Kant and the Possibility of Progress: From Modern Hopes to Postmodern Anxieties

Published by University of Pennsylvania Press 2021

Kant and the Possibility of Progress

From Modern Hopes to Postmodern Anxieties

Edited by: Paul T. Wilford , Samuel A. Stoner and Samuel Stoner

https://doi.org/10.9783/9780812297799

Overview
Contents

About this book

Through a reexamination of Immanuel Kant and his philosophical legacy, this volume explores the philosophic presuppositions of the possibility of progress and our belief in reason's capacity not only to improve the material well-being of humanity but also to promote our true vocation as moral beings.

Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) transformed the philosophical, cultural, and religious landscape of modern Europe. Emphasizing the priority of practical reason and moral autonomy, Kant's radically original account of human subjectivity announced new ethical imperatives and engendered new political hopes. This collection of essays investigates the centrality of progress to Kant's philosophical project and the contested legacy of Kant's faith in reason's capacity to advance not only our scientific comprehension and technological prowess, but also our moral, political, and religious lives. Accordingly, the first half of the volume explores the many facets of Kant's thinking about progress, while the remaining essays each focus on one or two thinkers who play a crucial role in post-Kantian German philosophy: J. G. Herder (1744-1803), J. G. Fichte (1762-1814), G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831), Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855), Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), and Martin Heidegger (1889-1976). This two-part structure reflects the central thesis of the volume that Kant inaugurates a distinctive theoretical tradition in which human historicity is central to political philosophy.

By exploring the origins and metamorphoses of this tremendously influential tradition, the volume offers a timely perspective on fundamental questions in an age increasingly suspicious of the Enlightenment's promise of universal rational progress. It aims to help us face three sets of questions: (1) Do we still believe in the possibility of progress? If we do, on what grounds? If we do not, why have we lost the hope for a better future that animated previous generations? (2) Is the belief in progress necessary for the maintenance of today's liberal democratic order? Does a cosmopolitan vision of politics ultimately depend on a faith in humanity's gradual, asymptotic realization of that lofty aim? (3) And, if we no longer believe in progress, can we dispense with hope without succumbing to despair?

Author / Editor information

Paul T. Wilford is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Boston College.
Samuel A. Stoner is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Assumption University.

Reviews

Kant was not an optimist, exactly, but he did think that there are rational grounds for hope regarding the long-term ethical and political progress of our species. This expertly curated volume provides a critical examination of Kant's own account, as well as of the various ways it was appropriated in the post-Kantian context. A highly recommended and accessible resource for anyone interested in politics, the philosophy of history, and the philosophy of religion.

Paul T. Wilford and Samuel A. Stoner have put together an outstanding collection of essays by top-notch philosophers on the topic of progress in world history. Although Kant's philosophy of history is the center of attention, nearly half of the essays consider the treatment of progress by figures such as Fichte, Hegel, and Kierkegaard.

From Immanuel Kant through Walter Benjamin, philosophy of history was a vital way of grappling with the question 'what may I hope?' This incisive volume of essays is both a splendid guide for exploring these enduringly important discussions and a timely call to investigate them anew.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Introduction. Modernity and Postmodernity: Our Temporal Orientation Samuel A. Stoner and Paul T. Wilford Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
PART I. KANT ON PROGRESS
Chapter 1. Kant on Individual Moral Progress Oliver Sensen Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	19
Chapter 2. Should We Believe in Moral Progress? Kate Moran Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	30
Chapter 3. Respect, Moral Progress, and Imperfect Duty Jens Timmermann Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	47
Chapter 4. Loneliness and Ambiguity in Kant’s Philosophy of History Rachel Zuckert Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	62
Chapter 5. Kant’s Organic Religion: God, Teleology, and Progress in the Third Critique Naomi Fisher Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	77
Chapter 6. Realizing the Ethical Community: Kant’s Religion and the Reformation of Culture Samuel A. Stoner and Paul T. Wilford Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	94
Chapter 7. Kant as Soothsayer: The Problem of Progress and the “Sign” of History Susan Meld Shell Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	115
PART II. PROGRESS AFTER KANT
Chapter 8. History, Progress, and Autonomy: Kant, Herder, and After Karl Ameriks Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	137
Chapter 9. Language, Embodiment, and the Supersensuous in Fichte’s Addresses to the German Nation Richard L. Velkley Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	153
Chapter 10. Hegel on the Conceptual Form of Philosophical History Mark Alznauer Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	165
Chapter 11. Relocating the Highest Good: Kierkegaard on God, Virtue, and (This- Worldly) Happiness Ryan S. Kemp Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	185
Chapter 12. Kant and Benjamin on Hope, History, and the Task of Interpretation C. Allen Speight Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	202
Chapter 13. The Curious Fate of the Idea of Progress Robert B. Pippin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	217
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	233
List of Contributors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	283
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	287
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	293