This book, sure to become a standard reference work, is a comprehensive, lucid, and systematic commentary on Kant's practical philosophy. Kant is arguably the most important moral philosopher of the modern period. Using as nontechnical a language as possible, Professor Sullivan offers a detailed, authoritative account of Kant's moral philosophy - including his ethical theory, his philosophy of history, his political philosophy, his philosophy of religion, and his philosophy of education - and demonstrates the historical, Kantian origins of such important (...) notions as 'autonomy', 'respect for persons', 'rights', and 'duties'. An invaluable resource, this book will be extremely useful to advanced undergraduates, graduates, and professional philosophers alike. (shrink)

This is the most up-to-date, brief and accessible introduction to Kant's ethics available. It approaches the moral theory via the political philosophy, thus allowing the reader to appreciate why Kant argued that the legal structure for any civil society must have a moral basis. This approach also explains why Kant thought that our basic moral norms should serve as laws of conduct for everyone. The volume includes a detailed commentary on Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant's most widely studied (...) work of moral philosophy. The book complements the author's much more comprehensive and systematic study Immanuel Kant's Moral Theory, a volume that has received the highest critical praise. With its briefer compass and non-technical style this new introduction should help to disseminate the key elements of one of the great modern philosophies to an even wider readership. (shrink)

I will conclude that the Kantian analyses of Aristotle’s moral theory are historically inaccurate and the criticisms invalid. Further, those criticisms are focused in such a way that they tend to distract us from more fundamental issues, especially the different ontologies presupposed in each theory. If my arguments are sound, they show that much of Kant’s moral philosophy is not as novel as he believed it to be nor as it generally has been taken to be.

One of the more striking developments in contemporary philosophic discussions about morality has been the rise of anti-theory — the rejection of moral theories as ‘unnecessary, undesirable, and/or impossible’. Among those associated with this view have been Bernard Williams, John McDowell, Edmund Pincoffs and James Wallace.

Evolutionary theories of schizophrenia must account for the maintenance of putative alleles in past and present populations despite reduced fitness among the affected. Such models must also account for extant intersex and population-level variability in the expression of schizophrenia. We argue that genetic balanced-polymorphism hypotheses remain the most robust in terms of modeling and testing these processes in populations.

We applaud Müller & Schumann (M&S) for bringing needed attention to the problem of motivation for common non-addictive drug use, as opposed to the usual focus on exotic drugs and addiction. Unfortunately, their target article has many underdeveloped and sometimes contradictory ideas. Here, we will focus on three key issues.

Henrich et al. reject the “selfishness axiom” within a narrowly-defined economic model, and are premature in claiming that they have demonstrated cross-cultural variability in “selfishness” as defined in broader evolutionary theory. We also question whether a key experimental condition, anonymity, can be maintained in the small, cohesive, social groupings employed in the study.

Henrich et al. reject the within a narrowly-defined economic model, and are premature in claiming that they have demonstrated cross-cultural variability in as defined in broader evolutionary theory. We also question whether a key experimental condition, anonymity, can be maintained in the small, cohesive, social groupings employed in the study.

Near the end of each section he reviewed what he had done, and both times he concluded that he had achieved his first two goals. At the end of the first section he wrote.

In this essay I will examine several features of the dominant contemporary view about the nature and functions of practical reason, a view finding its most natural home in deontological theories within the Kantian tradition.

I begin this paper by claiming that commentators who regard the Groundwork as Kant's final word on ethics inevitably misunderstand his moral theory. In support of this claim I focus on how Kant portrayed the role of inclinations in the morally virtuous life. A person who reads only the Groundwork will surely be struck by Kant's negative treatment of desires in that book: they are completely irrelevant to the rightness of our moral judgments, and the only specifically moral motive is (...) dutifulness, excluding all influence of the emotions, which function as the main rival to moral motivation.Kant left a thorough discussion of his division of duties for his Metaphysics of Morals, and there, when he discusses imperfect duties as well as morally permissible activities, we find that the categorical imperative is an indeterminate guide to the majority of our decisions. That is, in such matters, pure practical reason must be supplemented by both prudential judgments and motives grounded on inclinations. Then inclinations operate, not as a crutch to induce us to do our duty, but as a complement to the Categorical Imperative.The Categorical Imperative, therefore, has a more limited role in most of our decisions than appears to be the case in the Groundwork. Yet the all-encompassing role enjoyed by the moral law means that which permissible activities we engage in and exactly how we fulfil positive obligations still both need to be recognized as expressions of a person's character. Contrary a common misinterpretation, then, the criterion of effectiveness can therefore be both relevant to and even mandated by the moral law and so function as a moral category in Kant's theory. Instances in which practice goes amiss in these areas are failures of prudence, and such "faults," as Kant called them, are not necessarily incompatible with a person's ultimate moral commitment.We now can see how misled are those who describe Kant's moral theory as totally rule-bound and excessively rigoristic. That his theory leaves vast areas of our life open to prudential judgments is but another reflection of the way in which he was faitful to the thinking of ordinary people. Zu Beginn meines Beitrags behaupte ich, daß Autoren, die die Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten als sein letztes Wort zur Ethik ansehen, Kants Moraltheorie unvermeidlich mißverstehen. Um diese Behauptung zu begründen, richte ich meinen Blick in erster Linie auf die Frage, wie Kant die Rolle der sinnlichen Antriebe und Neigungen in einem moralisch tugendhaften Leben schildert. Demjenigen, der sich auf die Grundlegung beschränkt, wird die negative Behandlung dieser sinnlichen Antriebe und Neigungen in diesem Buch sicherlich auffallen. Für die Richtigkeit unserer moralischen Urteile spielen sie keine Rolle. Im Gegenteil: Die spezifisch moralische Triebfeder ist allein die Pflicht selbst. Die Gefühle sind von jedem Einfluß ausgeschlossen; statt dessen fungieren sie als die hauptsächlichen Rivalen eines eigentlich moralischen Antriebs.Kant hat die eingehende Erörterung der Einteilung der Pflichten auf die Metaphysik der Sitten verschoben, und wenn er dort sowohl unvollkommene Pflichten als auch moralisch erlaubte Handlungen diskutiert, dann sehen wir, daß der Kategorische Imperativ für die Mehrzahl unserer Entscheidungen nur eine unbestimmte Anleitung liefert. Das heißt, in diesen Bereichen bedarf die reine praktische Vernunft einer Ergänzung, durch Klugheitsurteile wie auch durch Motive, die von unseren Neigungen abhängig sind. Die Neigungen sind in der Metaphysik der Sitten nicht eine Krücke, um uns zu pflichtgemäßem Handeln zu bringen, vielmehr dienen sie der Vervollständigung des Kategorischen Imperativs.Die Rolle, die der Kategorische Imperativ bei den meisten unserer Entscheidungen spielt, ist deshalb viel eingeschränkter, als es in der Grundlegung erscheint. Das bedeutet, daß die Art und Weise, wie wir unsere positiven Verpflichtungen erfüllen, und die Auswahl der erlaubten Handlungen, auf die wir uns einlassen, immer noch als Ausdruck des Charakters unserer Person anerkannt werden müssen, obwohl und weil das moralische Gesetz über allem steht. Entgegen einem gewöhnlichen Mißverständnis kann auch das Kriterium der Effektivität für das moralische Gesetz relevant und vom moralischen Gesetz sogar vorgeschrieben sein und so in Kants Theorie als eine moralische Kategorie fungieren. Soweit diese Überlegungen reichen, erweisen sich Mängel in unserer Praxis als Fälle, in denen unsere Klugheit versagt hat, und derartige "Fehler", wie Kant sie nennt, sind nicht notwendigerweise unvereinbar mit einem Selbstverständnis, daß das moralische Gesetz für mich letztendlich die entscheidende Rolle spielt.Wir sehen nun, wie falsch eine Interpretation ist, die Kants Moraltheorie als vollständig an Regeln gebunden und übertrieben rigoristisch beschreibt. Daß seine Theorie große Bereiche unseres Lebens für Klugheitsentscheidungen offen läßt, ist nur ein anderer Aspekt seiner Bindung an die "gemeine Menschenvernunft". (shrink)

Some twenty years ago, W. F. R. Hardie focused his attention on an issue which has since become a programmatic theme for Aristotelian scholars. He wrote: "In speaking of the good for man Aristotle hesitates between an inclusive and an exclusive formulation. [He further fails] to make explicit the distinction between the comprehensive plan and the paramount end". Since that time, virtually everyone writing on Aristotle's ethics has essayed a view about what Aristotle said or should have said about the (...) best human life. (shrink)

The title of this book indicates its main theme, that "the most central concept" in an analysis of intelligent activity is that of making. The author begins by asking, "what in general we might mean by the 'process' of making if we consider it as a form of intelligible activity," and proceeds both by analyzing the grammar of claims about making things and by inviting us to look more closely at the activity of making.

This volume consists of twenty brief papers delivered at the Tenth Jerusalem Philosophical Encounter, held in January 1992, and published under the general editorship of Yirmiyahu Yovel. Only one essay has appeared previously.