[lit-ideas] Re: A serious inquiry: Hannah
- From: "Phil Enns" <phil.enns@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2006 18:53:03 -0400
Walter Okshevsky wrote:
"Moral judgement for Kant has no necessary relation to ends desired.
Moral judgements are practical judgements (and conversely). Morality and
politics are separate spheres for Kant ..."
Certainly there is no necessary relation between moral judgments and
ends desired, and morality and politics are separate spheres, but it
seems to me there is a relationship between the two for Kant that comes
out in _Conflict_. Government has a responsibility to promote proper
moral judgments.
"According to reason (that is, objectively), the following order exists
among the incentives that the government can use to achieve its end (of
influencing the people): first comes the eternal well-being of each ...
By public teachings about the first of these [i.e. eternal well-being],
the government can exercise very great influence to uncover the inmost
thoughts and guide the most secret intentions of its subjects."
The manner in which Kant thinks religion can be used to promote proper
moral judgments is described in _Religion Within the Limits_, but
clearly Kant here sees a role for Government in guiding moral judgments.
This role is a role proper to Government not practical reason yet the
proper exercise of practical reason facilitates the operation of good
Government and so Government ought to concern itself with practical
reason.
Government concerns itself with practical reason not only through the
practice of religion but also through legislative power.
"To refuse to obey an external and supreme will on the grounds that it
allegedly does not conform with reason would be absurd; for the dignity
of the government consists precisely in this: that it does not leave its
subjects free to judge what is right or wrong according to their own
notions, but [determines right and wrong - trans.] for them by precepts
of the legislative power."
The exercise of practical reason is not a solitary practice but communal
and so there is a place for Government to guide practical reason through
its legislative power. To be clear, Kant is not at all suggesting that
this legislative power determines practical judgments but rather
functions as a reification of a common practical reason.
To guard against the conflation of the moral and political spheres, Kant
turns to philosophy.
"Now we may well comply with a practical teaching out of obedience, but
we can never accept it as true simply because we are ordered to. This
is not only objectively impossible (a judgment that ought not to be
made), but also subjectively quite impossible (a judgment that no one
can make). ... So when it is a question of the truth of a certain
teaching to be expounded in public, the teacher cannot appeal to a
supreme command nor the pupil pretend that he believed it by order.
This can happen only when it is a question of action, and even then the
pupil must recognize by a free judgment that such a command was really
issued and that he is obligated or at least entitled to obey it;
otherwise, his acceptance of it would be an empty pretense and a lie.
Now the power to judge autonomously - that is, freely (according to
principles of thought in general) - is called reason. So the philosophy
faculty, because it must answer for the truth of the teachings it is to
adopt or even allow, must be conceived as free and subject only to laws
given by reason, not by the government."
The Philosophy faculty serves the interests of the Government by testing
the truth of any public teaching so that what is authorized by the
Government not only has the force of legislative power but also, and
most importantly, the force of reason. Philosophy determines whether
particular practical judgments is true and therefore to be endorsed by
the Government while also determining whether any particular act of
Government is true and therefore ought to be disseminated as part of the
communal practical reason. In this way political judgment and moral
judgment are distinguished yet a necessary relationship between the two
comes into view.
I agree with Walter that it is all very messy but I think one can find
in Kant's writing, and in particular _Conflict_, a sense that there is a
necessary relationship between the exercise of political judgment and
practical judgment.
Sincerely,
Phil Enns
Toronto, ON
------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
Other related posts:
