Critique of Practical Reason PDF
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CAMBRIDGE TEXTS IN THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY IMMANUEL KANT Critique of Practical Reason CAMBRIDGE TEXTS IN THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Serieseditors KARL AMERIKS ProfessorofPhilosophyattheUniversityofNotreDame DESMOND M. CLARKE EmeritusProfessorofPhilosophyatUniversityCollegeCork ThemainobjectiveofCambridgeTextsintheHistoryofPhilosophyistoexpandthe range,variety,andqualityoftextsinthehistoryofphilosophywhichareavailablein English.Theseriesincludestextsbyfamiliarnames(suchasDescartesandKant)and alsobylesswell-knownauthors.Whereverpossible,textsarepublishedincomplete andunabridgedform,andtranslationsarespeciallycommissionedfortheseries.Each volumecontainsacriticalintroductiontogetherwithaguidetofurtherreadingandany necessaryglossariesandtextualapparatus.Thevolumesaredesignedforstudentuse atundergraduateandpostgraduatelevel,andwillbeofinterestnotonlytostudentsof philosophybutalsotoawideraudienceofreadersinthehistoryofscience,thehistory oftheology,andthehistoryofideas. Foralistoftitlespublishedintheseries,pleaseseeendofbook. IMMANUEL KANT Critique of Practical Reason TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY MARY GREGOR WITH A REVISED INTRODUCTION BY ANDREWS REATH RevisedEdition UniversityPrintingHouse,CambridgeCB28BS,UnitedKingdom CambridgeUniversityPressispartoftheUniversityofCambridge. ItfurtherstheUniversity’smissionbydisseminatingknowledgeinthepursuitof education,learningandresearchatthehighestinternationallevelsofexcellence. www.cambridge.org Informationonthistitle:www.cambridge.org/9781107467057 ©CambridgeUniversityPress2015 Thispublicationisincopyright.Subjecttostatutoryexception andtotheprovisionsofrelevantcollectivelicensingagreements, noreproductionofanypartmaytakeplacewithoutthewritten permissionofCambridgeUniversityPress. Firstpublished1997andreprintedfourteentimes Revisededitionfirstpublished2015 PrintedintheUnitedKingdombyClays,StIvesplc. AcataloguerecordforthispublicationisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary LibraryofCongresscataloguinginpublicationdata Kant,Immanuel,1724–1804. [KritikderpraktischenVernunft.English] Critiqueofpracticalreason:/ImmanuelKant;translatedandeditedby MaryGregor;translationrevisedbyAndrewsReath, UniversityofCalifornia,Riverside;witharevisedintroductionby AndrewsReath.–RevisedEdition. pages cm.–(Cambridgetextsinthehistoryofphilosophy) ISBN978-1-107-09271-6 1. Ethics. 2. Practicalreason. I. Gregor,MaryJ. II. Title. B2773.E5B4 2015 170–dc23 2014034656 ISBN978-1-107-09271-6Hardback ISBN978-1-107-46705-7Paperback CambridgeUniversityPresshasnoresponsibilityforthepersistenceoraccuracyof URLsforexternalorthird-partyinternetwebsitesreferredtointhispublication, anddoesnotguaranteethatanycontentonsuchwebsitesis,orwillremain, accurateorappropriate.Informationregardingprices,traveltimetablesandother factualinformationgiveninthisworkarecorrectatthetimeoffirstprintingbut CambridgeUniversityPressdoesnotguaranteetheaccuracyofsuch informationthereafter. Contents Introduction pagevii Chronology xxxv Furtherreading xxxvii Noteonthetranslation xli Critique of Practical Reason 1 Preface 3 Introduction 12 Part i Doctrineoftheelementsofpurepracticalreason 15 i Theanalyticofpurepracticalreason 17 ii Dialecticofpurepracticalreason 87 Part ii Doctrineofthemethodofpurepracticalreason 119 Conclusion 129 Index 133 v Introduction I The Critique of Practical Reason, published in 1788, is the second of Kant’s threeCritiques,fallingbetweentheCritiqueofPureReason(firstedition:1781, secondedition:1787)andtheCritiqueofJudgment(1790).Itisalsothesecond ofhisthreemajorworksdevotedtomoraltheory,alongwiththeGroundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) and the Metaphysics of Morals (1797). Theseworksdevelopanaccountofmoralitythatreactstothosefoundinboth the empiricist and the rationalist traditions, and together they constitute Kant’slastingcontributiontomoraltheory. CertainremarksintheGroundworksuggestthatKantdidnotoriginally planaseparatecritiqueofpracticalreason.Henotesthatalthoughacritique ofpracticalreasonistheonlyfoundationforametaphysicsofmorals(i.e.a systematicclassificationofhumandutiesonapriorigrounds),theneedfor critiqueislesspressinginthecaseofpracticalreasonthanitisforspeculative reason,andthatanoutlineofsuchacritiquewouldsufficeforhispurposes.1 Inmoralthought,ordinaryreasonismoreeasilybrought“toahighdegree of correctness and precision” in that authoritative practical principles are revealed through the workings of ordinary moral consciousness, while in its“purebuttheoreticaluse,reasoniswhollydialectical,”tendingtomake illusory and illegitimate metaphysical claims. Furthermore, executing a critique of practical reason would introduce complexities not absolutely necessary to a presentation of the basic principle of duty [G 4: 391]. The idea of writing a separate critique of practical reason appears to have occurred to Kant while he was revising the Critique of Pure Reason for its secondedition. 1 SeeKant’sGroundworkoftheMetaphysicsofMoralsinthePracticalPhilosophyvolumeofthe CambridgeEditionoftheWorksofImmanuelKant,trans.anded.MaryGregor(Cambridge University Press, 1996), hereafter G, 4: 391, 445. The “outline” is the Third Section of the Groundwork,entitled“TransitionfromaMetaphysicsofMoralstoaCritiqueofPurePractical Reason.” References toKant’sworksare includedinthe textand (withthe exceptionofthe CritiqueofPureReason)givethevolumeandpageintheGermanAcademyofScienceseditionof Kant’s collected works, which are given in the margins of most English translations. Other abbreviationsandtranslationsusedareasfollows: CPRCritiqueofPureReason,trans.PaulGuyerandAllenW.Wood(CambridgeUniversity Press,1998). MMTheMetaphysicsofMorals,inPracticalPhilosophy,trans.anded.MaryGregor(Cambridge University Press, 1996); also in Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy (Cambridge UniversityPress,1996). ReferencestotheCritiqueofPracticalReason,alsototheAcademypaging,usenoabbreviation. vii Introduction ThetopicstreatedintheCritiqueofPracticalReasonfallunderthreemain areas: moraltheory, freedom of the will, and the doctrine ofthe “postulates of pure practical reason,” in which practical reason provides grounds for assumingtherealityofcertain metaphysicalideaswhichcouldnotbeestab- lished theoretically. The second Critique is a work of moral theory. But as thislistoftopics mayindicate,itestablishesimportantconnections between themes that had been treated independently in the Groundwork and the Critique of Pure Reason – in other words, between Kant’s moral theory and hisepistemologyandmetaphysics.OrsinceKantisneverunconcernedwith suchconnections,itismoreaccuratetosaythatinthesecondCritiqueKant laystheseconnectionsoutexplicitly.Inthisrespect,thesecondCritiquemakes anessentialcontributiontotheedificeofKant’scriticalsystem.Thefactthat it is a work of moral theory that puts some of the key elements of Kant’s system into place is one aspect of what Kant terms the “primacy of pure practicalreason.” Because of the systematic nature of Kant’s concerns, it is difficult to appreciate the significance of certain themes in the second Critique without some familiarity with the Groundwork and the Critique of Pure Reason. To providesomeorientationtotheCritique,thissectionsurveysafewofitsmain themes and provides some, albeit cursory, background from these other works. Moraltheory The first major division of the Critique, its Analytic, presents some of the fundamentalideasofKant’smoraltheory.Forexample,theopeningchapter providesananalysisofthemorallawasaprinciplethatgivesrisetoobjective requirements on action which are reason-giving simply in virtue of their suitabilitytoserveaslawsthatanyagentcanregardasauthoritative,without appeal to an agent’s desires or interest in happiness, and which accordingly regulates agents’ pursuit of their personal ends. The two chapters of the Analytic that follow take up the idea of the good as the “object of practical reason”andrespectforthemorallawasthemotivationtomoralconduct.In Chapter 2, Kant explains the “paradox of method” to which his analysis of morality has led him [63]. Traditionally moral theories had accounted for thecontentofmoralitybyfirstassumingaconceptionofthegoodtakentobe self-evident, or which human beings are generally disposed to desire, and then deriving principles of conduct from this antecedent conception of the good. But Kant argues that in order to support the idea that moral require- mentsapplywithrationalnecessity,amoraltheorymustfirstidentifyalawor principletowhichanyrationalagentiscommittedsimplyinvirtueofpossess- ingreasonandwill,andsubsequentlydefinethegoodasthatwhichonewills underthedirectionofthisprinciple.Whatismorallygood–theactions,ends, andstatesofaffairswhicharetheobjectsofgoodwilling–istobespecified viii Introduction by the application of this law. Chapter 3 expands upon a long footnote in theGroundwork[G4:401n]onrespectforthemorallawasthepropermoral motive. While these discussions develop ideas presented in the Groundwork, the Critique of Practical Reason takes a somewhat different approach to the justification of the moral law. The Groundwork separates this task into two stages,andinthesecondattemptstoestablishthevalidityofthemorallawby deriving it from a conception of freedom that is independent of moral con- sciousness. The first two chapters of the Groundwork use an analysis of the conceptofdutytoarriveatastatementofthebasicprincipleofduty,butstop shortofshowingthatweoughttoendorsethisprinciple.Theformaljustifi- cationofthevalidityofthemorallaw,whichKantreferstoasits“deduction” [G4:454],islefttothethirdchapter.HereKanttriestoshowthatitisfully rationaltoacceptthemorallawasourbasicprincipleofconductbyderivingit fromaconceptionoffreedomthatwearewarrantedinattributingtoourselves on grounds that are independent of morality. The argument is notoriously obscure,butroughly,itemploysasetofanalyticalclaimsthatconnectfreedom with morality, and rational agency with freedom, and then holds that our possessing theoretical reason, which is a capacity for spontaneous activity, warrantsusinregardingourselvesasrationalagentsinthesenserequiredby his argument. Since we identify with our capacity for free and spontaneous agencyandregarditasour“properself,”wearecommittedtoacceptingthe authorityofitsfundamentalprinciple,themorallaw.2However,intheCritique Kantarguesthatthemorallawneitherallowsofnorneedsadeductioninhis technical sense, but that its authority is firmly established in ordinary moral consciousnessasa“factofreason.”[See,e.g.31,46–50.]Onreflectionwedo accept the moral law as an authoritative standard of conduct that provides sufficientandoverridingreasonsforactionandwearemotivatedtoactbyour judgmentsofwhatitrequires.Werealizethatwecandosomethingbecausewe judge that it is our duty, even when it involves setting aside or foregoing substantial desire-based interests, and we are disposed to self-criticism and self-contempt when we fail to. Whether it is reasonable to accept the 2 That theoretical reason is a capacity for spontaneous activity is shown by the fact that it formulatesideasthatoutrunanythinggivenbysensibility,throughwhichitprescribesendsto theunderstandingthattheunderstandingcannotformforitself.Kantappearstoargueherethat arationalbeingwhoregardshimselfaspossessingthiskindofintelligencemustregardhimselfas havingthesamecapacityforspontaneityinhisagency.Fordiscussionofdifferentaspectsofthe argument of Groundwork, iii, see: Henry E. Allison, Kant’s Theory of Freedom (Cambridge University Press, 1990), ch. 12; Thomas E. Hill, Jr., Dignity and Practical Reason (Ithaca: CornellUniversityPress,1992),ch.6;ChristineM.Korsgaard,CreatingtheKingdomofEnds (CambridgeUniversityPress,1996),ch.6.FordiscussionofthechangeinKant’sapproachtothe justificationofmoralitybetweentheGroundworkandthesecondCritique,seeDieterHenrich, “TheDeductionoftheMoralLaw:TheReasonsfortheObscurityoftheFinalSectionofKant’s GroundworkoftheMetaphysicsofMorals,”inPaulGuyer,ed.,GroundworkoftheMetaphysicsof Morals:CriticalEssays(Lanham,MD:Rowman&Littlefield,1998);andKarlAmeriks,Kant’s TheoryofMind(Oxford:ClarendonPress,1982),ch.6. ix Introduction requirements of morality is not in question in ordinary practical contexts. In claimingthatthevalidityofthemorallawisgivenasa“factofreason,”Kant holds that it cannot and need not be grounded in anything outside of our ordinarymoralconsciousness,inwhichwearedirectlyawareofthelaw-giving activityofreason. Freedomofthewill TheCritique’ssecondgeneralareaofconcernis,inasense,justanotheraspect of the first. Kant claims to provide a proof of a strong notion of human freedom–thatis,toestablishtherealityoftranscendentalfreedom,according to which the human will is a capacity for spontaneous activity, or a kind of causalpower,whichisindependentofdeterminationbyempiricalconditions. Thepossibilityoftranscendentalfreedomasacausalitywhichisundeter- mined by antecedent causal conditions had been of concern to Kant in the CritiqueofPureReason,andimportantcomponentsofhisaccountoffreewill aredevelopedthere.SinceKant’stheoryoffreewilldrawsontheepistemo- logy of the first Critique, it will be useful to mention some of its principal doctrines here. First, Kant’s transcendental idealism holds that space and time are not mind-independent features of reality,but structural features of experiencespecifictohumancognition;theyarethe“formsofintuition,”or the forms of human perception. The fact that our experience has structural featuresthatareduetoourcognitivefacultiesintroducesadistinctionbetween objectsastheyappeartous(“appearances”or“phenomena”)andobjectsas theyareinthemselves,consideredapartfromtheconditionsunderwhichthey appear (“things-in-themselves” or “noumena”). Second, we should recall Kant’sviewthattwodifferentelementsofcognition,intuitionsandconcepts, arerequiredforsyntheticknowledge.Intuitionsaresingularrepresentations throughwhichmaterialispresentedtothemind,whileconceptsaregeneral representationsoriginatinginthespontaneousactivityoftheunderstanding. Theactofbringingintuitionsunderaconceptinajudgment,throughwhich themanifoldofintuitionisunifiedandbroughttoconsciousness,iswhatgives risetoknowledge. TheseelementsofKant’sepistemologyhaveseveralimportantconsequen- ces. First, the spatio-temporal properties of objects and the laws governing spatio-temporal events do not characterize things in themselves, but objects astheyappear.Sincesyntheticknowledgepresupposessomeintuition,whichin usisalwaysspatio-temporal,ourknowledgeislimitedtoobjectsastheyappear inspaceandtime;thereisnoknowledgeofthingsinthemselves,whichcannot begiven inintuition. Thisanalysis of theconditions and limits of knowledge entails the impossibility of a certainkind of metaphysics. Traditionally meta- physics had sought a priori demonstrative knowledge of transcendent facts such as the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and the principles ofcosmology.Butiftheseliebeyondthelimitsofexperience(asthetradition x
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