Episode Details

Kant thought he had cracked the code of morality: a test that reveals whether what you do is morally permissible.

Topics Discussed

• Review of Kant’s metaphysics, freedom, and the relationship between morality and rational agency
• Deontology versus consequentialism
• Hypothetical and categorical imperatives
• Kant’s Universal Law Formulation and how to test a maxim through universalization
• Perfect and imperfect duties, including duties to oneself and duties to others
• Kant’s Humanity Formulation and the requirement to treat rational persons as ends rather than merely as means
• Whether the Universal Law and Humanity formulations always generate the same moral conclusions
• Kant’s broader philosophical system, including the highest good and the practical postulates of freedom, God, and immortality
• Kant’s place within the Enlightenment and some criticisms of his views