Kant attempted a synthesis between rationalist and empiricist views of morality. He believed that "moral sense" and hedonism were mistaken concepts of morality.

According to Kant, moral principles must have the characteristics of universal law and feelings only apply to the individual experiencing them.

The Critique of Pure Reason is Kant's attempt to reconcile 2 contemporary (of his time) theories of knowledge: British empiricism and Continental thought

for British Empiricism (see John Locke, Berkeley, David Hume)

for Continental thought (see Rationalism, Descartes, Leibnitz, Wolff)

The Kantian Bridge (synthesis) of these two schools of thought is marked by

the passive empiricist mind of David Hume (skepticism = human ideas are bereft of necessity)

changing to an active critical mind (which organizes the world according to reason)

Key terms for understanding Kant include "forms of intuition" and "categories of thought".

For Kant, necessity means the universal operation of human reason.

To establish possibility of metaphysics as a science, it must be shown that synthetic a priori truths (prior to human experience) are possible; that a priori laws (prior to human experience) of cognitive activity exist. In other words, there are important truths knowable by reason alone independent of perceptual experience.

FREEDOM AND REASON

For Kant, determinism was not compatible with morality because only those who are true authors of their acts which they are free to or not perform, can be praised or blamed for what they do.

Responsibility entails freedom of choice (from Rousseau) AND spawns cult of moral autonomy. All decisions of moral will are to be guided by freely adopted principles.

Kant's intellectual debt to Rousseau lies in the idea that man is an active being, possessor of will which makes him free to resist temptations of the senses: Kant's free moral will.

Critique of Practical Reason: was Kant's attempt to create a purely rational ethic; to show that reason controls, drives and determines external ends.

Kant sought a priori (prior to human experience) categorical laws of the rational will; he sought to base morality on pure reason (not on experience). This is because even the empiricists themselves  understood that human experience was different for each individual.

Freedom: for Kant, the human will is free; people use reason and voluntarily chose to be moral; morality and freedom are both parallel and dovetail.

Kant's law is like Rousseau's general will:

it is a condition of freedom and morality

there is no real distinction between freedom and law

Diderot: in his work Rameau's Nephew shows freedom to be self-consciousness

Rousseau sees freedom as what human must do to be natural

Kant defines freedom as the individual's commitment to his or her own conscience; the capacity of pure reason to determine the will's total activity.

This is an objective ethic based on freedom, e.g. not subject to conditions (not "relative").

Therefore, according to Kant, moral laws cannot be based on the pleasure/pain principle.

Maxims (moral law) claim universality because they are based on form (reason) not content (experience); i.e. a priori (prior to human experience).

The moral test for Kant: Universalize the statement and see if the maxim negates itself (this is the categorical imperative.)

For example:

To make one man happy as a goal is OK.

To make all men happy as a goal is not possible.

Therefore, this cannot be a moral maxim.

According to Kant, humans know freedom through experiencing moral law as duty, rational necessity:

"thou ought" implies "thou canst"

The moral law allows us to know ourselves to be free.

This fundamental law of pure practical reason is the Categorical Imperative:

"So act that the maxim of" your will could always hold at the same time as a principle establishing universal law."

This imperative is categorical because it is unconditioned, e.g. it is universal not grounded in particulars.

It is imperative because it is experienced as DUTY, as an inner compulsion provided by reason

This is a philosophical statement of the golden rule.

- This is an extension of the maxim of self love to include the happiness of others.

- Freedom's objectiveness is perceived through reason's practical operation (rather than theoretical).

- Reason: every moral postulate is objective and rational, cognitive (we only know it through experiencing it).

What is Enlightenment? published

He defines a crucial distinction (which is later picked up by Romantics):

The German word verstand means use of reason, understanding, intelligence.

The connotation is more human.

The German word vernumft means REASON

The connotation is more abstract.

REASON

For Kant, reason is used in a functional sense; it is the activity and process of knowing (Kant focuses on the use of reason, the function of the human mind and not of an individual entity.)

The person who thinks is the center of reality; cause and effect is located in humans - the individual becomes the center of thought (not the object of thought as the center).

The categories of understanding impose structure on reality. Humans are defined by reason and use of reason [as compared with Hume's subjectivism and skepticism].

FOR KANT, THE ONLY PRECONDITION FOR REASON IS FREEDOM - really, reason is a part of Kant's definition of freedom - free use of reason is implicit in his definition.

For the Philosphes , freedom was not a necessary condition of enlightenment. The Philosphes believed that an enlightened despot could reform society.

For Kant, the use of reason cannot be promulgated by an Enlightened despot, society must have freedom.

Both free thought and speech in the public forum are required for society to be free.

[This is a reversal of our public private notion; right to privacy.]

Kant does not see Enlightenment as a revolutionary process; he recognizes that both

political revolution: can change leaders and

social revolution: chance of structure.