Whatever can serve as a means for a purpose has a price, i. e. a value which can be compensated. Rational and autonomous beings however, since they are the ones who can give purposes and without whom no purposes and therefore no values could be, have dignity, i. e. a value in themselves. Reverence for human dignity, that is for the autonomy of humanity, is the whole morality. To have shown and proven this is Kant's great accomplishment.

Quote: 0:08

The categorical imperative according to the 1st formula: 1:14

Means and purpose in itself, price and dignity: 6:04

Atheism is disbelieve in the purpose in itself: 34:17

The categorical imperative according to the 2nd formula: 50:17

Humans may be used as means, as long as there is reverence for their freedom at the same time: 1:01:50

Morality is conditioned on transcendental idealism: 1:22:58

The second wording of the categorical imperative prevents many possible misunderstandings of the first one: 1:28:25

The inconsistent and anti-human utilitarianism: 1:33:40

The unaufkläred person is led by his sensual impressions, the aufkläred one thinks according to principles: 1:51:47

Human dignity in justice and law: 2:01:02

Human dignity in international law and crimes against humanity: 2:03:43

Reverence is owed to humanity, not to the human: 2:18:05

Morality is reverence for humanity, not pity with the creature and its sensitivities: 2:37:04

Humans are not equal, but the humanity in all of them is: 2:45:51

Thanks: 3:04:07

The categorical imperative is at the center of Kant's writings on moral philosophy. Its three formulas can be found and are explained in the Groundworks to the Metaphysics of Morals: https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/kant1785.pdf. The categorical imperative as well as the type of the moral law are also described in the Critique of Practical Reason: https://www.bard.edu/library/arendt/pdfs/bc_Arendt_Kant_CritiquePracticalReason.pdf. I reccomend also reading Kant's handwritten estate on moral philosophy: http://korpora.org/kant/aa19/ (I am not aware of any English translation) along with those two texts, which includes many reflections on the categorical imperative as well as various wordings of it.

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It's not just important what but also how a philosopher thinks. His method helps in better grasping him and the results of his thinking. But more then that, it can also help in one's own aufklärung.

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Through our reason we give ourselves a moral law. The categorical imperative is expressed in three formulas by Kant, whose wording is very different but which have the same spirit. The most well known of them says that we should only act according to such a maxim through which we can want for it to become a universal law. And this means simply that a person should be consistent and in unity with himself, instead of self-contradicting and allowing himself what he would forbid others.

Quote: 0:08

Kant's teachings on the categorical imperative are often misunderstood: 0:17

There are three different formulas of the categorical imperative: 12:05

The objective-formal formula of the categorical imperative: 26:25

The type of the moral law: 31:41

Homo phaenomenon and homo noumenon: 51:05

The inconsistency and double standards of evil people: 1:07:46

The categorical imperative is for acting what the principle of contradiction is for thinking and crimes happen for the same reason as errors: 1:27:46

Kant's moral principle is a merely formal one: 1:48:34

Material moral principles can only lure or threaten: 2:07:00

We don't ought to do what's good, rather what we ought to do is good: 2:14:01

Thanks: 2:26:36

The imperatives according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/imperatives-according-to-Kant.jpg

The categorical imperative is at the center of Kant's writings on moral philosophy. Its three formulas can be found and are explained in the Groundworks to the Metaphysics of Morals: https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/kant1785.pdf. The categorical imperative as well as the type of the moral law are also described in the Critique of Practical Reason: https://www.bard.edu/library/arendt/pdfs/bc_Arendt_Kant_CritiquePracticalReason.pdf. I reccomend also reading Kant's handwritten estate on moral philosophy: http://korpora.org/kant/aa19/ (I am not aware of any English translation) along with those two texts, which includes many reflections on the categorical imperative as well as various wordings of it.

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To understand a philosopher's philosophical project, it is helpful to understand what philosophy itself means to him. For Kant it can be taken in two different ways: According to the school concept it is rational cognition from concepts and especially metaphysics: The cognition of the Supersensual, especially of God, freedom and immortality of the soul. According to the world concept on the other hand it is love of wisdom and the philosopher is the lawgiver of reason who asks what we can know, what we would should and what we can hope for.

Overiew over science according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Science-according-to-Kant.jpg

Overiew over philosophy according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Philosophy-according-to-Kant.jpg

Overiew over metaphysics according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Metaphysics-according-to-Kant-scaled.jpg

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In the Critique of pure Reason Kant shows that freedom is an idea of something completely supersensual. Through experience can neither be proven nor, as philosophically uncultivated people like to think nowadays, disproven. But likewise it can neither be proven or disproven by pure reason in theoretical metaphysics. Practically we find ourselves to really be free however. We find that we have a moral duty and responsibility. Each shall however implies a can. And so Kant manages to show in the Critique of Practical Reason that we are free, autonomous beings.

Quote: 0:08

Freedom is connected with rationality and morality: 1:30

The possible doubt of freedom: 5:43

The question of the Critique of Practical Reason: How are practical synthetic judgments a priori or categorical imperatives possible: 14:24

Hypothetical imperatives are analytic and grounded in the principle of contradiction: 25:53

Categorical imperatives are synthetic and grounded in the idea of freedom: 48:24

We appear as unfree and still are free as noumena: 55:04

The practical argument for freedom: 1:13:46

Practical reason offers access to the supersensual which theoretical reason cannot grant: 1:33:57

Thanks: 1:55:02

The imperatives according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/imperatives-according-to-Kant.jpg

In order to understand Kant's practical proof of freedom, one should first duty the Critique of Pure Reason, at least the passages on the antinomies: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4280/4280-h/4280-h.htm. The proof itself can then be read in the Critique of Practical Reason: https://www.bard.edu/library/arendt/pdfs/bc_Arendt_Kant_CritiquePracticalReason.pdf or the Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals: https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/kant1785.pdf.

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Before I will speak about Kant's thinking in the upcoming lectures, I first want to give a frame for that and therefore say some words about his life. Private details however shall not be my focus as much as his intellectual development and an overview over his intellectual activities during the different periods of his life.

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Kant's concept of freedom is often reduced to its importance for moral philosophy. It is however the maybe most important key to understand Kant's philosophical project and cause as a whole. In the center of Kant's thinking there is the insight that wild, untamed, ruleless freedom destroys itself, that freedom therefore, in order to be able to persist, must be brought under a law by reason. This law is, insofar as our acting is concerned, the moral law. Freedom, rationality and morality for Kant are reciproce concepts and none of the three is possible without both the others.

Quote: 0:08

Wild freedom and freedom under the law: 1:09

The laws under which freedom must be brought are the imperatives of reason: 22:44

Empirical and pure Will, heteronomy and autonomy: 25:23

All moral theories except Kant's are grounded in heteronomy of the Will and come down to eudaemonism: 32:32

Reason, freedom and morality are directly connected: 37:59

Reason:

- Selfishly seeking one's own benefit is not rational but on the contrary submission to irrationality: 39:21

- The arationalism and dishonesty of the egoistical naturalists: 51:33

- Most only know instrumental (technical-practical) reason: 53:37

Freedom:

- The reigning concept of freedom is that of liberalism which is prominent on both the left and the right: 59:23

- The freedom of a turnspit: 1:16:05

- Psychological and transcendental freedom: 1:26:16

Morality:

- Negative and positive freedom: 1:38:11

- By proving a pure practical reason Kant gave the reason for our duty: 1:41:57

- A reason is not needed for why we should do good but for why we'd want evil: 2:03:21

- Today morality is not associated with freedom but with force: 2:17:32

- Most don't want to be free: 2:42:44

The moral law is universal for all rational beings: 2:50:06

Freedom is not the ability to choose between Good and Evil but to do what has been understood to be good: 3:07:38

Thanks: 3:21:14

The imperatives according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/imperatives-according-to-Kant.jpg

The thinking faculty according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/faculty-of-thinking-according-to-Kant.jpg

On Kant's concept of freedom one can read the Groundworks to the Metaphysics of Morals, particularly the third section: https://www.earlymoderntexts.com/assets/pdfs/kant1785.pdf. The Critique of practical Reason also deals with freedom and it's connection with morality: https://www.bard.edu/library/arendt/pdfs/bc_Arendt_Kant_CritiquePracticalReason.pdf. I strongly recommend also reading the main part on the antinomies in the Critique of Pure Reason: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/4280/4280-h/4280-h.htm. The concept of freedom however is so central for Kant's thinking that almost all his metaphysical, moral-philosophical and political works are grounded in it and contain important additions and explanations.

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With this I'm announcing a series of shorter videos which, accompanying my longer Kant lectures, are supposed to show a light on all the main elements of Kant's philosophy in their basic outlines. - I know what I'm talking about, for I read the 29 volumes of Kant's collected works - that is the texts he published, his letters, his lectures, his manuscripts and notes -completely, in order to gain an understanding not just of singular thoughts of Kant's, but of his whole system of thinking and in order to now pass it on to others.

I get to releasing this video only now, on Kant's 301st birthday, though I already recorded it some months ago. So when I speak of last year in thi video, this is refering to 2023. And my book on Kant's philosophy of religion will not be published in a few months, but already in the upcoming month.

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The human being is a rational being which nonetheless is also a sensual being and can obey the blind natural drive. The pronouncements of reason therefore are imperatives for him: They are objectively, but not subjectively necessary, i. e. they tell him which action would be good, but there always remains the possibility that he will still rather do the bad. Kant identifies three kinds of imperatives, through which reason can determine our actions: Rules of skill, advice of prudence and commandments of wisdom. And since the first of those aren't truly practical, but just an application of theory, there can only be two possible principles of action: Eudaemonism and eleutheronomy, striving for happiness or free moral self-lawgiving.

Quote: 0:08

The imperatives of reason: 0:30

Why Kant doesn't differentiate the imperatives according to their quantity and quality: 8:01

The imperatives according to their relation: Categorical and hypothetical (and disjunctive?) imperatives: 12:44

The imperatives according to their modality: Skill, prudence and wisdom: 30:11

Technique doesn't belong to practical philosophy, but rather follows from theoretical philosophy: 51:51

The imperatives correspond with the thinking faculties: 56:23

World prudence: 59:17

The two types of foolishness: 1:11:56

Practical philosophy as doctrine of prudence or doctrine of wisdom: 1:16:51

The adventage of Kant's architectonic: 1:24:07

Kant's principle of eleutheronomy is the only moral principle, all others come down to eudaemonism: 1:43:40

Thanks: 1:47:58

The table of judgments according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/table-of-judgments-according-to-Kant.jpg

The imperatives according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/imperatives-according-to-Kant.jpg

The thinking faculty according to Kant: https://jonathanivoloewer.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/faculty-of-thinking-according-to-Kant.jpg

The doctrine of the imperatives is best explained in the second section of the Groundworks to the Metaphysic of Morals: https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/blog.nus.edu.sg/dist/c/1868/files/2012/12/Kant-Groundwork-ng0pby.pdf.

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Today someone wanting to study philosophy is usually presented with an aggregate of alleged types of morality randomly thrown together, sometimes several variations of the same morality being treated as if they were different in principle, while at the same time possible and already proposed systems of morality sometimes get left out. Kant goes about this, as should always be done in science according to him, in an architectonic manner and therefore establishes two possible sources of morality: experience and thinking. And as always in the conflict between empiricism and rationalism he in the end is on the latter's side - mere experience can not give us a Shall, this has to be deduced from reason - but he doesn't propose a dogmatic-objective but rather a critical-subjective rationalism: Our reason doesn't find a morality that exists independently of it, rather through our reason we give ourselves a moral law.

Quote: 0:08

Kant's moral philosophy often faces misunderstandings: 1:31

Kant doesn't want to introduce a new principle of morality, but to bring to more clarity that principle which lies even in the unlearned people: 12:46

What is morality about?: 43:47

Today's common overviews of alleged principles of morality are only rhapsodic, not systematic: 1:04:18

Morality has to be deduced in an empiricist or rationalist manner: 1:13:54

- Moral empiricism: 1:15:25

- Moral rationalism: 1:25:47

All common explanations of morality commit a naturalistic fallacy: 1:39:36

Kant's justification of morality through critical, subjective rationalism: 1:47:57

Thanks: 1:59:12

Kant discusses the possible principles of morality mainly in the main part on the principles of pure practical reason in the Critique of Practical Reason: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/5683/5683-h/5683-h.htm.

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