Immanuel Kant’s Moral and Political Thought
History of Philosophy 1600 - 1800
Topic:
The course will focus on Kant’s moral and political thought. We shall read his three main books on the topic. Furthermore, we shall look at the historical context of
The course will be taught in English.
Requirements:
In order to get their study points, participants have to attend the course sessions on a regular basis (not miss more than three sessions without explanation), they have to submit 2 short (2 page) texts in the first part of the semester and then a draft of their semesteroppgave before they deliver the final version of this paper. The short texts, the draft and the semesteroppgave can be written either in Norwegian or in English.
Reading list:
Primary texts:
Crusius, Christian August (1744) ‘Guide to Rational Living.’ In Schneewind, J. B., ed. (2003) Moral Philosophy from Montaigne to Kant (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 568-585. FRONTER
Kant, Immanuel (1785/1996) Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. In: Immanuel Kant. Practical Philosophy. Translated and edited by Mary J. Gregor, general introduction by Allen Wood). (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Kant, Immanuel (1788/1996) Critique of Practical Reason. In: Immanuel Kant. Practical Philosophy. Translated and edited by Mary J. Gregor, general introduction by Allen Wood). (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Kant, Immanuel (1797/1996) The Metaphysics of Morals. In: Immanuel Kant. Practical Philosophy. Translated and edited by Mary J. Gregor, general introduction by Allen Wood). (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
Secondary literature:
Beiser. Frederick (2006) ‘Kant’s Intellectual Development’. The Cambridge Companion to Kant. Ed. Paul Guyer. Cambridge: CUP, 26ff. FRONTER
Fricke, Christel (unpublished) ‘Kants moralische Begründung der Rechtspflichten und das Immanuel-Kant-Problem.‘ – For those who read German, nor generally required.
Fricke, Christel (unpublished) ‘Kant’s Way of Moral Worldmaking: Rejecting voluntarism for the sake of the possibility of a priori knowledge of the moral law.’ FRONTER
Kain, Patrick (2004) ‘Self-legislation in Kant’s Moral Philosophy’. Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 86/3, 257-306. FRONTER
Kain, Patrick (2010) ‘Practical Cognition, Intuition, and the Fact of Reason.‘ Lipscomb, Benjamin J. Bruxvoort and James Krueger (eds) (2010) Kant’s Moral Metaphysics. God, Freedom, Immorality. Berlin: DeGruyter, 211-230. FRONTER
Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996) The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge: CUP.
Korsgaard, Christine M. (1997) ‘The Normativity of Instrumental Reason.’ In: Garrett Cullity and Berys Gaut (eds) Ethics and Practical Reason. Oxford: Clarendon Press. FRONTER
Reidar Maliks (2012) ‘Revolutionary Epigones: Kant and his radical followers’.
History of Political Thought XXXIII/ 4, pp 647-671.
Maliks, Reidar (2015) ‘Kant and his conservative critics.’ In: Quentin Skinner and Martin Van Gelderen (eds) Freedom and the Construction of Europe. Vol 2 Free Persons and Free States. Cambridge: CUP, 188-207.
Schneewind, J.B. (1998) The Invention of Autonomy. A History of Modern Moral Philosophy. Cambridge: CUP.
Schneewind, J.B. (2006) ‘Autonomy, obligation, and virtue: An overview of Kant’s moral philosophy’. The Cambridge Companion to Kant. Ed. Paul Guyer, 309-341, Cambridge: CUP. FRONTER