Self-constitution in the ethics of plato and Kant

Journal of Ethics

Volumn 3, Issue 1, 1999, Pages 1-29

  Korsgaard, Christine M ^a  

^a HARVARD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Action; Autonomy; Categorical imperative; Constitution; Deliberation; Internal standard; Justice; Kant; Normativity; Plato; Universalizability; Will

Indexed keywords

EID: 0038907360     PISSN: 13824554     EISSN: 15728609     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1026418314102     Document Type: Article

References (27)

1. David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, 2nd Edition, edited by L. A. Selby-Bigge and P. H. Nidditch (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), Book II, Part III, Section III, p. 413.
2. Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, Book II, Part III, Section III, p. 413.
3. One might think that Hume is also presenting a constitutional model, since his own argument suggests that the function of passion is to determine our ends and the function of reason is to discover means to ends. Elsewhere, however, I have argued that Hume does not really believe in a principle of instrumental practical reason, which instructs us to take the means to our ends, and which would be needed to integrate the two functions (the determination of the end and the identification of the means) into a single system which produces actions. Because of that, Hume is unable to work up a person out of these meager resources. What I've just said will become clearer as this essay proceeds, for it is actually, in a sense, a short version of the whole argument of this essay. For the argument that Hume does not believe in a principle of instrumental practical reason.
4. see my "The Normativity of Instrumental Reason" in Garrett Cullity and Berys Gaut (eds), Ethics and Practical Reason (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), pp. 215-254, especially pp. 220-234.
5. References to Plato's Republic are inserted into the text, using the standard Stephanus numbers inserted into the margins of most editions and translations of Plato's works. Direct quotations come from the translation by G. M. A. Grube as revised by C. D. C. Reeve, which may be found in Plato: Complete Works, edited by John M. Cooper (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997).
6. The other two arguments are the "outdoing" argument used to establish that justice is a form of virtue and knowledge (349a-350d) and the function argument used to establish that the just person is happiest (352d-354a).
7. Socrates not only openly acknowledges this oddity later on, but actually suggests that the principle of the specialization of labor is "beneficial" because it is "a sort of image of justice" (443c)
8. .I have also discussed these points in "Taking the Law into Our Own Hands: Kant on the Right to Revolution," in Andrews Reath, Barbara Herman and Christine M. Korsgaard (eds), Reclaiming the History ofEthics: Essays for John Rawls (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp. 308-309. The discussion here is in large part lifted from that discussion.
9. References to Kant's works are inserted into the text, using an abbreviation for the title followed by the volume and page numbers of the German Academy edition, which are found in the margins of most translations. The abbreviations and editions used are as follows: C2 = Critique of Practical Reason, edited and translated by Mary Gregor with an Introduction by Andrews Reath (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).
10. G= Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, edited and translated by Mary Gregor with an Introduction by Christine M. Korsgaard (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).
11. R= Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone, edited and translated by Theodore M. Greene and Hoyt H. Hudson with an Introduction by John R. Silber (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1960).
12. For a more complete account of these ideas and Kant's moral psychology generally see the first section of my "Motivation, Metaphysics, and the Value of the Self: A reply to Ginsborg, Guyer, and Schneewind," Ethics, 109 (1998), pp. 49-66.
13. Julia Annas and others have pointed out to me that there is some tension between this idea and certain passages in the latter books of the Republic which strongly suggest that Plato's view is that we should identify with reason - most notably the passage at 588b-e in which Plato compares the three parts of the soul to a many-headed beast (appetite), a lion (spirit), and a human being (reason). I agree, but I think that the tension is within the text of the Republic itself, that it is part of a general tension between the conceptions of the soul in the earlier and later books.
14. I discuss the conception of an internal standard in "The Normativity of Instrumental Reason," in Garrett Cullity and Berys Gaut (eds), Ethics and Practical Reason (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), pp. 215-254. See especially pp. 249-250. There I argue that the hypothetical imperative is an internal standard for acts of the will.
15. The model for my Harriet is the persuadable Harriet Smith in Jane Austen's novel Emma (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990).
16. See my "From Duty and for the Sake of the Noble: Kant and Aristotle on Morally Good Action" in Stephen Engstrom and Jennifer Whiting (eds), Aristotle, Kant, and the Stoics: Rethinking Happiness and Duty (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 203-236, especially pp. 208-212.
17. If I am right in saying that Kant sees self-love as operating unreflectively, this might seem to favor a wanton principle of self-love. Sometimes, however, it is clear that Kant has a prudent principle of self-love in mind - see for instance C2 5:35-36. While I think that the wanton principle does square better with Kant's arguments, I also think it should be possible to make the second Critique passages consistent with the view that those who act from self-love are unreflective. We just need to argue that there is a difference between being reflective and being calculating.
18. Although space constraints don't allow me to spell out the idea in sufficient detail here, I am tempted to say that the problem with the timocratic person is that he is unable to deal with the contingencies that call for the application of what I have elsewhere called, following John Rawls, "non-ideal theory" [See my "The Right to Lie: Kant on Dealing with Evil" in Creating the Kingdom of Ends (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 133-158, especially pp. 147-154].
19. That is, he acts well, except in those moments when true goodness calls for concession, compromise, a less strict rule, or even - though this is rare - actions that are formally wrong [See my "Taking the Law into Our Own Hands: Kant on the Right to Revolution," in Andrews Reath, Barbara Herman and Christine M. Korsgaard (eds), Reclaiming the History ofEthics: Essays for John Rawls (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) for a discussion of this kind of case].
20. See Plato, Phaedo 68d-69c.
21. A number of people have argued that the problem described here would not arise for the rational egoist in the more ordinary modern sense, the person who seeks to maximize the satisfaction of his own interests. Indeed this is suggested by my own remarks about how imitation virtue can help hold the oligarch together, for modern egoism is much like Plato's imitation virtue. If correct, this objection would suggest that you can constitute yourself through the egoistic principle. A full response to this objection requires a full treatment of the claim that there is a coherently formulable principle of rational egoism. See my "The Myth of Egoism" forthcoming.
22. I have lifted this example from a footnote in my "The Normativity of Instrumental Reason," Garrett Cullity and Berys Gaut (eds), Ethics and Practical Reason (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), pp. 215-254, p. 247, n. 64.
23. The problem with tyranny is not the same as that with timocracy, oligarchy, and democracy - it is not that the unity it produces in the soul is contingent. Plato envisions tyranny as a kind of madness (see R 573cff.). As I imagine the tyrant, his relation to his obsession is like a psychotic's relation to his delusion: he is able, and prepared, to organize everything else around it, but at the expense of a loss of his grip on reality, on the world. But that is only a sketch, and a fuller treatment of this principle, and of the question why a person cannot successful integrate himself under its governance, is required for the completeness of the argument of this paper.
24. To put it somewhat more strictly, you take yourself to be the cause of your intelligible movements, since it is only really an action if you are, or to the extent that you are, the cause. I think that there are important philosophical questions, yet to be worked out, about exactly how this point should be phrased, but for now I leave the more familiar formulation in the text. I am indebted to Sophia Reibetanz and Tamar Schapiro for discussions of these points.
25. The argument that follows made its first appearance in Section 1 of my "Reply" in The Sources of Normativity(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 225-233. I hope that the present version is clearer.
26. I owe this formulation of my point to Govert den Hartogh.
27. In Lecture 3 of The Sources of Normativity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), I give an argument that aims to move from the formal version of the categorical imperative to moral requirements by way of Kant's Formula of Humanity. See especially sections 3.3.7-3.4.10.