior is determined by the laws of nature, not free will. By this picture of reality free will is impossible, it would be tantamount to our minds not following the laws of nature, meaning our minds would be supernatural. This picture gives us a powerful perspective to explain nature as a whole, it also means that having free will is just an illusion, in reality all that we think and all that we do is pre determined. If we accept this we will have demoralization. Meaning we will cease to strive. All that we are, is determined outside of us based on the laws of nature and the prior history outside of us. This means ultimately that morality is an illusion. We cannot be praised or blamed because we do not choose our own actions anymore than a robot chooses to move or our computers choose to run software.

11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 5 of 6 The only way according to Kant to preserve morality and our belief in self improvement is by supplementing the Newtonian world view and this is what he argues in this essay. What he want to do is argue that the above picture of nature is valid and is valid absolutely. Like Hobbes he accepts the conclusion that mathematical and physical truth is beyond any possibility of error and revision. These are all completed sciences, and Kant believes the same about Newton, it is beyond doubt, but this means we must deal qith the consequences of our self interest. We must accept Newtonian view of nature, but supplement it with a kind of teleology.

Kant argues that there are certain concepts or ideas with a capital I which reason needs to use. In particular the ideas of Gods existence, the immortality of the soul, and teleology (that nature does have a purpose, even though according to Newton it cannot have one.) So what are ideas? According to Kant Ideas are special principles according to enquiry, they regulate our thinking. In particular they regulate our thinking about values and conduct, they are used for practical purposes, or practice, meaning action or conduct, there are two different deployments of reason. 1. Theoretical reason The discovery of eternally valid necessary truths. The goal is knowledge for its own sake, to know for the sake of knowing without any application for what is known. 2. Practical reason Reason regarding how we ought to act or conduct ourselves. It does not mean practicality, it means politics, law, and the like are about how we ought to act. Politics, morality, and law are all examples of practical reason. We can use these values in practical reason alone. We cannot ever use practical reason to undermine theoretical reason but what we can use it for it to be better individuals. These ideas must guide our living even though we can never show that they are valid. We can say they are hypothetical, but reason must accept them in their practical mode of conduct. Otherwise we would destroy our morality and state.

He argues we need to and have a right to assume that nature has a purpose even though you can never validate this claim. There is no possible experience or data that can validate this. We have a need and right to assume that this purpose is manifested in human history. This is a link between Kants political philosophy and his philosophy of history. We have to assume there is a purpose to our existence, otherwise human life would cease to be meaningful and there would only be randomness and this would be demoralizing. We expect continuity with the past and that things will continue more or less how it has in the past. The sun will rise and people will go on being accountable for their actions. People will go on being praised or blamed depending on how they act. Either we assume that

11/06/2009 Kant Lecture Notes #1 Page - 6 of 6 nature and history are meaningful or they are random, if they are random there are great consequences for our meaning and well being. The purpose which nature and history have are a universal one, it is a purpose applicable to all human societies past, present, and future. There is only one human history, that of the species. The history of nations or culture are just a microcosm of the major species history. Species improve their knowledge, and level of morality, it is an improvement over the past. Move from particularism to universalism as we move from antiquity to the modern age. He is referring to all situations where universalism was not thought of or considered. A move to return to any of the past value systems would be morally wrong. Kant gives two argument for accepting the idea of teleology. 1. It is how we ought to see nature and human history in order for us to have any rational thought for human progress. We must accept the Newtonian system because it is valid beyond any question but we must supplement it. If we believe things occur at random we will give up hope, we will stop trying to be better, our moral striving will be weakened and even destroyed. Which is true, if you think something is impossible will you try to achieve it? No, and the more you think it is possible the more you will try to achieve it. The more we believe it can be done, the more we will try to achieve it. The idea of teleology is needed to enable us to fulfill the prophecy in a positive way. 2. We have a moral duty to see nature and history as teleological, we have a moral duty not be corrupt, and not to give way to despair and be demoralized. - Wouldnt it be irrational to be vulnerable to despair? Yes of course it would be.