Kant’s Philosophy: Enlightenment, Ethics, and Practical Reason

HYF Background

I agree that the modern age began with the collapse of the medieval and renaissance periods and extends to the time of the great revolutions of the late 18th-century Enlightenment. In the field of thought, figures like Montesquieu and Rousseau stand out. Kant answers the question “What is Enlightenment?” as follows: “Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed nonage. Nonage is the inability to use one’s own understanding without another’s guidance. Dare to know! (Sapere aude.) “Have the courage to use your own understanding!” is therefore the motto of the Enlightenment.

This 18th-century intellectual movement encompasses the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. It’s key to interpreting modernism and the transition to the contemporary age. The anthropocentric shift begun in the Renaissance and the commitment to the autonomy of human reason explain why Enlightenment thinkers prioritized secularization. They applied reason to emphasize the contractual nature of society and understood history as a progressive process. They valued education and the popularization of ideas, as reflected in the Encyclopédie.

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Kantian philosophy holds a prominent place in modernity. Kant’s rational approach influences modern science, which is based on observing phenomena and explaining their causes. This empirical and rational approach remains central to science today.

Another important factor is morality. Kant emphasizes being good as a duty for the common welfare, not as an act of faith or religion.

Finally, the dialectic, the eternal struggle of opposites, accelerated in this century, reflects Kantian thought. Debates between those who base ethics on reason and those who justify it through feelings continue today. Postmodernism reports a weakening of Enlightenment reason and its emancipatory project. Emotivism and intuitionism persist. However, Kant’s legacy continues to inspire those seeking a rational basis for a neomodernity focused on communication and human progress.

Critique of Practical Reason

Kant’s stance on metaphysics is ambiguous. He states that we cannot know the absolute since human knowledge is limited to experience. Simultaneously, he considers humans to be endowed with reason, an unconditioned power, making metaphysics a natural human need. Humans cannot be indifferent to metaphysical problems and must take a position.

Kant attempts to resolve this contradiction in the realm of practical reason (reason as it determines human action).

While we cannot know the absolute, we have access to something close: moral consciousness, the awareness of good and evil, right and wrong. For Kant, moral consciousness is the presence of the absolute within us. It issues absolute, unconditional commands. Conscience is the awareness of an absolute requirement that cannot be explained by natural phenomena. In nature, things simply happen; a stone doesn’t “ought” to fall, it just falls.

Ethics

Kant’s ethics is operational, a formal morality without specific content. It is categorical, autonomous, free from external guidance, and a priori. It is a demanding morality. Kant acknowledged its difficulty but argued that its importance justifies its demands.

This duty involves assumptions we must admit even without proof: the three postulates of practical reason – freedom, God, and immortality. Our reason cannot reach or prove these, but we must admit them for practical use on moral grounds.