Kant’s Human Being: Essays on His Theory of Human Nature
Files
Document Type
Book
Description
This book continues and deepens avenues of research first initiated in the author’s highly acclaimed book, Kant’s Impure Ethics. Drawing on a wide variety of both published and unpublished works spanning all periods of Kant’s extensive writing career, the author focuses on Kant’s under-appreciated empirical work on human nature, with particular attention to the connections between this body of work and his much-discussed ethical theory. Kant repeatedly claimed that the question, “What is the human being” is philosophy’s most fundamental question, one that encompasses all others. The author analyzes and evaluates Kant’s own answer to his question, showing how it differs from other accounts of human nature. The book is divided into three parts. Part One explores the nature and role of virtue in Kant’s ethical theory, showing how the conception of human nature behind Kant’s virtue theory results in a virtue ethics that is decidedly different from more familiar Aristotelian virtue ethics programs. Part Two uncovers the dominant moral message in Kant’s anthropological investigations, drawing new connections between Kant’s work on human nature and his ethics. Part Three explores specific aspects of Kant’s theory of human nature developed outside of his anthropology lectures, in his works on religion, geography, education, and aesthetics, and shows how these writings substantially amplify his account of human beings.
ISBN
9780199768714
Publication Date
2011
Publisher
Oxford University Press
City
New York
Keywords
Kant, human nature, ethical theory, virtue theory, virtue ethics
Recommended Citation
Louden, Robert B. PhD, "Kant’s Human Being: Essays on His Theory of Human Nature" (2011). Faculty, Staff, and Alumni Books. 660.
https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/facbooks/660
