Andrews Reath
Biographic Data
| ID | 163823 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Andrews Reath |
| GIVEN NAMES | Andrews |
| FAMILY NAME | Reath |
| SIGNATURE | REATH A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California, Riverside |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 30 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 202 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 27 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 3 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1988 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Kantian Constructivism and Kantian Constitutivism: Some Reflections
Is moral constructivism an account of the basis of the content of morality or of its authority? In fact, different writers have understood constructivism to be addressing different issues. In this paper I argue that Kant should be understood as a constructivist about the content of morality – or better about a limited set of general substantive principles – and as a constititutivist about its authority. After some general remarks in Section 1 abo…
Kant's Moral Philosophy
"Philosophical ethics consists in the human endeavor to answer rationally the fundamental question of how we should live. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics explores the history of philosophical ethics in the western tradition from Homer until the present day. It provides a broad overview of the views of many of the main thinkers, schools, and periods, and includes in addition essays on topics such as autonomy and impartiality. The auth…
Paul Hurley, Beyond Consequentialism (Oxford and New York: (Oxford University Press, 2009), pp. viii + 275
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Will, Obligatory Ends and the Completion of Practical Reason: Comments on Barbara Herman's Moral Literacy
This paper discusses three inter-related themes in Barbara Herman's Moral Literacy – the idea that, for Kant, the will is a ‘norm-constituted power’ whose activity is guided by its own internal norm, that the obligatory ends are reasonably viewed as the ends of all rational choice, and that morality ‘completes’ practical reason or rational agency
Kant's Critique of Practical Reason: A Critical Guide
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Kant's three Critiques, and his second work in moral theory after the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. Its systematic account of the authority of moral principles grounded in human autonomy unfolds Kant's considered views on morality and provides the keystone to his philosophical system. The essays in this volume shed light on the principal arguments of the second Critique and explore thei…
Two conceptions of compatibilism in the Critical Elucidation
The 'Critical Elucidation of the Analytic of Pure Practical Reason' develops two distinctive conceptions of how freedom of choice and causal determinism may be reconciled. These two conceptions of freedom of choice correspond to a distinction between what Kant calls 'psychological' and what he calls 'transcendental freedom'. The Critical Elucidation presents the argument of the Analytic of Pure Practical Reason as a kind of practical syllogism th…
Kant's 'Critique of Practical Reason': A Critical Guide
Autonomy of the Will as the Foundation of Morality
This chapter distinguishes the various claims that make up the thesis that autonomy of the will is the foundation of morality, and offers a reconstruction of the arguments on which they depend. To do so it argues that autonomy should be interpreted as a kind of sovereignty. The model for the autonomous agent is the political sovereign not subject to any outside authority, who has the power to enact law. The chapter proceeds as follows. Section II…
Agency and Universal Law
This chapter offers some reflections about how the Formula of Universal Law (FUL) has been understood by those who think that it can provide substantive guidance about choice and action. If the FUL were a purely formal criterion of universalizability, it would not reliably lead to any substantive moral judgments. These theorists have not, in general, understood the FUL as purely formal. Rather, they have incorporated a conception of rational agen…
Legislating for a Realm of Ends: The Social Dimension of Autonomy
This chapter uses the connection between Kant's conception of autonomy and his concept of a realm of ends to explore a number of issues about the nature of autonomy. It begins by developing some general observations about how freedom and autonomy may be related to governance by rules and standards. We tend to think that rules restrict free activity, but there are also rules that make meaningful and creative activities possible. Attention to the d…
Legislating the Moral Law
This chapter spells out two distinct senses in which the rational will legislates moral requirements: one that holds for the Categorical Imperative, and a different sense that holds for particular categorical imperatives or moral requirements. The Formula of Universal Law is a law that Kant derives from the nature of rational volition or rational choice. In this sense, it is a law that the rational will legislates or gives to itself. Roughly, the…
Self-Legislation and Duties to Oneself
This chapter considers some of Kant's ‘foundational’ remarks about duties to oneself and some of the problems that they raise. It focuses on the problems that emerge from Kant's attempt to dispel an apparent conceptual difficulty that he thinks attends the concept of duties to oneself. Essentially, he takes a fairly straightforward concept and, rather than shedding light on it, puts it under a cloud. The chapter begins with a brief commentary on …
The Categorical Imperative and Kant's Conception of Practical Rationality
This chapter outlines an explanation of how Kant grounds morality in reason. It argues that all rational choice is guided by normative considerations (reasons with normative force for the agent). In moral choice, the reasons from which the agent acts are in fact sufficient to justify the action to anyone. Such a view underlies Kant's derivation of the Categorical Imperative, and offers the best understanding of the connection that he draws betwee…
Agency and the Imputation of Consequences in Kant's Ethics
This chapter analyzes the structure and underlying rationale of Kant's principles of imputation (Zurechnung), with particular concern for his principles governing the moral imputation of bad consequences. It shows how Kant's principles make the imputation of actions and consequences a question for practical reason, rather than a straightforward factual, causal, or metaphysical issue. For Kant, the imputation of actions and consequences is made wi…
Hedonism, Heteronomy, and Kant's Principle of Happiness
This chapter addresses the issue of whether Kant was a psychological hedonist about natural desires and the actions for which they are the motives. It calls this interpretation into question, and argues that Kant did not adopt a simple hedonistic psychology of non-moral choice, and that nothing in his moral theory, in particular the central distinction between autonomy and heteronomy, depends on such a psychology. The chapter is organized as foll…
Kant's Theory of Moral Sensibility: Respect for the Moral Law and the Influence of Inclination
This chapter explores two parallel topics in Kant's moral psychology: respect for the moral law as the motive to moral conduct, and the influence of inclinations on the will. It explains some of Kant's views about respect for the moral law and its role in moral motivation, and this leads to a consideration of the sensible motives that respect for the law limits, as well as the more general question of how Kant thinks that inclinations affect choi…
Agency and Autonomy in Kant's Moral Theory: Selected Essays
This book contains chapters on various features of Kant's moral psychology and moral theory, with particular emphasis on a conception of rational agency autonomy. The opening chapters explore different elements of Kant's views about motivation, including an account of respect for morality as the distinctive moral motive and a view of the principle of happiness as a representation of the shared structure of non-moral choice. These chapters stress …
Value and Law in Kant’s Moral Theory
Self‐Legislation and Duties to Oneself
Immanuel Kant Critique of Practical Reason: Critique of Practical Reason
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Kant's three Critiques, one of his three major treatises on moral theory, and a seminal text in the history of moral philosophy. Originally published three years after his Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals, the Critique provides further elaboration of the basic themes of Kant's moral theory, gives the most complete statement of his highly original theory of freedom of the will, and develops …
Reclaiming the History of Ethics: Essays for John Rawls
The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. All the contributors are philosophers who have studied with Rawls and they offer this collection in his honour. The distinctive feature of this approach is to address substantive normative questions in moral and political philosophy through an analysis of the texts and theories of major figures in the history of…
Legislating for a Realm of Ends: The Social Dimension of Autonomy
Shortly after Kant claims autonomy for the moral agent, the argument of the Groundwork takes a turn that leads one to question what this autonomy amounts to. In attributing autonomy to rational agents, Kant regards them as a kind of sovereign legislator with authority over the use of their rational capacities. He holds that they have (in some sense) the power to enact law through their wills, without being bound to any external authority, and are…
Kant's System of Rights
This book marks a total departure from previous studies of the Boxer War. It evaluates the way the war was perceived and portrayed at the time by the mass media. As such the book offers insights to a wider audience than that of sinologists or Chinese historians. The important distinction made by the author is between image makers and eyewitnesses. Whole categories of powerful image makers, both Chinese and foreign, never saw anything of the Boxer…
Human Morality
Intelligible character and the reciprocity thesis 1
This paper surveys some themes of Allison's Kant's Theory of Freedom, and then raises a problem for his presentation of Kant's Reciprocity Thesis. Allison argues that a transcendentally free agent is bound to the moral law as follows. Rational agents fall under a justification requirement, and when transcendental freedom is added to the concept of rational agency, the justification requirement extends to the choice of fundamental maxims. Since fa…
Immanuel Kant Critique of Practical Reason: Critique of Practical Reason
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Kant's three Critiques, one of his three major treatises on moral theory, and a seminal text in the history of moral philosophy. Originally published three years after his Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals, the Critique provides further elaboration of the basic themes of Kant's moral theory, gives the most complete statement of his highly original theory of freedom of the will, and develops …
Agency and Autonomy in Kant's Moral Theory: Selected Essays
This book contains chapters on various features of Kant's moral psychology and moral theory, with particular emphasis on a conception of rational agency autonomy. The opening chapters explore different elements of Kant's views about motivation, including an account of respect for morality as the distinctive moral motive and a view of the principle of happiness as a representation of the shared structure of non-moral choice. These chapters stress …
Two Conceptions of the Highest Good in Kant
Two Conceptions of the Highest Good in Kant ANDREWS REATH l~ KANT'S NOTION of the Highest Good has always been a subject of some controversy ., But in my opinion, it has attracted controversy of the wrong sort. Scholars disagree whether the Highest Good belongs in Kant's moral theory, or has any importance there. But these questions cannot be resolved until one has settled an issue that is clearly more fundamental, though less often asked: What i…
Kant’s Theory of Moral Sensibility. Respect for the Moral Law and the Influence of Inclination
Value and Law in Kant’s Moral Theory
The Categorical Imperative and Kant’s Conception of Practical Rationality
Journal Article The Categorical Imperative and Kant's Conception of Practical Rationality Get access Andrews Reath Andrews Reath North Carolina State University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic PubMed Google Scholar The Monist, Volume 72, Issue 3, 1 July 1989, Pages 384–410, https://doi.org/10.5840/monist198972322 Published: 09 December 2014
Intelligible character and the reciprocity thesis 1
This paper surveys some themes of Allison's Kant's Theory of Freedom, and then raises a problem for his presentation of Kant's Reciprocity Thesis. Allison argues that a transcendentally free agent is bound to the moral law as follows. Rational agents fall under a justification requirement, and when transcendental freedom is added to the concept of rational agency, the justification requirement extends to the choice of fundamental maxims. Since fa…
Hedonism, Heteronomy and Kant's Principle of Happiness
Kant's Moral Philosophy
"Philosophical ethics consists in the human endeavor to answer rationally the fundamental question of how we should live. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics explores the history of philosophical ethics in the western tradition from Homer until the present day. It provides a broad overview of the views of many of the main thinkers, schools, and periods, and includes in addition essays on topics such as autonomy and impartiality. The auth…
Two Conceptions of the Highest Good in Kant
Two Conceptions of the Highest Good in Kant ANDREWS REATH l~ KANT'S NOTION of the Highest Good has always been a subject of some controversy ., But in my opinion, it has attracted controversy of the wrong sort. Scholars disagree whether the Highest Good belongs in Kant's moral theory, or has any importance there. But these questions cannot be resolved until one has settled an issue that is clearly more fundamental, though less often asked: What i…
Kant’s Theory of Moral Sensibility. Respect for the Moral Law and the Influence of Inclination
Hedonism, Heteronomy and Kant's Principle of Happiness
The Categorical Imperative and Kant’s Conception of Practical Rationality
Journal Article The Categorical Imperative and Kant's Conception of Practical Rationality Get access Andrews Reath Andrews Reath North Carolina State University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic PubMed Google Scholar The Monist, Volume 72, Issue 3, 1 July 1989, Pages 384–410, https://doi.org/10.5840/monist198972322 Published: 09 December 2014
Immanuel Kant's Moral Theory
Intelligible character and the reciprocity thesis 1
This paper surveys some themes of Allison's Kant's Theory of Freedom, and then raises a problem for his presentation of Kant's Reciprocity Thesis. Allison argues that a transcendentally free agent is bound to the moral law as follows. Rational agents fall under a justification requirement, and when transcendental freedom is added to the concept of rational agency, the justification requirement extends to the choice of fundamental maxims. Since fa…
Kant's System of Rights
This book marks a total departure from previous studies of the Boxer War. It evaluates the way the war was perceived and portrayed at the time by the mass media. As such the book offers insights to a wider audience than that of sinologists or Chinese historians. The important distinction made by the author is between image makers and eyewitnesses. Whole categories of powerful image makers, both Chinese and foreign, never saw anything of the Boxer…
Human Morality
Immanuel Kant Critique of Practical Reason: Critique of Practical Reason
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Kant's three Critiques, one of his three major treatises on moral theory, and a seminal text in the history of moral philosophy. Originally published three years after his Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals, the Critique provides further elaboration of the basic themes of Kant's moral theory, gives the most complete statement of his highly original theory of freedom of the will, and develops …
Reclaiming the History of Ethics: Essays for John Rawls
The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. All the contributors are philosophers who have studied with Rawls and they offer this collection in his honour. The distinctive feature of this approach is to address substantive normative questions in moral and political philosophy through an analysis of the texts and theories of major figures in the history of…
Legislating for a Realm of Ends: The Social Dimension of Autonomy
Shortly after Kant claims autonomy for the moral agent, the argument of the Groundwork takes a turn that leads one to question what this autonomy amounts to. In attributing autonomy to rational agents, Kant regards them as a kind of sovereign legislator with authority over the use of their rational capacities. He holds that they have (in some sense) the power to enact law through their wills, without being bound to any external authority, and are…
Self‐Legislation and Duties to Oneself
Value and Law in Kant’s Moral Theory
Autonomy of the Will as the Foundation of Morality
This chapter distinguishes the various claims that make up the thesis that autonomy of the will is the foundation of morality, and offers a reconstruction of the arguments on which they depend. To do so it argues that autonomy should be interpreted as a kind of sovereignty. The model for the autonomous agent is the political sovereign not subject to any outside authority, who has the power to enact law. The chapter proceeds as follows. Section II…
Agency and Universal Law
This chapter offers some reflections about how the Formula of Universal Law (FUL) has been understood by those who think that it can provide substantive guidance about choice and action. If the FUL were a purely formal criterion of universalizability, it would not reliably lead to any substantive moral judgments. These theorists have not, in general, understood the FUL as purely formal. Rather, they have incorporated a conception of rational agen…
Legislating for a Realm of Ends: The Social Dimension of Autonomy
This chapter uses the connection between Kant's conception of autonomy and his concept of a realm of ends to explore a number of issues about the nature of autonomy. It begins by developing some general observations about how freedom and autonomy may be related to governance by rules and standards. We tend to think that rules restrict free activity, but there are also rules that make meaningful and creative activities possible. Attention to the d…
Legislating the Moral Law
This chapter spells out two distinct senses in which the rational will legislates moral requirements: one that holds for the Categorical Imperative, and a different sense that holds for particular categorical imperatives or moral requirements. The Formula of Universal Law is a law that Kant derives from the nature of rational volition or rational choice. In this sense, it is a law that the rational will legislates or gives to itself. Roughly, the…
Self-Legislation and Duties to Oneself
This chapter considers some of Kant's ‘foundational’ remarks about duties to oneself and some of the problems that they raise. It focuses on the problems that emerge from Kant's attempt to dispel an apparent conceptual difficulty that he thinks attends the concept of duties to oneself. Essentially, he takes a fairly straightforward concept and, rather than shedding light on it, puts it under a cloud. The chapter begins with a brief commentary on …
The Categorical Imperative and Kant's Conception of Practical Rationality
This chapter outlines an explanation of how Kant grounds morality in reason. It argues that all rational choice is guided by normative considerations (reasons with normative force for the agent). In moral choice, the reasons from which the agent acts are in fact sufficient to justify the action to anyone. Such a view underlies Kant's derivation of the Categorical Imperative, and offers the best understanding of the connection that he draws betwee…
Agency and the Imputation of Consequences in Kant's Ethics
This chapter analyzes the structure and underlying rationale of Kant's principles of imputation (Zurechnung), with particular concern for his principles governing the moral imputation of bad consequences. It shows how Kant's principles make the imputation of actions and consequences a question for practical reason, rather than a straightforward factual, causal, or metaphysical issue. For Kant, the imputation of actions and consequences is made wi…
Hedonism, Heteronomy, and Kant's Principle of Happiness
This chapter addresses the issue of whether Kant was a psychological hedonist about natural desires and the actions for which they are the motives. It calls this interpretation into question, and argues that Kant did not adopt a simple hedonistic psychology of non-moral choice, and that nothing in his moral theory, in particular the central distinction between autonomy and heteronomy, depends on such a psychology. The chapter is organized as foll…
Kant's Theory of Moral Sensibility: Respect for the Moral Law and the Influence of Inclination
This chapter explores two parallel topics in Kant's moral psychology: respect for the moral law as the motive to moral conduct, and the influence of inclinations on the will. It explains some of Kant's views about respect for the moral law and its role in moral motivation, and this leads to a consideration of the sensible motives that respect for the law limits, as well as the more general question of how Kant thinks that inclinations affect choi…
Agency and Autonomy in Kant's Moral Theory: Selected Essays
This book contains chapters on various features of Kant's moral psychology and moral theory, with particular emphasis on a conception of rational agency autonomy. The opening chapters explore different elements of Kant's views about motivation, including an account of respect for morality as the distinctive moral motive and a view of the principle of happiness as a representation of the shared structure of non-moral choice. These chapters stress …
Kant's Critique of Practical Reason: A Critical Guide
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Kant's three Critiques, and his second work in moral theory after the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. Its systematic account of the authority of moral principles grounded in human autonomy unfolds Kant's considered views on morality and provides the keystone to his philosophical system. The essays in this volume shed light on the principal arguments of the second Critique and explore thei…
Two conceptions of compatibilism in the Critical Elucidation
The 'Critical Elucidation of the Analytic of Pure Practical Reason' develops two distinctive conceptions of how freedom of choice and causal determinism may be reconciled. These two conceptions of freedom of choice correspond to a distinction between what Kant calls 'psychological' and what he calls 'transcendental freedom'. The Critical Elucidation presents the argument of the Analytic of Pure Practical Reason as a kind of practical syllogism th…
Epistemology (27 works) · Philosophical Ethics and Theory (23 works) · Philosophy (19 works) · Political science (19 works) · Sociology (15 works) · Law (14 works) · War, Ethics, and Justification (13 works) · Morality (11 works) · Free Will and Agency (10 works) · Law and economics (9 works)