Document Type : Original Article

Authors

• Mohammad Kazemizadeh ¹
• Hossein Kalbasi Ashtari ²

¹ M.A. Student, Allamah Tabatabai University, Tehran, Iran

² Professor, Department of Philosophy, Allamah Tabatabai University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

The process of inferring the ethical law in Kantian ethics has been a contentious topic among contemporary Kantian scholars. The central issue revolves around how one can justify the ethical law - the categorical imperative - from the Kantian perspective or, in Kant's terms, influenced by the jurists of his time. In other words, how can we establish the ethical law and the ethical way of living in a world governed by mechanical necessity, which is not illusory? Can the idea of freedom serve as a valid and foundational basis for inferring the ethical law? If freedom lacks any sensory or cognitive basis, can it still be used to infer or justify another concept?  The foundation of the ethical law in Kant's two works, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and Critique of Practical Reason, is the idea of freedom. However, whether we can have cognitive knowledge about freedom independent of the ethical law is another fundamental question. In this essay, In the current essay, an attempt has been made to, after establishing the principles of pure practical reason and the ethical law, provide a clear justification of the idea of freedom by referring to various interpretations in both books, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals and Critique of Practical Reason. The fundamental idea of Groundwork for inferring the ethical law in the third section of the book is freedom and the transition to the rational world. Kant, in the Critique of Practical Reason, presents the idea of the fact of reason or the immediate awareness of the ethical law to explain freedom, thus justifying the possibility of acting by the ethical law and ethical living. After analyzing these two fundamental ideas - the idea of freedom and the idea of fact of reason - based on readings by scholars such as Timmermann, Guyer, Lewis White Beck, and Dieter Henrich, it is concluded that freedom cannot be the basis and cognitive reason for our adherence to the ethical law because freedom cannot be apprehended through any sensory experience, and consequently, one cannot infer the ethical law through freedom. Therefore, the proof of the idea of freedom is temporarily set aside and there will be no "Deduction" here; only explanation remains, and Kant, through the idea of the fact of reason or immediate awareness of the ethical law and accepting that "the ethical law as something given to practical reason is the reason and cognitive basis for our idea of freedom," explains the concept of freedom. Thus, instead of deducting the ethical law based on the idea of freedom the idea of freedom is analyzed based on the ethical law as the fact of reason.

Keywords

• Ethical law
• will
• freedom
• practical reason
• fact of reason
• metaphysical deduction
• transcendental deduction

Main Subjects

• Western Philosophy