GF and ESPF lunch lecture: Patricia Kitcher (Columbia University, NY)

GF and ESPF lunch lecture with Patricia Kitcher: The Moral Core of Kant's Theory of Practical Reasoning.

“The Basic Law of Pure Practical Reason”

Abstract

I have three goals in the paper. The first is to argue that Kant’s claim in the Critique of Practical Reason that the formula of universal law is a fundamental principle of the faculty of pure practical reason (5.30)—a principle by which humans actually reason—should be taken literally and to explain how he supports the claim. My second is to show that although Kant rejected a natural foundation for morality, his faculty-based moral theory could be given a scientific basis through the theory of evolution and that this basis would not undermine, but support, his important claims about morality. A final goal is to show that even though Kant takes morality to be a native endowment of humans, he has plausible theories about how individuals and societies can make moral progress.

More information available from: pauline.kleingeld rug.nl