In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kant without SadeFrancis SparshottErmanno Bencivenga’s discussion of “Kant’s Sadism” rests on a misrepresentation of Kant’s enterprise. 1 It presents Kantian morality as a matter of motivation, so that reason has to be pitted against desire. But Kant’s whole point is that, because the psychological causes of one’s actions can never be ascertained, they are irrelevant to morality. Morality is entirely a matter of the reasons (...) for one’s actions, no matter what one’s feelings. It is true that moral questions arise, morality exists, only for finite rational beings, who have inclinations that are relatively independent of the dictates of reason. But that independence does not mean that one should always act against one’s inclinations.The morality of an action depends on the agent’s “maxim”—the subjective practical principle on which one acts, the reasons one has and can give for thinking that what one is doing is right. Kant’s whole discussion is in terms of maxims. The word does occur twice in Bencivenga’s paper, but his account makes no use of it. When he says that “It is the motives of the action, the motives the person actually has—never mind what evidence we have for them—that confer moral content on the action” (p. 41), he does so in flat contradiction of Kant.The confusion underlying Bencivenga’s misunderstanding is most familiar to English-language Kantians from Schiller’s joke: “Gladly I serve my friends, but alas I do it with pleasure. / Hence I am plagued with doubt that I am not a virtuous person. // —Surely, your only resource is to try to despise them entirely, / and then with aversion do what your duty enjoins you.” 2 Both participants in the exchange think [End Page 151] the morality of an action depends on its psychological causes, not on the reasons the agent has for thinking the action right and doing it. Both are wrong.What is revolutionary in Kant’s position is his contention that all a maxim requires to be moral is that agents should really make it their principle at the time of action—that the agent should really stand by it. That means, obviously, that at that moment the agent should be able consistently to will that everyone should act on it. Kant argues that it also means, less obviously, that doing the right thing should be one’s paramount principle, which involves treating humanity and human freedom as an end in itself—ultimately, treating oneself and others as “law-making members of a kingdom of ends.” Thus, for Kant, morality is entirely a matter of rational consistency.Since rational consistency is all that morality requires, morality lays down no plan of action, but presupposes the familiar world in which people already have plans and purposes. What one wills is always some particular thing. Morality has to do with the principles to be followed in pursuing these objectives. 3 Bencivenga’s contention that “making the well-being of some other human, or of one’s own community, or of humankind the goal of one’s action would be relegating rationality to (at best) an instrumental role, and thus denying any ethical value to that action” is wrong. Kant insists that finite rational beings inevitably pursue happiness, 4 and it is their duty to do so for others and (in a sense) for themselves. 5 A leading contention of the Critique is that happiness, like duty, is a component of the summum bonum. Making a principle of maximizing happiness does not destroy the autonomy of the will; the principle is a principle and subject to the critique of consistency, like other principles. Kant explicitly denies what Bencivenga asserts, that it is merely an empirical matter that humans are desirous as well as rational. On the contrary, it belongs to their essence. 6 What is empirical, as Kant explains at some length, is the specific content of a person’s desires.Neither of Bencivenga’s examples tends to show that morality is opposed to inclination. It is true that if the reason moral agents treat people well is really only that, on each occasion, this is... (shrink)

In this paper, I set out to consider the extent to which Horkheimer and Adorno's account of the transition from Kant's philosophy to key features of the novels of the Marquis de Sade in the Second Excursus of their Dialectic of Enlightenment can be viewed as a fragment of the ‘history of philosophy’ and to explain this account in a way that allows us to ask whether it succeeds in establishing a necessary connection between Kant's philosophy and (...) Sade's novels. In connection with, a particular problem emerges. This problem concerns the role played by a non-instrumental form of reason in Horkheimer and Adorno's attempt to establish an essential connection between Kant's theoretical philosophy and Sade's novels, in which the practical implications of the theoretical employment of reason allegedly become explicit. It will be shown that, despite appearances to the contrary, an employment of reason of the relevant type is not identified by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason. (shrink)

In this paper, I set out to consider the extent to which Horkheimer and Adorno's account of the transition from Kant's philosophy to key features of the novels of the Marquis de Sade in the Second Excursus of their Dialectic of Enlightenment can be viewed as a fragment of the ‘history of philosophy’ and to explain this account in a way that allows us to ask whether it succeeds in establishing a necessary connection between Kant's philosophy and (...) Sade's novels. In connection with, a particular problem emerges. This problem concerns the role played by a non-instrumental form of reason in Horkheimer and Adorno's attempt to establish an essential connection between Kant's theoretical philosophy and Sade's novels, in which the practical implications of the theoretical employment of reason allegedly become explicit. It will be shown that, despite appearances to the contrary, an employment of reason of the relevant type is not identified by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason. (shrink)

This book offers the first comprehensive discussion of Lacan's Kant with Sade, an essay widely recognised as one of his most important and difficult texts. Here, the reader will find a detailed roadmap for each section of the essay, including clarifications of the allusions, implicit borrowings and references in Lacan's text, unique insights into the essay's publication history, and a critical assessment of its reception. The author expertly defines key terms, explains complex theoretical arguments, and contextualizes the work (...) within a larger philosophical discourse. No prior knowledge of Lacan, Kant or Sade is assumed, allowing both newcomers and those who are well-versed in psychoanalysis, philosophy, and literary criticism to benefit from the book. This engaging book clears the path for a long overdue re-discovery and a proper appreciation of one of Lacan's most challenging works, inspiring a renewed debate on the significance of Lacanian psychoanalysis for moral philosophy and literary theory.. (shrink)

Escrito em 1963, três anos depois do seminário sobre A ética da psicanálise, o texto de Jaques Lacan, Kant com Sade, possibilita férteis discussões a respeito da prática analítica. Quais os limites desta prática? Qual é a razão que a sustenta? A prática analítica é um saber, uma ética ou uma terapêutica? Quais os pressupostos que orientam a sua ação? É evidente que não dispomos de condições necessárias e suficientes para respondermos a tais perguntas no limite de um (...) artigo, tampouco temos a pretensão de fazê-lo. Entretanto, as tomaremos como bússola em busca de pistas sobre a prática analítica lacaniana e o solo em que repousa até a década de 1960. A partir do texto Kant com Sade e do Seminário VII, A ética da psicanálise, ambos escritos por Lacan, buscaremos as semelhanças e diferenças irreconciliáveis entre a lei moral kantiana, a vontade de gozo sadeana e a ética psicanalítica, apontando que é a partir das consequências práticas, efetuadas pelo Marquês de Sade, da aplicação de uma razão pura, tal qual proposta por Kant, que Lacan buscará um novo horizonte para a prática analítica não mais baseada no desejo puro. Nesse sentido, tanto o filósofo alemão Immanuel Kant quanto o escritor francês Marquês de Sade, contemporâneos dos ares da modernidade, expõem um princípio universal pelo qual a ação é valorada. Princípio cuja execução evidencia sua dimensão ética, política e, com Lacan, clínica. Nessa pista, faremos uma discussão a propósito da perversão e da melancolia como limites à prática analítica. (shrink)

Resumo: Neste artigo, pretendemos trabalhar, a partir de uma leitura de Zizek e Lacan, a perspectiva radical de liberdade como superação da dialética entre a Lei moral kantiana e o gozo sádico. Para isso, procuramos primeiramente mostrar como Lacan articula a relação de Kant com Sade, para, em seguida, pensar como, segundo Zizek, o psicanalista encontra uma saída para o princípio de liberdade kantiana, a partir da ética do desejo puro, o que nos permitirá pensar um Kant (...) sem Sade.: In this article, based on a reading of Zizek and Lacan, we discuss the radical perspective of freedom as an overcoming of the dialectic between the Kantian moral law and sadistic joy. We first try to show how Lacan articulates Kant's relationship with Sade, and then consider how, according to Zizek, the psychoanalyst finds an outlet for the Kantian principle of freedom based the ethics of pure desire, which allows us to think of a Kant without Sade. (shrink)

Düşünce tarihinin neredeyse her döneminde insanı ahlaki bir faile dönüştürebilmek amacıyla çeşitli kuramlar geliştirilmiştir. Bu kuramlarda genel olarak insanın ahlaki bir ilkeyi kendi eylemsellik alanına tatbik etmesi için gerekli olan şeyin ve erdemli davranışlarla erişilmesi hedeflenen mutluluğun ne olduğu üzerine bir düşünme faaliyeti gerçekleşir. Geliştirilen yanıtlar arasında şüphesiz çok seçkin bir yere sahip olan kuram, Kant’a aittir. Kant’a göre doğa alanında eğilim ve isteklere bağlı davranışlarla amaç olarak mutluluğa ulaşmak, insanı ahlaklı kılmaz. Bu bakımdan, insanı mutlu kılan şeyin (...) değil, onu iyi yapan, bir ahlaki faile dönüştürmenin olanağını soruşturur. En yüksek iyiyi gerçekleştirmeyi, eğilim ve isteklere bağlı bir amaç olarak belirlenen çeşitli türden mutluluklara ulaşma çabasıyla eşitleyen tüm anlayışlar karşısında Kant, en yüksek iyiyi gerçekleştirmenin ilk koşulunu ahlaklılık, ikinci koşulu olarak –birinci koşul sağlandığı takdirde- ortaya çıkacağına inandığı mutluluk olarak belirler. Ona göre yalnızca ahlak yasasıyla belirlenen erdemli davranışların sonucunda gerçekleşeceği beklenen, aklın bir ideali olarak mutluluk insanı ahlaklı kılabilir. Nitekim özerk bir biçimde kendisi için koyduğu yasayla, akıl sahibi bir varlığını kişilik sahibi bir varlığa dönüştüren insan aynı zamanda ahlaki değer taşıyan davranışlarda bulunmanın sonucunda hep bir beklentisi olan bir varlıktır. İnsanın bu beklentisine yanıt, dinden gelir. Burada Kant, geliştirdiği ahlak öğretisinin mutluluk öğretisi olarak da adlandırılabilmesinin koşulunu ortaya koyar. Buna göre sırf akıl talep ettiği için insana ödevler yükleyen yasa zemininde temellenen en yüksek iyiyi gerçekleştirme isteğiyle, aklın yasa koyuculuğu altında yaşadığımız için içimizde doğan iyiyi gerçekleştirme arzusuyla dine yönelindiğinde ancak ahlak öğretisi bir mutluluk öğretisi olabilir. Bir başka deyişle, yalnızca ahlaklılık temelinde tesis edilen bir dinsellikle mutluluk ahlaki kılınabilir. Bu yazıda mutluluğun nasıl ahlaki kılınabildiği ya da mutluluğa layık olabilmek için ne yapılması gerektiği konusu irdelenip, en yüksek iyiye yönelen insana yüklenilen ödevlerin tanrısal buyruklar olarak benimsenmesiyle mutluluktan pay alma umudunu doğuran ahlak temelli din anlayışına dikkat çekilmektedir. (shrink)

This study takes up the discussion held by Philippe Sabot in Foucault, Sade and the Enlightenment when it came the Marquis de Sade's work uses in studies conducted by Michel Foucault from Madness and Civilization to The Will to Knowledge. What interests us know of this relationship? This is the main question that guided our study.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy and Literature 26.2 (2002) 397-404 [Access article in PDF] The Sexist Sublime in Sade and Lyotard Caroline Weber In this case the masculine returns to haunt the place of the feminine like a ghost...., bloody and inhuman, in order to manifest and to root unforgettably in us the idea of a perpetual conflict and a spasm in which life is constantly being cut short. Antonin Artaud, The (...) Theater and Its Double"VIOLENCE," JEAN-FRANÇOIS LYOTARD ASSERTS in a recent article on Kantian aesthetics, "is necessary to the sublime." 1 More precisely, the sublime, held to transport an individual beyond his or her "ordinary" register of aesthetic responses, may do violence to a person's faculty of imagination, by shattering the accepted limits of sensory experience. Lyotard explains: In the sublime, the imagination must be subjected to violence, because it is by way of its suffering, the mediation of its violation, that the joy of seeing—or almost seeing—the law can be obtained.... This "joy" [here Lyotard cites The Critique of Judgment] "is only possible by the mediation of pain." 2Indeed, students of Kant's work have long been familiar with the exclusion of sentiment, pathos, and personal interest that he posits as a requirement for exalted status in the aesthetic and the moral sphere. For Kant, the law is precisely about the painful suppression of pleasure-seeking impulses for the sake of a disinterested, higher good. To achieve the transcendental perfection of the law, typically understood to be the domain of God alone, one must, godlike, overcome the [End Page 397] limitations of human nature and human feeling. And this effort—of which the Passion is just one vivid example—can be extraordinarily painful. In this context, Lyotard's formulation of the problem may not strike us as particularly startling. In contending that the Kantian experience of the sublime requires the mediation of pain, the French poststructuralist appears simply to be reminding us that the law, whether aesthetic or moral in nature, always demands some sort of discomfort, some kind of sacrifice.We might be more inclined to accept this last statement if Lyotard's own work hadn't already taught us to think otherwise. For as he demonstrates admirably in The Differend, his 1983 meditation on testimony and the Holocaust, there is always a winner and a loser under the law; its attendant pains are always selectively applied. From a discursive point of view, this asymmetrical relationship manifests itself in a differend, a situation where two parties find themselves in dispute, and "the 'regulation' of the conflict that opposes them is done in the idiom of one of the parties, while the wrong suffered by the other is not signified in that idiom." 3 According to Lyotard, the suffering of the Jews at the hands of the Nazis exemplifies this pattern. In a strict juridical sense, any attempted protests by concentration camp prisoners had no meaning, and no right to mean anything, in Third Reich Germany: In the differend, something "asks" to be put into phrases, and suffers from the wrong (tort) of not being able to be put into phrases right away. This is when the human beings who thought they could use language as an instrument of communication learn through the feeling of pain... to recognize that what remains to be phrased exceeds what they can presently phrase.... 4Here Lyotard reveals that an encounter with the law, mediated by pain, inevitably creates injustices and wronged parties. In this paper, I will draw on this insight from The Differend to point up the ethical deficiencies or torts inherent in his own ruminations on the Kantian sublime—and in those of another philosopher whose thinking closely resembles Lyotard's on the subject, the notorious Marquis de Sade. To limit the scope of my inquiry, I shall focus in this brief essay on the differend to which each thinker's writings subject the figure of the mother.For Lyotard and Sade alike, the mother represents first and foremost the capacity to reproduce. With this capacity... (shrink)

The Presentation of Sacher-Masoch is Deleuze’s boldest establishment of the three-way relation Art-Desire-Law, rich with consequences in the attempt to find new foundations for critique. Rather than trying to rethink Kant with Sade, Deleuze chose to rethink Kant with Masoch, treating the latter as a therapist as well as an artist.

Consideration of the work of Sade in relation to Adorno usually refers to the much-discussed chapter from Dialektik der Aufklärung. But Adorno made a number of other remarks across his career that suggest a very different reading. I will discuss the three most significant of these remarks and show how they develop an approach to the libidinal aspect of aesthetic experience that challenges our understanding of the relation of thought and language. In doing so, Sade’s works indicate an (...) extraordinary liberation of the dialectic of natural-history through a mimesis of desire, which is made apparent in what Sade’s texts literally present; in their contingency and also their facticity. (shrink)

Kant defines enlightenment of the individual as emergence of the individual from a self-imposed immaturity. In this definition, individuals who are not enlightened are held responsible for their failures. This is because Kant, in this text, implies that the only thing we need in order to be enlightened as individuals is to be able to use our capacity to think, which is present in every mentally fit individual. One can infer that Kant has an egalitarian understanding of (...) enlightenment, since anyone who has the courage and determination to use their mind can be enlightened. However, when the text is examined more closely and Kant's other writings are consulted, it becomes clear that another factor beyond the individual's control plays a role in whether an individual is enlightened. This factor is the individual's upbringing and education. If Kant admits that the education one receives plays a role in one’s state of being enlightened, and if not everyone is exposed to the education necessary to become an enlightened individual, then Kant would have an elitist approach to enlightenment. In this article, I will first point out the visible tension in Kant’s texts about the enlightenment of the individual. This apparent tension, however, will be resolved by showing that Kant stands in opposition to the Platonic account of enlightenment and the elitist attitude attached to it, and instead adopts a Stoic account of enlightenment and thereby develops an egalitarian approach to enlightenment. __________________ -/- Kant bireyin aydınlanmasını insanın kendi suçu ile düşmüş olduğu bir ergin olmama durumundan kurtulması olarak tanımlar. Bu tanımda aydın olamayan bireyler başarısızlıklarından kendileri sorumlu tutulur. Zira bu metinde Kant, aydın bireyler olabilmemiz için gereken tek şeyin –mental olarak sağlıklı her bireyde var olan- düşünme kapasitesini kullanabilmek olduğunu ima eder. Aklını kullanma cesareti ve azmi gösteren herkesin aydın olabileceğini iddia etmesi sebebiyle Kant’ın eşitlikçi bir aydınlanma anlayışını olduğu düşünülebilir. Ancak bu metne daha yakından baktığımızda ve Kant’ın diğer metinlerine danıştığımızda, bireyin aydın olup olmamasında bireyin kontrolü dışındaki başka bir faktörün daha rol oynadığını görüyoruz. Bu faktör de bireyin yetiştirilme tarzı ve aldığı eğitimdir. Eğer aydın olmamızda aldığımız eğitimin rolü varsa ve aydın bireyler olabilmek için herkes gerekli olan eğitimi alamıyorsa, Kant’ın aydınlanma konusunda elitist bir yaklaşıma sahip olduğunu düşünebiliriz. Bu çalışmada bireyin aydınlanması konusunda Kant’ın metinlerinde görünür bir gerilim olduğuna işaret edilecektir. Kant’ın aydınlanma konusunda kendi dönemine hâkim olan Platoncu aydınlanma anlayışından ve buna bağlı olarak gelişen elitist tavırdan farklı olarak Stoacı aydınlanma anlayışını benimsediği ve dolayısıyla da eşitlikçi bir tutum sergilediği gösterilerek bu gerilim çözümlenecektir. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kant’s SadismErmanno BencivengaIn The Ethics Of Psychoanalysis, Lacan says: “So as to produce the kind of shock or eye-opening effect that seems to me necessary if we are to make progress, I simply want to draw your attention to this: if The Critique of Practical Reason appeared in 1788, seven years after the first edition of The Critique of Pure Reason, there is another work which came out (...) six years [!] after The Critique of Practical Reason, a little after Thermidor in 1795, and which is called Philosophy in the Boudoir.” 1 What is supposed to produce the shock effect is not the simple juxtaposition of dates, of course, but the implicitly Hegelian reading of history which makes those dates significant, and which comes out in full strength when Lacan says, in Kant avec Sade: “The Philosophy in the Boudoir comes eight years [!] after the Critique of Practical Reason. If, after seeing that the former agrees with the latter, we prove that it completes it, we will say that it gives the truth of the Critique.” 2 Lacan’s “proof,” however, is anything but rigorous or systematic; so his provocative statement will probably sound inspiring to Lacan enthusiasts and gratuitous to virtually anyone else. Which is a pity, because the statement is absolutely correct: it is indeed the case that Sade brought to their extreme consequences the characteristic premises of Kant’s ethics, thus unfolding their truth in ways which the man Kant might even have vehemently resisted, but which were nonetheless necessary. Here I would like to provide more of a systematic and rigorous defense of this statement, though I make no claim as to how faithful my reconstruction might be to Lacan’s “intentions” (the irrelevance of this issue from the point of view espoused here will soon become apparent; hence it will also become apparent that it is an issue this point of view need not be concerned with). [End Page 39]According to Kant, a moral duty cannot be based on any inclination or feeling—including feelings of compassion or sympathy for another human being. Any dependence on such feelings would represent a pathology of reason, a case of reason being guided by something other than itself, of it not being practical, and hence of heteronomous behavior. Making the well-being of some other human, or of one’s community, or of humankind, the goal of one’s action would be relegating rationality to (at best) an instrumental role, and thus denying any ethical value to that action. Kant says that “kindness done from duty—although no inclination impels us, and even although natural and unconquerable disinclination stands in our way—is practical, and not pathological, love, residing in the will and not in the propensions of feeling, in principles of action and not of melting compassion; and it is this practical love alone which can be an object of command.” 3This independence of any empirical conditioning is further articulated in the distinction between acting in conformity with duty and acting from the motive of duty: “When... disappointments and hopeless misery have quite taken away the taste for life; when a wretched man, strong in soul and more angered at his fate than faint-hearted or cast down, longs for death and still preserves his life without loving it—not from inclination or fear but from duty; then indeed his maxim has a moral content.” 4 But now the problem is how exactly to understand this distinction. Kant’s talk of motives suggests that it’s one’s intentional state that makes the difference: that the very same behavior may have only the appearance of morality, or instead be truly moral, depending on what one’s goals are. If, say, I promote the well-being of my neighbor because it makes me feel good, or because I empathize with him, then there is nothing moral to what I do. If, on the other hand, I do exactly the same thing because it is rational to do so, then there will be moral content to it. And indeed this position is often identified with Kant, and sometimes suggested by Kant himself—from now... (shrink)

Bu makale, Kant’ın felsefesinde özgürlük konusunu incelemeyi ve tartışmayı amaçlamaktadır. Bu amaçla öncelikle Kant’ın özgürlük anlayışının ahlak felsefesiyle olan ilişkisi irdelenmiştir. İnsanın çevresini olduğu gibi kabul etmesi ve kendi özgür iradesi ile çevresine müdahale etmesi, onu değiştirmesi ve deneyimleri ile idrak etme süreci onun eylemlerinin dolayısıyla özgürlüğünün sınırları olduğu bilincine varması koşuluyla gerçekleşir. Dolayısıyla istediği biçimde eylemde bulunma ve her istediğini yapma anlamında bir özgürlük nasıl gerçekleşir. Bu anlamda İnsan özgür olduğunu biliyorsa bu bilginin nereden geldiğini belirtmek gerekir. (...) Kant’a göre özgürlüğü teorik olarak anlayamasak da bütün ideler içinde doğuştan olarak bildiğimiz tek idedir. Çünkü özgürlüğü ahlak yasasının koşulu olarak görmekteyiz. Yani özgürlüğün bilincine varmanın koşulu ahlaklılıktır. (shrink)

Felsefe, kümülatif yapısı ile ele alınmalıdır. Bu yüzden, bir filozofun düşünceleri anlaşılmak istendiğinde, o kendi çağındaki mevcut ve geçmiş teorilerden soyutlanmamalı ve bu kümülatif ve devamlılık arz eden yapı dikkate alınarak incelenmelidir. Bu bağlamda, Kant, Bergson ve İkbal’in zaman anlayışları, bazı uyumsuz noktalara sahip gibi anlaşılabilseler de, dikkatle incelendiğinde birbirleri arasında bir devamlılığın bulunduğu göze çarpar. Kant’ın zaman anlayışı, Kritik öncesi ve Kritik dönemi olmak üzere iki dönemde incelenebilir. Kritik öncesi döneminde Kant, zamanın insan zihninin dışında kendinde (...) bir gerçekliğe ve varlığa sahip olduğunu kabul eder. Fakat Kant, zamanı bütün duyuları önceleyen bir görü olarak anlamasının tohumlarını da hala Kritik öncesi dönemde iken eker. Bu doğrultuda, onun odağı özneyi merkeze alan bir tutuma doğru ilerler görünür. Kritik döneminde özne merkezci konumu daha da belirginleşir ve Kant, zamanın bütün dışsallıkları öncelediğini iddia eder. Ona göre zaman, duyulur bir görü olarak, eşyayı zihnin algılayabilmesi için eşzamanlılık ve ardışıklık içinde konumlandırır. Diğer taraftan Bergson, Kant’ı pek çok açıdan eleştirmekle beraber onun düşüncelerinden açık bir şekilde faydalanır. Bergson’un zaman anlayışı iki bileşenden oluşur: Salt süre ve homojen zaman. Salt süre, özne-merkezci olması bakımından üzerinde Kant’ın düşünce pratiğinin etkisinin görünür olduğu bir kavramsallaştırmadır. Bu, her bir bilincin, kişinin geçmiş ve şimdisini bir bütünde birleştirerek bireysel olarak sahip olduğu ve özünde heterojen, sırasız bir şekilde ardışık ve bölünemez zamandır. Homojen zaman ise sıralı ve eşzamanlı olması bakımından köklerini yine Kant’ta bulur. Homojen zaman, salt sürelerin uyum içinde çalışmasını sağlayan, bireyler için ortak zemini teşkil eden zamandır. Bu iki filozofun düşünceleri doğrultusunda İkbal’in zaman teorisi incelendiğinde, onun hem duyulabilir görünün bir formu olan Kant’ın zamanından hem de Bergson’un salt süresinden faydalandığı ortaya çıkar. İkbal, bu iki zaman anlayışını kullanarak İslam düşüncesinde İlahi Zaman’ı ve dolayısıyla da özgür iradeyi yeniden inşa eder. Salt süre ve yaratıcılık açısından, evrene yönelik mekanik bir anlayış Bergson ve İkbal tarafından reddedilir. Böylece İkbal, özgür iradenin Tanrı’nın salt süresi, yani İlahi Zaman, aracılığı ile yayılmasına ve tüm benliklere ait salt sürelere nüfuz etmesine izin verir. Biz, bu makale aracılığı ile, İkbal’in salt süre mefhumunu ve Tanrı’ya ait salt süre olarak İlahi Zaman’ı kullanarak özgür irade anlayışını yeniden inşa etmesinin köklerine gitmek niyetindeyiz. (shrink)

Par l'expression ile de la verite, Kant designe l'objet de la premiere partie de la logique transcendantale - la logique de la verite ou encore l'Analytique transcendantale. C'est celle-ci que l'on s'est propose de suivre ici. Les resultats ont, apres une etude de la Deduction transcendantale, permis de mieux saisir le principe de la grandeur intensive et surtout de renouveler l'approche de la chose en soi reliee a la methode qui n'est autre que le sujet transcendantal. Et la serie (...) des equivalences nous a conduit a mettre en lumiere les concepts limites de mort et de neant, si negliges par les interpretes. Cette lecture est une aventure qui mene beaucoup plus loin que les acquis de l'oeuvre de Kant. Elle suscitera, esperons-le, au moins des controverses. (shrink)

Kant, 1770 yılında Duyulur ve Anlaşılır Dünyanın Form ve İlkeleri eserini kaleme aldıktan sonra on yıl boyunca sessiz kalıp ardından Saf Aklın Eleştirisi’ni yazar. Bu bakımdan 1770 tezi Kant’ın eleştirel döneme geçiş eseri olarak değerlendirilir. Eser Kant’ın bitmez uğraşı metafiziği sağlam bir eksene yerleştirmek için giriş önerisidir. Bu bağlamda Kant duyusallığın konusu olan dünya ile anlayışın konusu olan dünyayı ayırarak metafizik için bir yol arar. Duyusallığa konu edilen dünya uzay ve zaman formları yoluyla kavranabilir. Anlaşılır dünya (...) ise duyuların sızıntılarından uzak yalnızca anlayış kavramları yoluyla belirlendiğinde metafizik yanılsamalardan korunabilir. 1770 tezi, Saf Aklın Eleştirisi’nin özellikle transendental estetik bölümü göz önünde bulundurulduğunda eleştirel dönemle büyük oranda örtüşse de anlaşılır dünyada noumenanın bilinebileceğini varsayması açısından eleştirel dönemden uzaklaşır. Çalışmada 1770 tezinin temel varsayımlarını ortaya koyarak bu varsayımları eleştirel dönemle ilgileri açısından ele alacağız. Özellikle, Saf Aklın Eleştirisi’nin A ve B baskılarında iki kez yazılan, deneyim ile anlama yetisi kavramları arasındaki uyuşmayı ele alan transendental türetim sorununun başlangıcının 1770 tezinde olduğunu göstereceğiz. Böylelikle 1770 tezinin eleştirel felsefede sürdürülen ve yadsınan varsayımlarını belirgin kılacağız. Çalışmadaki bir başka çabamız ise 1770’ten sonraki mektuplaşmaları yoluyla Kant’ın felsefi tutumunun nasıl farklılaştığını ortaya koymak olacak. 1772 yılında Herz’e yazdığı ünlü mektuptan önce Kant’ın Lambert, Herz ve Mendelssohn’la yazışmalarında yer alan 1770 tezi değerlendirmelerinin eleştirel döneme geçiş sürecini nasıl etkilediğini konu edeceğiz. (shrink)

Competing contemporary theories of health, the reductionist and the relativist of an objective goal, can be classified as objectivist theories. The ultimate goal of all living things is life, the standard by which states or functions can be measured, and thereby defined as healthy or disease states. While disease can be classified in a taxonomy of biological dysfunctions without remainder, health is a richer concept that includes not only biological values, but also moral values, both leading to the ultimate goal (...) of human flourishing. (shrink)

A group is lying when it makes a statement that it believes to be untrue but wants the addressee(s) to believe. But how can we distinguish statements that the group believes to be untrue from honest group statements based on mistaken beliefs or confusion within the group? I will suggest a narrative constraint for honest group statements, made up of two components. Narrative coherence requires that a new group statement should not conflict with group knowledge on the matter, or beliefs (...) of relevant operative subgroups, unless a coherent rationale is given. Narrative intention looks at the process of gathering new evidence on the area of expertise of the group and requires that the group position behind the statement is formed in good faith. The narrative constraint will help to distinguish group lies from more innocent erroneous statements of group beliefs when there is an internal disagreement within the group, including in cases involving spokespersons. (shrink)

In der 1785 veröffentlichten Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten formuliert Kant erstmals die Prinzipien einer universalistischen Ethik der Autonomie, deren Einfluß bis heute ungebrochen ist. Schon beim Übergang von der gemeinen zur philosophischen Vernunfterkenntnis findet man die Hauptgedanken: In der Ethik geht es nicht primär um das gute Leben und das Glück, und es geht auch zunächst nicht darum, welche Handlungserfolge erzielt werden; Gegenstand moralischer Hochschätzung sind vielmehr Intentionen und Maximen. Gut ist, was für alle vernünftigen Wesen gilt, weil (...) es von ihnen als autonomen und vernünftigen Wesen gewollt wird. Die Schrift ist kurz, einfach gegliedert und verständlich geschrieben. Sie eignet sich daher als Einführung in Kants Ethik, enthält aber zugleich als Grundlegung alle wesentlichen Gedanken seiner praktischen Philosophie. Auf der Grundlage der Originalausgabe von 1785/86 wurde der Text völlig neu erstellt. Eines der wichtigsten Bücher der Philosophiegeschichte liegt damit in einer zuverlässigen und preisgünstigen Neuausgabe vor. (shrink)

This paper explores types of organisational ignorance and ways in which organisational practices can affect the knowledge we have about the causes and effects of our actions. I will argue that because knowledge and information are not evenly distributed within an organisation, sometimes organisational design alone can create individual ignorance. I will also show that sometimes the act that creates conditions for culpable ignorance takes place at the collective level. This suggests that quality of will of an agent is not (...) necessary to explain culpable ignorance in an organisational setting. (shrink)

How should we make sense of praise and blame and other such reactions towards collective agents like governments, universities, or corporations? Collective agents can be appropriate targets for our moral feelings and judgements because they can maintain and express moral positions of their own. Moral agency requires being capable of recognising moral considerations and reasons. It also necessitates the ability to react reflexively to moral matters, i.e. to take into account new moral concerns when they arise. While members of a (...) collective agent are capable of this, the collective frames the thinking of the individual moral agents within it and affects their options in myriad ways. The moral positions thus formed and expressed belong to the collective. Crucially, unlike marginal moral agents, collective agents as moral actors can be held fully responsible for their acts and omissions. (shrink)

Breaches of electronic medical records constitute a type of healthcare error, but should be considered separately from other types of errors because the national focus on the security of electronic data justifies special treatment of medical information breaches. Guidelines for protecting electronic medical records should be applied equally to paper medical records.

A Monumental Figure of Western Thought Wrestles with the Question of God Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) is one of the most influential philosophers in the history of Western philosophy. His contributions have had a profound impact on almost every philosophical movement that followed him. Kant's teachings on religion were unorthodox in that they were based on rationality rather than revelation. Though logically proving God's existence might be impossible, it is morally reasonable to "act as if there be a God." (...) His strictly rational approach was considered so scandalous that the King of Prussia forbid him to teach or write further on religious subjects, which Kant obeyed until the king's death. A work of major importance in the history of Western religious thought, Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone represents a great philosopher's attempt to spell out the form and content of a type of religion grounded in moral reason and meeting the needs of an ethical life. (shrink)

Climate change can be construed as a question of collective responsibility from two different viewpoints: climate change being inherently a collective problem, or collective entities bearing responsibility for climate change. When discussing collective responsibility for climate change, “collective” can thus refer to the problem of climate change itself, or to the entity causing the harm and/or bearing responsibility for it. The first viewpoint focuses on how climate change is a harm that has been caused collectively. Collective action problem refers to (...) an aggregation of individual actions which together produce an outcome that is not intended at the level of an individual action. It cannot be solved by any one agent acting unilaterally. Instead, climate change action must be enacted and supported by numerous agents. The second way to conceptualize climate change as a question of collective responsibility focuses on the collective entities that bear responsibility for climate change. As a global problem, climate change is linked to the realm of international politics, where states, governments, and intergovernmental organizations are the main collective entities. Other important agential collectives in terms of climate responsibility are corporations, including carbon majors who have produced the bulk of emissions. Climate change has also been theorized as a structural injustice, which combines elements from both the viewpoints on what is collective about responsibility for climate change. (shrink)

Does it make sense to talk about corporate responsibility for climate change mitigation? Through utilizing systems thinking, I will argue that mitigation should be incorporated into corpora...

Universities are knowledge institutions. Compared to several other knowledge institutions (e.g. schools, government research organisations, think tanks), research universities have unusual, anarchic organisational features. We argue that such anarchic features are not a weakness. Rather, they reflect the special standing of research universities among knowledge institutions. We contend that the distributed, self-organising mode of knowledge production maintains a diversity of approaches, topics and solutions needed in frontier research, which involves generating relevant knowledge under uncertainty. Organisational disunity and inconsistencies should sometimes (...) be protected by institutional structures and procedures in order for research universities to best serve their purpose as knowledge institutions. The quality control for the knowledge produced stems from knowledge fields, clusters of knowledge and research that exist beyond the confines of individual organisations. The diversity of epistemic contributions is therefore kept in check by the order imposed by the internal logic of science as a social practice. Our argument provides a new defence for the autonomy of research conducted at universities. (shrink)

Henry Shue’s latest book, The Pivotal Generation: Why We Have a Moral Responsibility to Slow Climate Change Right Now, is an excellent read, both clear and comprehensive. It is written in a way that makes it accessible to philosophers and non-philosophers alike. The book argues persuasively that the people alive today must take immediate and drastic action to tackle climate change, as the current decade will be crucial for determining how severe the impacts will become. Shue warns how a sharp (...) division into past, present, and future is misleading when it comes to climate change and can obfuscate the extent of the responsibility that the current generations bear. For us to acknowledge our responsibility, we must recognise how deeply intertwined our lives are with both the past and the future. One of these innate deep connections between generations is the extensive time period that carbon emissions can continue to contribute to climate change, for dozens of centuries. -/- The current generations have been bequeathed an energy system that relies on fossil fuels and that continues to add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. For over two centuries now, the planet has been getting warmer as an unintended side effect of industrialisation. We are the first humans to understand the dynamics of the Earth’s climate and how human actions cause anthropogenic climate change. With the rapidly advanced scientific knowledge, it has become apparent that there is a need to quickly transition to a different energy regime. Shue points out that this knowledge has made us the first humans to recognise that action is required, but the urgency of the problem also makes us possibly the last to still be able to act before certain major threats are aggravated. With many irreversible climate change impacts, the date-of-last-opportunity to take action to prevent them might be very soon. According to Shue (2021, p. 6), “This gives us an awesome responsibility. Humans have accidentally set our own house on fire, and if we do not douse the flames while they are no more extensive than they are now, it may not be possible ever to extinguish them”. That is why we alive now are the pivotal generation. -/- Although a sense of urgency runs through the book and the seriousness of the situation is made very clear, Shue steers away from fearmongering. He does not think that human extinction is around the corner, but underlines that we cannot rule out such threats until we stop feeding the beast. Unless we cap emissions at a relatively safe level and transform our infrastructure to net zero, we will keep on increasing risks to future people by “adding continuously to the mushrooming danger” (p. 23). The book stresses that the possibility of passing several tipping points adds to the urgency and the risks because when positive feedback mechanisms are triggered, climate change accelerates. These positive feedbacks can feed into each other, such as when warming seawater melts even more ice, with the possibility of a cascade of feedbacks if enough tipping points are passed. Such changes are irreversible and could themselves become further positive feedbacks. Shue (pp. 24–25) warns that it is “likely that the near future is the last chance to avoid passing significant tipping points and entirely possible that the near future is the last chance to avoid provoking a cascade of tipping points” (emphasis in original). -/- While I applaud the general message of Shue’s book, I find that the brushstrokes he uses when identifying those responsible are a little too broad. The reason for this is twofold. Firstly, it is questionable as to how many of us really know enough about the risks we are leaving future generations with. Secondly, discussion in terms of generations underplays the big differences between the responsibility of different groups of actors within them. In what follows, I will elaborate on these points. I should note from the outset, however, that although I think that these are important issues, I find them to be points of clarification in an impressive and ambitious book on why our actions have such significance and why objections to urgent, large-scale climate action are misplaced. (shrink)

We attribute knowledge to institutions on a daily basis, saying things like "the government knew about the threat" or "the university did not act upon the knowledge it had about the harassment". Institutions can also attribute knowledge to themselves, like when Maybank Global Banking claims that it offers its customers "deep expertise and vast knowledge" of the Southeast Asia region, or when the United States Geological Survey states that it understands complex natural science phenomena like the probability of earthquakes occurring (...) along a given fault line. This article aims to discover when we can correctly attribute knowledge to an institution. I find this an interesting question, especially because when something does go wrong, all too often the official line of response from institutions is that they were unaware of the situation: in other words, they did not have enough information at their disposal. I will argue that institutions have fewer excuses for being ignorant than individuals do, and that many admissions of institutional knowledge are too modest. I begin by discussing a real-life example of the latter, before turning my attention to the usually fragmented nature of institutional knowledge. I also discuss the robustness of this knowledge, offering a distinction between two types of institutional knowledge. I then discuss knowledge parameters and why institutions have fewer excuses for not knowing about something than individuals do. I round off the chapter by examining institutional knowledge on climate change. (shrink)

It is doubtful that any feature of the American health care system in the last several decades has had as profound an effect on the way Americans pursue their perceived health needs as complementary and alternative medicine. Almost half of all Americans take care of some of their health care needs outside of contemporary scientific medicine. The number of visits to CAM practitioners was estimated 6 years ago to be 629 million a year, with expenditures of $27 billion a year. (...) The use of CAM has been expanding rapidly despite little objective evidence of its safety or effectiveness. Little more than a decade ago CAM was viewed by the traditional medical community as a nuisance that offered unproven treatments at best and as outright quackery at worst. In any case, alternative medicine, as it was known at that time, seemed unworthy of serious attention. (shrink)

It is doubtful that any feature of the American health care system in the last several decades has had as profound an effect on the way Americans pursue their perceived health needs as complementary and alternative medicine. Almost half of all Americans take care of some of their health care needs outside of contemporary scientific medicine. The number of visits to CAM practitioners was estimated 6 years ago to be 629 million a year, with expenditures of $27 billion a year. (...) The use of CAM has been expanding rapidly despite little objective evidence of its safety or effectiveness. Little more than a decade ago CAM was viewed by the traditional medical community as a nuisance that offered unproven treatments at best and as outright quackery at worst. In any case, alternative medicine, as it was known at that time, seemed unworthy of serious attention. (shrink)

The topic of my thesis is individual and collective responsibility for collectively caused systemic harms, with climate change as the case study. Can an individual be responsible for these harms, and if so, how? Furthermore, what does it mean to say that a collective is responsible? A related question, and the second main theme, is how ignorance and knowledge affect our responsibility. -/- My aim is to show that despite the various complexities involved, an individual can have responsibility to address (...) climate change. I argue that climate change is not a problem just for states and international bodies, but also for individuals. There are three possible sources of moral responsibility for individuals in relation to climate change harms: direct responsibility (individuals qua individuals), shared responsibility as members (individuals qua members of collective agents), and shared responsibility as constituents (individuals qua constituents of unorganised collectives). -/- Accounts that deny individual responsibility fail to either take our interdependent reality seriously or fail to understand marginal participation (or in the case direct responsibility, fail to appreciate the nature of the climate change phenomenon). Individuals can be complicit in climate change harms, either as members of collective agents (e.g. as citizens of states or employees of a corporation) or as constituents of unorganised collectives (e.g. as consumers or polluters). -/- Although I focus on individual complicity, I do not deny the obligations of collective agents. However, nation-states, governments, and international bodies are not the only relevant collective agents in climate ethics: other collective agents, such as corporations, matter also and can have obligations concerning making sure that their activities are as carbon-neutral as possible. In addition, those corporations that have engaged in lobbying against climate regulation through creating and disseminating misleading information have acquired themselves additional obligations to mitigate climate change and compensate for the harm they have caused. Even so, the ethical claims can only be understood by individual members of these collective agents because only they can feel the pull of moral claims. I suggest that we could distinguish between what one must possess in order to be capable of making moral claims (i.e. moral agency conditions), and what it means to have the ability to exhibit such claims through one’s conduct. -/- Individual direct responsibility is to not to increase the probable risk of serious harm to other people, at least as long as we can do so at a less than significant cost to ourselves. It is limited to relatively wealthy individuals. Offsetting is not a reliable way to meet this duty; we need to look at the emissions from our lifestyle choices (within the available infrastructure). Shared responsibility qua members of collective agents is the key individual responsibility, and it presses especially on those occupying key positions within key collective agents. Saying that, our shared responsibility qua constituents of unorganised collectives has the potential to be decisive in whether some action is taken or not, either through a set of actions that can signal certain acceptance or support, or as a form of political support from the grass roots. (shrink)

The dead donor rule (DDR) has facilitated the saving of hundreds of thousands of lives. Recent advances in heart donation, however, have exposed how DDR has limited donation of all organs. We propose advancing the moment in the dying process at which death can be determined to increase substantially the supply of organs for transplantation. We justify this approach by identifying certain flaws in the Uniform Determination of Death Act and proposing a modification of that law that permits earlier procurement (...) of healthier organs in greater numbers. (shrink)

This paper examines the establishment and enforcement of codes of conduct governing the use of Internet technology as a means of providing a basis of trust in the e‐business context. The discussion draws on the findings of a survey of 80 UK organisations, and considers the relationship between factors such as organisation size, type, use of IT, the length of time with an Internet connection and the use of a code of conduct, as well as the specific areas of Internet (...) technology covered by codes of conduct. The paper also investigates the extent of disciplinary cases associated with the misuse of Internet technology, as well as the ownership and responsibility for implementing codes of conduct. The survey results suggest that the use of codes of conduct varies significantly from organisation to organisation, and that those who initiate such codes are not those seen as being responsible for implementing them. The results also indicate that a growing number of employees are disciplined for misuse of facilities offered by Internet technology. (shrink)

The Dead Donor Rule (DDR) states that organ donation must not cause the death of the donor and is generally interpreted as requiring that the donor be declared dead before organs can be removed (Be...