The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. The distinctive feature of this approach is to address substantive normative questions in moral and political philosophy through an analysis of the texts and theories of major figures in the history of the subject: Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Rousseau, Kant, and Marx. By reconstructing the core of these theories in a way that is informed by contemporary theoretical concerns, the contributors show how the history of the subject is a resource for understanding...
The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. The distincti...
Barbara Herman argues for a radical shift in the way we perceive Kant's ethics. She convincingly reinterprets the key texts, at once allowing Kant to mean what he says while showing that what Kant says makes good moral sense. She urges us to abandon the tradition that describes Kantian ethics as a deontology, a moral system of rules of duty. She finds the central idea of Kantian ethics not in duty but in practical rationality as a norm of unconditioned goodness. This book both clarifies Kant's own theory and adds programmatic vitality to modern moral philosophy.
Barbara Herman argues for a radical shift in the way we perceive Kant's ethics. She convincingly reinterprets the key texts, at once allowing Kant to ...
The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. The distinctive feature of this approach is to address substantive normative questions in moral and political philosophy through an analysis of the texts and theories of major figures in the history of the subject: Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Rousseau, Kant, and Marx. By reconstructing the core of these theories in a way that is informed by contemporary theoretical concerns, the contributors show how the history of the subject is a resource for understanding...
The essays in this volume offer an approach to the history of moral and political philosophy that takes its inspiration from John Rawls. The distincti...
A distinguished moral philosopher and a leading interpreter of Kant's ethics, Barbara Herman draws on Kant to address timeless issues in ethical theory as well as ones arising from current moral problems, such as obligations to distant need, the history of slavery as it bears on affirmative action, and the moral costs of reparative justice.
Challenging various Kantian orthodoxies, Herman offers a view of moral competency as a complex achievement, governed by rational norms and dependent on supportive social conditions. She argues that the objectivity of duties and obligations does...
A distinguished moral philosopher and a leading interpreter of Kant's ethics, Barbara Herman draws on Kant to address timeless issues in ethical th...
First published in 1990. The aim of this thesis is to show that the way to understand the central claims of Kant s ethics is to accept the idea that morality is a distinctive form of rationality; that the moral "ought" belongs to a system of imperatives based in practical reason; and that moral judgment, therefore, is a species of rational assessment of agents actions. It argues, in effect, that you cannot understand Kant s views about morality if you read him with Humean assumptions about rationality. This title will be of interest to students of philosophy. "
First published in 1990. The aim of this thesis is to show that the way to understand the central claims of Kant s ethics is to accept the idea tha...
