Kant’s Categorical Imperative
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss how, in the Enlightenment, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) sought to define the difference between right and wrong by applying reason, looking at the intention behind actions rather than at consequences. He was inspired to find moral laws by natural philosophers such as Newton and Leibniz, who had used reason rather than emotion to analyse the world around them and had identified laws of nature. Kant argued that when someone was doing the right thing, that person was doing what was the universal law for everyone, a formulation that has been influential on moral philosophy ever since and is known as the Categorical Imperative. Arguably even more influential was one of his reformulations, echoed in The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in which he asserted that humanity has a value of an entirely different kind from that placed on commodities. Kant argued that simply existing as a human being was valuable in itself, so that every human owed moral responsibilities to other humans and was owed responsibilities in turn.
Guests
-
Alison Hills No other episodes
Professor of Philosophy at St John's College, Oxford -
David Oderberg No other episodes
Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading - John Callanan
3 episodes
Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King's College, London
Reading list
-
Kant's Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals: A Reader's Guide
P. Guyer (Continuum, 2007) Google Books → -
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Immanuel Kant (trans. Mary Gregor and Jens Timmerman) (Cambridge University Press, 2012) Google Books → -
Creating the Kingdom of Ends
Christine Korsgaard (Cambridge University Press, 1996) Google Books → -
Kant: A Very Short Introduction
Roger Scruton (Oxford University Press, 2001) Google Books → -
Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals: An Introduction
Sally Sedgwick (Cambridge University Press, 2008) Google Books → -
An Introduction to Kant's Ethics
Roger J. Sullivan (Cambridge University Press, 1994) Google Books → -
Kant
Allen W. Wood (Blackwell, 2005) Google Books → -
Kant's Ethical Thought
Allen W. Wood (Cambridge University Press, 1999) Google Books →
Related episodes
-
Kant’s Copernican Revolution
3 Jun, 2021 100 Philosophy -
David Hume
6 Oct, 2011 100 Philosophy -
Empiricism
10 Jun, 2004 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
Guilt
1 Nov, 2007 170 Ethics -
The Ontological Argument
27 Sep, 2012 100 Philosophy -
Common Sense Philosophy
21 Jun, 2007 100 Philosophy -
Deism
8 Oct, 2020 210 Philosophy and theory of religion -
Edmund Burke
3 Jun, 2010 320 Political science -
Bishop Berkeley
20 Mar, 2014 100 Philosophy -
The Enlightenment in Britain
18 Jan, 2001 940 History of Europe -
Schopenhauer
29 Oct, 2009 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
Good and Evil
1 Apr, 1999 200 Religion -
Utilitarianism
11 Jun, 2015 100 Philosophy -
Al-Kindi
28 Jun, 2012 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
Nihilism
16 Nov, 2000 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
Freedom
4 Jul, 2002 320 Political science -
Hobbes
1 Dec, 2005 320 Political science -
Virtue
28 Feb, 2002 170 Ethics -
Spinoza
3 May, 2007 190 Modern Western Philosophy -
Hegel’s Philosophy of History
26 May, 2022 900 History
Programme ID: b0952zl3
Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0952zl3
Auto-category: 170 (Ethics and moral philosophy)