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.To say that thehuman moral   disposition  is naturally evil is only to say that, by nature,the action-explaining forces of inclination and self-love are predominantin us.In Kant s view there is no path to overcoming our evil nature apartfrom striving continuously to make moral progress in strengthening respectfor the moral law that is, apart from attempting to become ever morevirtuous, in the formal sense.If the fault in our human natures lies in ourown timeless, noumenal deed, its remedy can be nothing other than ourown endless, empirical progress.Conclusion: Grounds for HopeThe seven preceding chapters have laid out the main theses of the theoryof human action that is presupposed by Kant s moral theory.Among themare: that we always act on maxims, as principles of practical reasoning; thatour maxims provide the basis for imperatival justifications of our actions;and that they also provide the basis for motivational explanations of actions,through the psychological forces of the incentives they incorporate.Thelatter point implies that Kant would have accepted psychological deter-minism.And this is controversial; since many see psychological determinismas undermining human freedom.But here it has been explained how Kantheld that our freedom of choice belongs to a noumenal world, apart fromspace and time; and how through a noumenal act we each freely determinethe contents of our characters in this empirical world; and that as differentas we are in regard to moral character, we are all basically evil (  even thebest  ).Our evil nature consists in our not being completely good (holy):in our not being predisposed, necessarily, to do whatever we recognize weare morally justified in doing.This brief, concluding section sketches some of Kant s thoughts on whatcan be called the human predicament, and, in view of it, on what we mayjustifiably hope.To be human is to act always, and only, on maxims: inways we think of as good.Yet   good  here is ambiguous.So there is asense in which each of us is, within him- or herself, fundamentally dividedon what to do.We want to do what secures our own well-being, and wewant to do what we see as good overall, or as morally good.But we donot seem to make any progress in achieving the one as we work towardthe other.On the one hand, considering what it means to be morallygood, we cannot achieve this while we work toward our own personalwell-being or happiness.On the other hand, it is not impossible that we232 conclusionshould secure our happiness by becoming morally better.But nothing inthe natural, sensible world guarantees our achievement of happiness as aconsequence of our moral improvement.In fact, any number of empiricalconditions or events provide evidence that moral choices preclude, orat least restrict, personal happiness.What is worse, we naturally favorpersonal well-being.Good intentions, conscientiously moral resolutions,have comparatively little staying power.And we can eliminate neitherinclination nor conscience; neither the basis for our happiness nor ourrespect for the moral law.¹One presupposition of recognizing our condition as a predicament is thatit shouldn t be this way.This is a central presumption of Kant s doctrineof humanity s   radical evil.  A second presupposition is that there shouldbe a way out of the predicament.This is an idea behind Kant s doctrine ofthe   highest good. The ambiguity in practical reason s guiding concept of   good,  betweenpersonal well-being and moral good, is the basis for our predicament.Yetthis duality in our basic goods should be representable, through practicalreason, as a normative totality.That is, there should be some rationalconception of the complete good, which somehow encompasses both ofour principal guiding interests.But for this a harmonious compromise ofmorality and happiness is out of the question.The rational conceptionof overall good cannot be the condition of morality and happiness eachobtaining a fair share.Since morality s demands are absolute, its interestwill not be served at all by making any concession, as a bargaining price,to effect some ideal coalition of moral and inclinational satisfactions.So theattainment of complete goodness is possible only in one way, according toKant: practical reason must present morality as the condition of happiness.That is, it must be rational for us to see compliance with morality sabsolute demands as making us worthy of happiness.That way, if we makeourselves morally good, or at least morally better, it should be rationalfor us to expect a corresponding increase in happiness.The realizationof happiness proportioned to virtue, for all, is Kant s conception of the  highest good. ¹ I have called this the human predicament.But it is more aptly named the normative predicament.There could be other, non-human rational agents similarly dedicated to both morality and the realizationof other goods.conclusion 233Yet events in the sensible world, upon which the satisfaction of ourinclinations depends, do not operate according to the principle that virtuedeserves happiness.We may be rationally justified in expecting to be happyif we comply with morality s demands.But we can have no guaranteethat conditions in the sensible world will satisfy that expectation.For thisreason, Kant claimed, it is rational to hope for happiness we deserve, ina world beyond the sensible world.He also saw this hope as giving usrational grounds for postulating our immortality, and God s existence.Oursouls must survive the deaths of our sensible bodies in the natural world ifthey are to enjoy happiness corresponding to our virtue, he thought.Andan omniscient judge, who is also an omnipotent benefactor, is required inorder to distribute happiness in exact proportion to virtue [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]