Kant's Theory of Virtue: The Value of Autocracy (Modern European Philosophy)
Cambridge University Press, 11/11/2010
EAN 9780521766234, ISBN10: 0521766230
Hardcover, 206 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 1.6 cm
Language: English
Anne Margaret Baxley offers a systematic interpretation of Kant's theory of virtue, whose most distinctive features have not been properly understood. She explores the rich moral psychology in Kant's later and less widely read works on ethics, and argues that the key to understanding his account of virtue is the concept of autocracy, a form of moral self-government in which reason rules over sensibility. Although certain aspects of Kant's theory bear comparison to more familiar Aristotelian claims about virtue, Baxley contends that its most important aspects combine to produce something different - a distinctively modern, egalitarian conception of virtue which is an important and overlooked alternative to the more traditional Greek views which have dominated contemporary virtue ethics.
Acknowledgments
List of abbreviations
Introduction
1. The good will, moral worth, and duty
concerns about Kant's rationalist moral psychology
2. Kant's Conception of Virtue and the autocracy of Pure Practical Reason
3. Virtue, human nature, and moral health
Kant's dispute with Schiller
4. The moral psychology of Kantian virtue
Conclusion
Kant's considered account of moral character and the good will reconsidered.