Lauren Simerlink Honors Reading Conference Prof. A.

Pryor 24 October 2013 Musings of Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant, who is recognized as one of the greatest philosophers of all time, was an empiricist who attempted to reconcile religion and reason. He was also concerned with many concepts such as the classification of species. One of his greatest musings was on how to classify humans as rational terrestrial beings when we have no other such creatures to compare them to. This quandary led him to the conclusion that humans must be categorized and analyzed according to their basic animalistic characteristics. Humans, in the eyes of Kant, are animals that have the capacity for reason. This rationality characterizes the species, allows for the training of the young, and allows people to organize societies so that they can function as cohesive groups. This capacity originated from the fact that humans are equally capable of causing chaos among themselves. To instill order into society, they developed reason as a means of regulating behavior. This benefited the general whole instead of allowing each individual to submit to his or her own selfish wills (p119). The manipulation of people, more formally known as pragmatic predisposition, leads to the thought that when in social settings, humans tend to improve themselves and abandon their less civilized ways- namely the tendency to immediately satisfy whims regardless of the cost to other people. Although at first glance this seems beneficial to both the individual and society, Kant wonders if people are better off left in their natural brutish states or better off educated and cultured. This question is raised because animals, which can only rarely rise above their natural

states, fulfill their purpose in life, which in their case is to eat, sleep, and reproduce. However, no human by himself can achieve his or her destiny (p120). It is only through collective efforts and the passing down of knowledge that the race can achieve its destiny. Unfortunately for the human race, Kant does not explicitly state what this destiny is (p121). One thought Kant is sure of is that people are born with several innate urges. The most obvious of these is the sex drive. All people, at some point in their lives, feel the physical need to engage in acts that lead to procreation. According to Kant, this is the cause of one of humanitys eternal problems: people sometimes lose control of their sex drive before they have reached a point in their lives where they can provide for their children (p 122). People are not fully ruled by sexual nature; they also have the urge to gain scientific knowledge. The urge to gain knowledge is so strong that it outlasts the human lifespan. All people die unfulfilled because they die without having learned and understood all the things they wanted to know. To exacerbate the situation, as people learn, they discover more new things. This leads to further curiosity for themselves and future generations. As much scientific progress as this cycle makes, its progress can be destroyed by uprisings of barbarism which may deem knowledge heretical (p122). Another tendency of humans is that people strive to achieve happiness, but reason limits peoples ability to be happy by making them adhere to morality, which limits what people can do, thereby preventing them from fulfilling their every desire (p122). Despite this, humans are not evil because they violate laws and moral codes, but because they expressly allow evil to influence them. People are fully conscious of inborn moral law, yet choose to break it. Therefore

evil originates in the thought process. The inborn inclination to do evil makes evil part of human nature (p134). Evil is not inherited. When trying to understand where evil came from, people should not only examine the evil manifested in actions but the potential for its manifestation and how human choice determines whether or not it is manifested. Circumstances do not infringe upon free will. A person never loses the power of choice and so has no excuse to succumb to the potential to evil within the human mind. Regardless of any evil actions a person has taken in the past, he or she retains the moral duty to better himself (p136) because evil begins in the intent, not the action. Humans have the ability to decide if they will follow their moral duty or not. Assuming this is true, to analyze the origins of evil, one must not focus on the actions, but rather on the thought process behind them (p136). Biblical writings concur with this supposition, as shown in the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve had no evil within them, but were given the choice to obey Gods command of not eating the forbidden fruit or to commit sin, which is essential defined by Kant as breaking Gods direct law. When the fruit was eaten, people lost their innocence and gained the potential for evil. As a result, it is the potential for evil that is inherited, not evil itself (p136). This means that the individual makes himself or herself good or evil as a result of decisions. Evil is the result of misused freedom (p136). Although concepts of good and evil are often based on religion, reason tends to write different meanings into religious texts to justify a persons actions. Religions classified as religions of rogation believe God will make a person eternally blissful forever even if the person makes no effort on his or her part to become a better human being. A person in this sort

of religion feels justified in doing this because he or she is under the assumption that God will directly intervene and upon request, make him or her into a better human being. This implies that people can become good merely by wanting to be good. Another classification of religion, known as moral religion, or religion as a lifestyle of good conduct, says that people must strive to be better to the best of their abilities and because of their sincerity of heart, God will do the rest (p138). Kants thoughts, although complex, have provided great insight concerning human nature and have often been used as a bridge between religion and intellect. The sheer magnitude of this great thinkers work allows Kants thoughts to not only be used to answer a multitude of religious and ethical questions, but to provide a formula for moral living. Discussion Questions 1) Does Providence have a religious or secular connotation in this context? - see p 124- Providence mean precisely the same wisdom 2) Based on the reading at the bottom of page 129, does Kant believe that humankind is good, evil, neither, or both? 3) Does Kant believe that each human determines his/her own good or evil nature? 4) According to Kant, can an the nature of humans as a whole be different from the nature of an individual? 5) Do you think his complex wording detracts from the meaning behind his statements?