Allison and Kant's Practical Deduction

In the final chapter of Allison's commentary on the Groundwork he describes the way he understands the "deduction" of the categorical imperative in the third part of Kant's work. Given how controversial the argument of Groundwork III has become it is surprising that Allison's final chapter does not only focus on this question. However Allison also includes here an account of the way Kant concludes the Groundwork by describing the limit of practical philosophy though this account is certainly much less interesting than that of the "deduction" and it is the latter that will be the focus of this posting.

It is the fourth section of Groundwork III that is headlined "how is a categorical imperative possible?" and it is here that the focus on the reading of the "deduction" of the categorical imperative is based. As Allison puts it: "Since every imperative involves a necessitation...of the will, to account for its possibility is to account for this necessitation" (332). With regard to the categorical imperative we have a synthetic a priori proposition and accounting for the necessitation requires showing that the imperative is, as Allison puts it, "practically possible" by which is meant that it expresses something whose binding character can be shown.

In the opening paragraph of the fourth section of Groundwork III Kant discusses the sense in which rational beings are forms of "intelligence" and indicates that if we were merely members of the world of understanding all our actions would conform 'perfectly' with the principle of autonomy of the pure will. Kant also goes on to claim later that the world of understanding contains the "ground" of both the world of sense and of its laws and purports to use this claim to show that as a being of intelligence I am therefore bound by the laws of the world of understanding. 

Allison's analysis of the "deduction" argument begins with the claim that thinking beings place themselves in the world of the understanding but adding to this the point that it is only if such beings also have will that the argument can begin. The next step of the argument, for Allison, is the claim that the self, considered as an active being, possesses spontaneous causal power so that, when viewed as an intelligence, it is seen to be a causal agent. The third key step is that actions, when considered thus to be originated by the agent in question so viewed are part of the "space of reasons". Fourthly, this aspect of the self is contrasted with the empirical one which is governed by reference to "happiness".

Allison's major interpretative move, however, concerns the fifth and final step of the argument as he views it, a step he breaks down into two sub-steps. The first sub-step is concerned with the claim that the world of understanding contains the "ground" of that of sense. The key question with regard to this claim concerns the way the grounding relation is to be understood. Following his general deflationary manner of reading Allison dismisses the idea that this should be seen in a "metaphysical" way as a causal claim. However in addition to the general philosophical reasons Allison possesses for resisting this reading he adds an important normative one to the effect that such a reading provides no binding ground for accepting the validity of the "laws" of understanding. What is needed instead of such a reading is thus one that does show the ground of validity of these laws.

Hence it is not only "ground" that needs to be given an account of but also "laws" in the sense that there could be a "law" of understanding that was validly taken to be binding by a sensible being. In the Critique of Pure Reason this question drove the argument of the transcendental deduction, the schematism and the general Analytic of Principles. From the argument of this part of the Critique we arrived at an account of the conditions of possibility of experience and the analogy between this procedure and that undertaken here in Groundwork III would appear to be that the latter text must provide an additional way of viewing the "possibility of experience" that allows us now to see a way in which there is included amongst "experience" the working of moral law (in the shape of the categorical imperative). Since the will belongs also to the world of understanding it would seem that Kant views it as the basis for providing laws that have to be added to those laid out in the Critique of Pure Reason.

The second sub-part of the fifth claim is where Allison finds the "crux" of the argument. Here Kant includes the claim that the being of sense is nonetheless subject to the laws of understanding which Allison argues are intended to be seen as holding simultaneously with the laws of the type described in the Critique of Pure Reason. This is followed by a paragraph that Allison sees as "explaining" the deduction apparently now given. It opens by declaring that categorical imperatives are "possible" but Allison views this claim as only being that we have had provided to us a reason for thinking that the categorical imperative is a necessary and not a sufficient condition of the argument that the idea of freedom makes me a member of an intelligible world. Further it is the "idea" of freedom only that makes one a member of such a world. Being a member of such a world is seen by Allison as having the mere intellectual capacity to think the idea of such freedom.

However Allison's conception of the "explanation" of the deduction runs into a problem with the appearance of a "sollen" (or "ought") that arises next when Kant states that I "ought" to conform my actions to the laws of the intelligible world. Allison thinks this move is here introduced illegitimately since all Kant has shown are epistemological grounds for being in two "worlds" and that a normative requirement does not arise from this alone. Part of the problem here is that Kant had earlier suggested that entirely belonging to the world of understanding would have produced the outcome that one simply "would" have followed the laws of understanding, a point that appears to render these laws, as Allison says, "vacuous". Allison argues that the problem with the text at this point arises from Kant not yet having explicitly to hand the distinction developed later in the Religion between two aspects of the "will". 

Kant next provides an account that is meant to give a basis for "confirmation" of the deduction and involves the awakening of a "scoundrel" to consciousness of the moral law. The claim of how this takes place in Groundwork III is, however, contrasted negatively with the parallel discussion in the Critique of Practical Reason by Allison. In Groundwork III Kant appears to state that it is the idea of freedom alone which suffices to change the standpoint of the scoundrel. By contrast, in the Critique of Practical Reason the "fact of reason" is invoked to provide the basis for a view that one does stand independent of determination by sensuous needs. This passage, even so amended, is, however, less plausible as a piece of moral psychology than Kant provides later in the Religion.

When Allison turns to assessing the deduction as he has reconstructed it he begins with the question of how to understand the argument that the world of "understanding" provides a ground for that of sense that enables a normative claim to be made on behalf of the former. Key to this is the point that the difference between the two is centred in the argument of Groundwork III on the self alone. This enables Allison to make the point that we need not view the supremacy of the "world" of understanding as a claim about a specific "realm" separate from that of sense. Further at Ak. 4: 458 Kant speaks of the distinction between the two "worlds" as that of a change in "standpoint". This change requires us to view ourselves as capable of legislating laws and having the capacity to recognise our own legislation as binding upon us. When we look at the "two standpoints" practically Allison adds we can give the "law" of understanding a content by means of the moral law. Such "laws" can also then be understood as "reasons". 

Allison also looks at the question of whether there is some specific non-empirical "interest" which supports the moral law and admits that it is impossible to account for the possibility of one. So Allison does not think Kant resolves or is capable of resolving this problem. However this leads to the question of the boundary of practical philosophy since this boundary is reached in terms of arguing that it is impossible to demonstrate the impossibility of freedom. Freedom is only an idea, not an "absolute reality" and it rests, for Allison, on viewing the relationship between a subject and an action in divergent ways. Part of Kant's defence of this claim was that it is essentially recognised within common human reason itself. The world of understanding, considered from a practical point of view, is the world of the will and this point requires us, given the general picture of the world, to see the will as something non-empirical. This supports the point that the "standpoint" of freedom is one that reason takes up in order to be able to think of itself practically.

However when Allison looks at the final passages of Groundwork III he argues that Kant here weakens some of the claims made earlier in the same section. Kant here states that the question of the possibility of the categorical imperative can be answered "to the extent that one can state the presupposition on which alone it is possible" (Ak. 4: 461). This "presupposition" is the idea of freedom. Allison's point is that this claim involves accepting that the deduction provides only a necessary condition of the possibility of the categorical imperative not conditions that are sufficient to account for its actual possibility. Thus it would appear, on this view, that the argument of Groundwork III is of less moment than it initially appears to be. This points, for Allison, to the superiority of the account of the "fact of reason" in the Critique of Practical Reason. Indeed the commentary Allison provides to the Groundwork ends with the claim that this work is "in many ways a transitional as well as a foundational work". 

Allison's account of the third part of the Groundwork in his commentary on it is instructive as the deflationary view of transcendental idealism that is Allison's hallmark is used here primarily to buttress the sense that the transcendental distinction has a primarily practical significance. However the conception that arises of the argument of the third part of the Groundwork is certainly a disappointing one and worth contrast in subsequent postings with quite different readings to that of Allison.

Allison and *Groundwork* III

In Chapter 11 of his commentary on the Groundwork Allison looks at two questions concerning the interpretation of the third section of the work. On the one hand, he assesses the way freedom is discussed here and on the other looks at the nature of the apparent "circle" the argument reaches at a crucial point. In looking at these points in Chapter 11 Allison prepares the way for an account of the "deduction" apparently carried out in Groundwork III. 

The first point Allison makes is that Kant does not really attempt to "prove" the reality of freedom but only the need to "presuppose" it (thus disagreeing with the view of Karl Ameriks who assimilates the argument of Groundwork III to certain passages from lectures in the 1770s). The "presupposition" in question is a necessary one in the sense that morality expresses a law for every rational being as such and so its principle must be bound up in an a priori fashion with the will of such a being. One of the reasons for taking this to be true is that it is requisite rationally to be able to act and one does so under the "idea" of freedom. The "idea" in question is understood by Allison to be freedom in the sense of transcendental spontaneity, the ability, that is, to begin a series absolutely. However this is not equivalent for Allison to the claim that it is necessary to "believe" that one is free or to the fictive claim that this freedom is "heuristic". Rather the idea in question is one which is a necessary product of reason and is thus possessed of objective validity. 

Not only is this the case but the idea of freedom also has normative force and acting in accordance with it places one in the "space of reasons". The use of this Sellarsian vocabulary is particularly interesting given that Allison connects the question of freedom to reason in two respects, both theoretical and practical. The understanding is the source of spontaneous grasp of truth (as given in the German for "concept") and it does this in a rule-governed way which is part of its internal operation. Similarly freedom in a practical sense is a product of the internal operation of the will. However whilst Kant's argument, as construed by Allison, appears to lead at this point to the conclusion that there is operative a practical reason whose "reality" we can show, the argument instead takes the turn that leads towards the "circle" that stops its progression in the manner that appears obvious.

Allison's account of the move the argument of Groundwork III takes at this point is grounded on the view that all that has been established up until now is a conditional claim. Freedom has not, as yet, been shown to be actual and the consciousness of autonomy is not one whose binding validity has been shown. So the establishment of the supreme principle of morality has not been achieved and thus the reason for departing from empirical interests has not been conclusively given. This is why Kant speaks now (at Ak. 4: 453) of a "hidden circle" having been apparent in the argument up to this point. Kant's reference to this "circle" is one that has puzzled many including Paton whose commentary Allison cites as a case of misrepresentation of Kant's argument. Allison understands the "circle" to consist in an inference from freedom to autonomy or from negative to positive freedom. However this does mean that Kant was not previously really guilty of arguing in a "circle" but only of begging the question in the sense of taking freedom to have an immediate certainty. 

In preparing the way for the resolution of the "circle" in question Kant discusses the notion of "two standpoints" and the rest of Allison's chapter is devoted to looking at the way these standpoints are characterised in Groundwork III. This distinction is one that has to be shown not to be merely an ad hoc device and Kant aims also to show that it is recognised by common understanding although the latter claim is regarded by Allison as dubious. The account of the distinction between appearances and things in themselves is drawn crudely enough in Groundwork III however and it may be, as Allison suggests, that the reason for this crudity is precisely to make the distinction one that can be related to "common understanding". It does, however, also include the distinction between two aspects of the agent, one that certainly seems at variance with "common understanding" but which is justified to it by means of the difference between active and passive aspects of the self. The active element includes the sense of spontaneity in the production of ideas, a capacity not sensibly conditioned. However the question of whether this consciousness is illusory has to be addressed. This is where the claim that all Kant is showing is that freedom is a necessary "presupposition" comes in for Allison since the presupposition is one that we have a warrant for adopting inasmuch as we consider ourselves as members of the intelligible world. This provides, on Allison's reading, a basis for claiming a "deduction" of the "moral law" though not the categorical imperative given his commitment to a "double deduction" reading.

Allison and Kant on the Moral Law

My last posting on Allison concluded a series on Chapter 9 of his commentary on the Groundwork, a chapter that raised so many questions it seemed to be necessary to split it between a number of postings. Chapter 9 also culminated Allison's discussion of the second part of the Groundwork. In this posting I am going to address Chapter 10 where Allison begins his discussion of the third section of the Groundwork.


If Groundwork II is particularly significant due to the question of the formulas of the categorical imperative being addressed there, Groundwork III is traditionally taken to have a problematic status due to its account of a "deduction" of the principle of morality and in this chapter part of Allison's task is to discuss what precisely it is that Kant is providing here a deduction of. This turns out to be problematic since it appears that there are at least two differing views concerning this question. The basic question turns out to be whether Kant provides only a deduction of the categorical imperative or whether he also provides one of the "moral law".  Allison distinguishes these two readings terming the view that Kant only provides a deduction of the categorical imperative a "single deduction" reading as opposed to the "double deduction" one that focuses on the moral law as distinct from the categorical imperative and assumes that Kant here provides deductions of both.


Allison himself prefers the "double deduction" reading and rests part of his argument on what he claims to be distinct referents in the text of Groundwork III for the term "deduction". On Allison's reading "the moral law" is the term Kant uses for a descriptive principle which depicts the modus operandi of an agent in abstraction from whatever ends or interests they have in view whilst the categorical imperative, by contrast, is taken to be a prescriptive principle which only applies to certain types of agents (finite or imperfectly rational ones). However there are some problems with this distinction, not least, as Allison himself notes, Kant rarely refers to "the moral law" in the Groundwork although he cites Ak. 4: 449 as evidence that Kant equates it with the principle of the autonomy of the will. This principle is distinguished by Allison from autonomy as a formula of the categorical imperative. 


The second problem is that the textual questions at issue for showing that the distinction is relevant to the description of the overall task of Groundwork III are pretty difficult ones. So Allison cites for example Ak. 4: 444 where Kant speaks of a "synthetic practical proposition" without clearly identifying the proposition in question. On Allison's own reading the passage is ambiguous and capable of being read in two different ways so that Allison's preference for taking it to refer to the moral law doesn't appear very firmly grounded. Indeed Allison himself agrees that: "the obscurity of the text makes any interpretation hazardous". 


Another issue that Allison addresses in this chapter concerns whether "the moral law" is analytic or synthetic. Again the argument here turns on some very fine textual details but Allison's claim that "the moral law" is be taken generically as a synthetic principle is surely correct assuming that "the moral law" is a substantive principle that Kant is affirming. The other point about the suggestion that there is a distinct "deduction" of this "moral law" is, however, as Allison again confesses, that, should it exist, it must be quite different from the "deduction" of the categorical imperative. The reason why it must be different is that the categorical imperative states something that is binding and the deduction of it would aim to establish this bindingness. By contrast, the "moral law" cannot be binding as it does not state an imperative so that the deduction of it would only be a deduction of a "descriptive" law. Should Kant be attempting such a deduction it has to be said it is far from obvious what status it would have for him.


The other topic that Allison addresses in Chapter 10 concerns the relationship asserted there between freedom and autonomy. Allison takes Kant to be arguing in Groundwork III that freedom is not only a necessary but also a sufficient condition for autonomy and that freedom and unconditional practical law imply each other. The general name Allison gives to this claim is the "reciprocity thesis" and he finds Kant's argument for it to reside in a short passage at Ak. 4: 446. Back in the Critique of Pure Reason Kant already presented an argument for a kind of "law of freedom" though he did not there present this law as equivalent to autonomy. However Allison is not convinced that the argument Kant gives for the notion of autonomy as a necessary law of freedom is compelling finding it only a basis for saying that some kind of internal (and thus possibly only contingent) "law" is required. This leads Allison to distinguish between two different senses of "autonomy", namely moral autonomy and free agency in a general (even only contingent) sense. 


Allison uncovers what he takes to be a better argument for the reciprocity thesis in the Critique of Practical Reason, better in the sense that it does not, on his reading, equivocate between two senses of autonomy, though he continues to fault it for having an ambiguous use of "form", moving from the sense of it to indicate abstraction from matter to the quite different sense of "lawgiving". Thus Allison eventually arrives instead at the claim that the real basis for the "reciprocity thesis" asserted in Groundwork III is found not there, nor in the Critique of Practical Reason but instead in Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone. In the latter work Kant asserts what Allison terms the "incorporation thesis" which requires maxims, in order to be justified, to be self-consciously understood as acts of free agency. The point of invoking this thesis is that the notion of such incorporation requires, on the one hand, that only such agency can be seen as the real source of the maxim and hence rules out appeals to sensuousness as normatively determinative and that it enables the first principle of maxims to be clearly described.


Thus it is not merely the choice that agents are making when they formulate maxims but also the reason for the choice that matters, a point that is central to the understanding of autonomy. Whilst this argument for the reciprocity thesis has some importance, however, it is clearly not sufficient as yet to provide a deduction of the categorical imperative and to that Allison will turn in the next two chapters of his commentary.

Allison and Kant on Autonomy (IV)

The previous posting on Chapter 9 of Allison's commentary on the Groundwork looked at his treatment of the various formulas of the categorical imperative and the type of defence he offers for the view that they are all "equivalent", at least in terms of extensionality. In this posting, by contrast, I'm going to look at how Allison treats Kant's contrast between autonomous and heteronomous principles of morality.


Allison opens his treatment of the contrast between autonomous and heteronomous principles of morality by looking at the three different ways Kant views autonomy. On Allison's reading Kant relates to the principle of autonomy as the principle of morality, as a formula of the categorical imperative and and as a property of the will, taking these to be three distinct characterisations. However, the key point for Allison is that it is because autonomy is a property of the will that it is the principle of morality and not because it is presented as one of the formulas of the categorical imperative. The reason for making this claim is that the property of autonomy is what enables it to be said that the will can bind itself without referring thereby to anything "objectively" required beyond its own willing. It is because, however, that autonomy is the supreme principle of morality that this principle gives unconditioned authority to the categorical imperative. Once these two characterisations are brought together, however, it is less obvious than Allison suggests that we can claim that the reference to the categorical imperative is not part of what makes the principle of autonomy the supreme principle of morality. After all, in the very name of the "categorical imperative" we have reference to the notion that it is unconditionally binding, something that supports my contrary suggestion that there is an intimate connection between the notion of the categorical imperative and the idea of autonomy.


Now, in turning directly to the contrast with heteronomy, it follows easily from Allison's description that the notion of heteronomy can be captured as requiring that the will is not the source of the moral law but is rather dependent for its relation to the moral law on something beyond itself. However, many readings of Kant's description of heteronomy view this as requiring that heteronomous principles of morality essentially depend on a hedonistic kind of motivation (something that prevents, however, the recognition of intellectualist forms of principle being seen as heteronomous). There are quite a few problems with this, even when the question is restricted to considering what is going on for Kant when reference to sensations is paramount in the choice of moral principle. For example, as Allison points out, the benevolent philanthropist of Groundwork I feels pleasure in being benevolent but this does not necessarily mean that it is only for the sake of the pleasure that accompanies the benevolent acts that they are being benevolent. After all, if they did not think the acts they performed were genuinely addressing cases of need, they would not perform them.


The basic problem with heteronomous principles is not found in reference to a presumed hedonistic motivation but rather in a false conception of the relationship between the law and the agent. In adopting a heteronomous principle the assumption is made that the decision to will the law is insufficient for actions governed by it to have moral worth, perhaps on the grounds of an assumed "anarchic" conception of such autonomous willing. Whatever the rationale in any case, in adopting a heteronomous principle of morality, the agent assumes that worth is given to action by something intrinsically external to the act of willing itself and thus cannot find the property that is distinctive to morality within willing. There are, as Allison goes on to point out, two distinct types of ground for heteronomy: empirical and rational. Empirical theories are not all reducible to hedonism since sentimentalist accounts of morality can take there to be delight in the adoption of maxims that are virtuous. However they are classified by Kant in relation to hedonism in a different way, namely, in viewing the increase of "happiness" in a general sense (even separately from reference to the one willing) as the central matter. 


Allison's discussion of the contrast between autonomy and heteronomy is brief and concentrates primarily on making the view of heteronomy more complicated than many other interpreters have suggested. However the conclusion of the chapter on autonomy does suggest a basic problem with Allison's overall approach which rests on a failure to relate the unconditionally binding character of autonomy to the unconditional requirement that is stated in the categorical imperative clearly enough. This is not contingent to Allison's presentation, however, but essential to it given that his interpretation cannot recognise the claim that the principle of autonomy is bound up with the very notion of the categorical imperative.

Allison and Kant on Autonomy (III)

My last posting on Allison concentrated on how, in Chapter 9 of his commentary on the Groundwork, Allison discusses the question of the relationship between the formulas of the categorical imperative, and, particularly, some questions that arise from his view that there is a second formula of universal law that emerges subsequent to the formula of autonomy. In this posting I am going to continue to look at the discussion of formulas of the categorical imperative in Chapter 9, focusing now on how Allison treats the question of their alleged equivalence.


The question of their equivalence is one that is approached by Allison initially in terms of extensional equivalence, which would involve the claim that the distinct formulas would yield the same results for the same cases. This is distinct from an intensional equivalence claim which would, by contrast, entail that the reason for the sameness of results would be because each of the formulas has the same fundamental rationale. The question of extensional equivalence is complicated by the problems of alleged counter-examples to the formulas, which, in the case of the formula of the law of nature, are generally false positives which are, on Allison's reading, not applicable to the Formula of Humanity. Since Allison's solution was to treat these two formulas as yielding different kinds of universality it appears difficult to see how, on his interpretation, a thesis of extensional equivalence of the formulas can be sustained.


In response Allison ventures what he terms a "complete construction interpretation" of the categorical imperative which  suggests that the different formulas are parts of the construction involved in arriving at the full sense of the categorical imperative. So, for example, the formula of universal law is not treated on this view as settled by its initial statement since Kant's later treatment is taken to enrich it. Each of the formulas is taken by Allison as presenting a vantage upon the categorical imperative. The claim that the formula of universal law is "equivalent" to the formula of humanity is understood as a claim about the reconstructed formula of universality that Allison takes to have followed from the statement of the formula of autonomy. The second, enlarged, sense of universalisability is related to as one that requires endorsement by any rational being and thus to be equivalent to taking rational beings as ends-in-themselves. However, it is also the case that this interpretation takes the fuller sense of Kant's reference to a universal law of nature to be one that requires understanding these laws as teleological.


Allison contrasts his account with that of Onora O'Neill who, in contrast to Allison, has argued not merely for extensional equivalence of the formulas but also for their intensional equivalence. O'Neill's interpretation takes the force of the formula of universal law to concern the conditions of agency at work in willing and thus argues that maxims that are ruled out by it are maxims that undercut such conditions of agency. However, O'Neill does take the "perspective" of the formulas of universal law and of humanity to be distinct. On O'Neill's view the formula of universal law is a formula from the perspective of agents who acknowledge that others are also agents and requires maxims to be adopted that relate to this recognition. By contrast, on her view, the formula of humanity involves the recognition that actions affect others and thus requires us to adopt maxims that will regulate actions with this in mind. Allison points out that O'Neill's account fails to address the formula of the law of nature, which is peculiar given that this formula is the one applied to consideration of maxims.


Allison's account, based as it is on his "complete construction" hypothesis, views the earlier formulas as more "primitive" than the later and in taking this tack rules out the possibility of intensional equivalence that O'Neill's interpretation is aimed at salvaging. Whilst this attempt on O'Neill's part is certainly an interesting element of her interpretation, the view of different "perspectives" she builds in can only involve the claim that the "same" reasons are involved in a very thin sense of "same". Allison's rejection of the view that autonomy can be involved prior to being directly stated does not seem plausible to me, not least because of the appearance of claims about respect as early as the Groundwork I discussion of universal law. Whilst there is something to be said about formulas being either explicit or implicit in their appeal to autonomy I don't agree with the reading that takes autonomy not to be involved in the earlier formulas. 

Allison and Kant on Autonomy (II)

In my last posting on Allison I looked at the discussion he provides in his commentary on the Groundwork of the "derivation" of Kant's Formula of Autonomy. In this posting I am going to look at the second part of Allison's discussion which focuses on the relations between Kant's formulas of the categorical imperative as these follow the initial statement Kant makes of the Formula of Autonomy.


At Ak. 4: 436 Kant describes three ways of representing the principle of morality as being "fundamentally only so many formulas of the very same law" and also states that one of the formulas in question unites the other two in itself. The claim that the three formulas are all variants on the same law is termed by Allison the "singularity thesis". A claim to this effect goes way back in Kant's lectures since he criticised Baumgarten for proposing the view that there are "many" principles in ethics, indicating that on Kant's own view there is only one true principle. However, Allison is nonetheless attentive to a claim that is added by Kant to the singularity thesis to the effect that there is a difference all the same between the formulas. The difference is one that Kant terms "subjective" rather than "objective". Kant also relates this "subjective" difference to the means by which an idea of reason can, by means of analogy, be brought nearer to intuition.


Allison indicates that he finds the reference Kant makes here to analogy to be obscure even though he recognises that it is connected to Kant's general procedure of schematizing laws (as in the typic of the Critique of Practical Reason). In explicating the reference to analogy Allison looks to the Prolegomena where cognition according to analogy is described by Kant as based on "a perfect similarity between two relations in wholly dissimilar things"  (Ak. 4 357-8). Allison suggests that the different formulas of the categorical imperative represent it according to different analogies. But this is difficult for Allison who does not find the Formula of Humanity to involve either an analogy with the categorical imperative or a typic. In responding to this problem Allison suggests that if the first analogy (at work in the formula of the law of nature) represents a connection between the categorical imperative and causal laws, the second, by contrast, relates to nature as embodying a teleological order, something Allison rather loosely relates to the conception of the end-in-itself in the Formula of Humanity. Even if this were to be accepted it remains unclear how the relations between the three formulas of the categorical imperative are to be grasped in relation to the requirement of coming closer to intuition.


Allison's next move is to look at the general claim that one formula unites the other two in itself. When making this claim Kant refers to the view that every maxim contains a form, a matter and a complete determination. The form is also subsequently connected to the general claim that maxims express universality. By contrast, Allison takes the reference to complete determination to refer to the harmonization of maxims with each other through the realm of ends (which relates to his earlier claim that here nature is being treated in a teleological way). So the formula of the realm of ends is taken by Allison to be the formula that unites the other two into itself.


However the next point that arises in Allison's treatment is the claim that Kant now mentions a new formula. This is the formula, expressed at Ak. 4: 436 which is referred to by Kant as "universal" and expressed as: "act according to that maxim which can at the same time make itself into a universal law". The reason why this should be taken as a "new" formula rather than as a way of showing that the formula of universal law, correctly understood, presupposes autonomy, is not immediately obvious. This is not quite the same as the view that Allison terms the "consensus" one which takes this formula to be equivalent to the formula of universal law as it requires an understanding of the "new" formula as a product of reflection upon the formula of universal law. Allison mentions a different view of the "universal formula" which has been presented by Allen Wood who takes this formula to be equivalent to the Formula of Autonomy (which does not, of course, cut against the interpretation I have suggested). However, Wood's reason for adopting this view is an odd one since he locates the basis for the claim that the Formula of Autonomy is to be primary only in a view of "human psychology" alone.


In contrast to Wood, Allison views the formula of autonomy as requiring a second, stronger, form of universalisability (being inter- rather than intra- subjective). However, since Allison thinks the second form of universalisability is made explicit in the Formula of Humanity and yet that the Formula of Humanity does not make an explicit appeal to universalisability he provides a ground for taking the "new" universal formula to unite the formula of universal law with the formula of humanity (which, however, we saw that a moment ago Allison took the formula of the realm of ends to do). 


Allison takes there to be a significant difference between the original formula of universal law and the "new" universal formula on the grounds that the first refers to "willing" universal laws whilst the second, by contrast, refers to "making" them. In making this claim he agrees with Allen Wood but Allison and Wood have quite different reasons for making the claim. Wood's view was that being able to will a maxim as a universal law provides only a test for the permissibility of the maxim and that this test really only relates to maxims taken one at a time. By contrast, on Wood's view, making maxims into universal law is concerned with our maxims viewed collectively (not individually) and requires the consistency of maxims to be taken into account. Allison, by contrast to Wood, does not take the difference to be one where one of the formulas is better than the other at tracking coherence on the grounds that a coherent combination of maxims has no obvious moral merit. 


Allison distinguishes between a number of the formulas in a different way. This is in terms of viewing the formula of universal law as a "meta-formula" or second-order formula which underlies and is expressed by the distinct formulas of the law of nature, the formula of humanity and the formula of autonomy (which latter Allison now equates with that of the formula of the realm of ends). However, after making this claim Allison goes on to add that the formula of universal law is only a "skeletal" form of the concept of the categorical imperative. The fully developed form of it is rather given in the "new" universal formula and this claim leads Allison to the view that there are effectively two separate forms of the formula of universal law, the one given when the categorical imperative is first introduced and the alternative one that is arrived at now, in the aftermath of the Formula of Autonomy.


The discussion in this section is thus elaborate, as is often the case when the relationship between the formulas of the categorical imperative is in question. What has thus far been lacking is any serious inquiry into the alleged difference between the two supposedly different formulas of universal law. Assuming this difference does exist there are three questions that could be asked concerning it, which are, is the difference tantamount to ruling out their extensional equivalence, does it effect any claim there might be to intensional equivalence, and does it have any practical import in reference to the consideration of maxims? 

Allison and Kant on Autonomy (I)

In my last posting on Allison's commentary on the Groundwork I looked at Chapter 8 which discussed the Formula of Humanity. I'm going to move on now to Chapter 9 where Allison makes a series of inter-related but distinct claims about the uses Kant makes of the Formula of Autonomy but Chapter 9 is, at least thus far, the richest and most intricate chapter of the book so my discussion of this will be over a series of postings, not all in one bite.


Chapter 9 opens with a reiteration of Allison's general view of Groundwork II as providing a complete "construction" of the categorical imperative where the term "construction" is defined by Allison to mean "an account of the necessary and sufficient conditions of its possibility". There are 3 conditions that Allison views Kant as having set for the categorical imperative: firstly, it must have a universal form, secondly, it must presuppose something of absolute value and, thirdly, it must command unconditionally (or be binding). The last of these is related by Allison to the Formula of Autonomy whilst the second element is related by him to the Formula of Humanity. This distinction between the two formulas is one that I expressed some scepticism about last time but in this posting I want to look more narrowly at how Allison discusses the process by which Kant arrives at the statement of the Formula of Autonomy.


This is the subject of the first part of Chapter 9 where Allison broadly discusses what we could term the "derivation" of the Formula of Autonomy. Allison states that this derivation is not a "model of clarity". It is stated at Ak. 4: 431 where Kant derives it from restating the formulas of universal law and humanity and suggesting that autonomy arises from some kind of combination of the first two. Allison addresses here the question of how this derivation is supposed to work, concentrating initially on how Kant refers at Ak. 4: 431 to "humanity" which is in terms of being "the subject of all ends". Allison indicates that this expression is ambiguous as it could refer either to "those for whom ends exist", that is, to end-setters, or to "the objects of those ends", that is, the same end-setters considered as self-standing ends.  The latter seems to me more obvious and is aligned by Allison with the point that the rational agents so considered would set a limiting condition on both the ends set and the means by which I select them.


Turning over to the understanding of universal law, Allison likewise introduces a distinction between two ways of understanding it, namely either in terms of intra- or inter- subjective universalizability. Intra-universalizability is now understood by Allison as a first sense of universalizability with inter-universalizability a second sense. The formula of the law of nature is related by Allison to the first sense but the introduction of rational beings in the Formula of Humanity is viewed by him as leading us to the second sense. It is this second sense that is combined with the notion of humanity discussed in the previous paragraph and taken thereby to lead us to the notion of autonomy.


The principle of autonomy involves the idea that the law is something that one gives to oneself and since it is so viewed some critics of Kant assume that this gives a kind of green light to amoralism. On Allison's construal of the derivation of autonomy this is ruled out since autonomy requires universal legislation limited by reference to respect for ends in themselves. This sense of maxims being adopted out of respect for the law introduces a clear reference to a respect requirement into Allison's account.


Kant also provides a reason for thinking that the Formula of Autonomy rules out dependence of maxims referring to "interest" as, in being autonomous, the will that wills the law becomes a "supreme lawgiver" (Ak. 4: 432). This point is indicated by Allison to depend on the sense that the universality of the maxims in question is of the second type.


There are three distinct features introduced according to Allison when Kant arrives at the explicit statement of the Formula of Autonomy. Firstly, there is another formula of the categorical imperative, and this formula gives us the newly expanded notion of universality. Secondly, we thereby learn something new about willing morally. Finally, it leads us to the concluding stage of Kant's account of rational agency in Groundwork II. Included in the last point is the connection Kant appears to draw between autonomy and the realm of ends. It seems that to consider oneself autonomously is of a piece with viewing oneself as part of a realm of ends where this realm is understood by Allison to mean "a systematic unification in which the members are ends in themselves".


The "ends" in question are not "private" ends in their content or, as Allison puts it, "it does not assume that they have any such ends in particular". This way of understanding the realm of ends draws Kant very close to the Rawlsian understanding of the original position and Allison clearly acknowledges this without drawing any serious consequences for what this might say about the process of "constructing" the categorical imperative, something about which Rawls had quite a bit to say. Allison does, however, distinguish two ways of belonging to the realm of ends, as ordinary members of it on the one hand and the supreme head of it on the other. The difference between these is whilst both make the laws of the realm of ends in the sense of legislating them, only the ordinary members are also subject to them by which he means that the supreme head is not subject to any constraint as it is "a fully independent being".


The opening part of Chapter 9 thus includes a rather weak account of the derivation of the Formula of Autonomy patently largely meant to justify the general claim that it is a formula distinct from that of humanity without addressing the questions raised in my previous posting. After this point has been made Allison effectively draws on a Rawlsian notion of construction without clarifying the consequences of this or exploring it seriously. So the opening moves of the chapter have some philosophical problems but, in making the case that he does, Allison does draw out well that the binding character of the law is connected to autonomy and this is a key point.

Allison and Kant on Humanity

In my last posting on Allison I looked at Chapter 7 of his commentary on the Groundwork that addressed Kant's formulas of universal law. In this posting I'm going to look at Chapter 8 where Allison moves on to a discussion of Kant's formula of humanity.


Allison opens the chapter by citing Kant's claim that "the will is a capacity to determine itself to act in conformity with [gemass] the representation of certain laws" and adds to it that what Kant here brings out is that rational beings set their own ends for themselves, a point that refers us forward to Kant's notion of autonomy although Allison, somewhat oddly, fails to draw this consequence. That the concept of moral obligation presupposes an end that is necessary in itself, is, however, something that Allison suggests Kant had a long commitment to, pre-dating even the composition of the Groundwork. However, the ends that are presupposed by the categorical imperative are taken by Allison to be ends only in a negative sense. What this means is that they are ends that are sources of constraint on the acts one can permissibly perform. 


After opening with these claims about ends Allison moves on to more careful distinctions within the Kantian discussion of ends. Firstly, Allison looks at the difference between "objective" and "subjective" ends for Kant aligning objective ends with motives and subjective ends with inclinations. However Allison is also careful to point out that by "objective" ends Kant does not merely mean a source of reasons for action but also ends that are given by pure reason. Any end that is capable of grounding a categorical imperative must, on Allison's view, meet two conditions. It must, firstly, be objective in the sense of being given by pure reason, and, secondly, it must have a self-standing character.


Now the "end" that Kant takes to meet these conditions is that of "humanity" so the key question concerns what the notion of "humanity" consists in for Kant. This question is complicated by the fact that, in different texts, Kant contrasts "humanity" on some occasions with "animality" and on others with "personality". Christine Korsgaard appears to take the relationship between "humanity" and "animality" to be the central one but also to view the distinguishing feature of humanity to consist in a rather minimal capacity, namely, that of purely being able to set ends. By contrast, Allen Wood, who frames the distinction between "humanity" and "personality" as the central one, sees the capacity to set ends "through reason" as what holds together the capacities of humanity. 


However Wood seems to take the reference to "reason" here to mean that Kant frames "humanity" in the Formula of Humanity in a way that involves no specific reference to morality (as fits his view that humanity is primarily a contrastive term with "personality" as the latter clearly does incorporate moral notions in itself). Wood's basic reason appears to be that the categorical imperative requires preserving and respecting rational nature in general, not just its moral function. However, as Allison rightly points out, this is beside the point since the issue is not what the categorical imperative requires but rather in virtue of what capacity "humanity" has the property of being an end in itself. Allison thinks that ambiguity on Kant's point might well have led Wood to adopt this view but it is not one that Allison can accept and his rejection of this view is one that I certainly endorse.


Another view of the "capacity" of humanity that Allison critically discusses is that of Richard Dean who identifies "humanity" with the good will. Dean's point is that Kant's argument leads to the conclusion that something is good in all circumstances only if its value is independent of inclination and that this is how Kant identifies the good will so the good will must be equivalent to the capacity of humanity. Allison regards this claim as based on a conflation of two distinct senses of end, namely "end" as something to be effected and "end" as something self-standing. The good will is an end to be effected (perhaps the ultimate such one) but it is not a self-standing end. 


After canvassing these views, Allison takes instead the claim that Kant is making about humanity to consist in the view that it is the capacity to be moral that is identified by Kant with "humanity" and uses citations from the Critique of Practical Reason to help make this point. The mere capacity to set ends is described by Kant in the Metaphysics of Morals as having only "extrinsic value" (Ak. 6: 434) which appears to rule out Korsgaard's minimal view. However, what is problematic in Allison's identification of humanity with the capacity for morality is surely that it leaves Kant's view as a highly general one (and leaves out reference to what makes this capacity possible, namely, autonomy).


After going through the discussion concerning what the capacity for humanity consists in Allison moves on to looking at Kant's derivation of the formula of humanity which, he alleges, occupies only two paragraphs of the Groundwork. Allison views this derivation as having two steps. The first is that the possibility of a categorical imperative presupposes the existence of something as an end in itself and then gives an argument for elimination concerning what that something must be. The second step is to argue that we have good reasons to regard rational agents as ends in themselves.


The argument for elimination that accompanies the first step rules out objects of inclination, inclinations themselves and what Kant terms "things". Allison's account of the inclinations themselves indicates that we don't have to accept Kant's apparently more extreme views of inclinations to accept this claim. However whilst Allison appears to find Kant's argument by elimination convincing he does not uncover a specific argument for viewing rational beings as the appropriate "something" in the first stage of the argument which is why he turns to the second stage in order to uncover this.


There are three parts to the second stage of Kant's derivation according to Allison. The first part is the claim that human beings necessarily represent their own existence in this way so that it is a subjective principle of action (based on Ak. 4: 429). One of the points Allison stresses in presenting this claim is that when one sets an end, one makes it one's own end. Further, to take oneself as an end is to make the consequential claim that one cannot be regarded as nothing more than a means to some other end. So the unconditioned worth that Kant was after in the "something" lies in the end-setter rather than in any particular end that they set for themselves.


The second part of the argument for Allison moves beyond the "subjective" claim of the first part as it claims that every rational being necessarily represent their existence in this way so that it is an "objective" principle (Ak. 4: 429). Allison views this as making a claim for the objective validity of my conception of myself as an end in itself. Allison takes this to introduce a normative import to the discussion that he did not find present previously though it is unclear to me where he finds this import since he still does not uncover the source of the claim to reside in autonomy. The third part of the derivation for Allison is the translation into imperatival form of the principle that rational nature exists as an end in itself. 


The final part of Allison's chapter turns to looking at Kant's uses of examples of application of the Formula of Humanity in the second part of the Groundwork. Since Allen Wood, amongst others, have argued that the Formula of Humanity has a status that is practically superior to that of the formulas of universal law, this is particularly interesting to do with regard to the Formula of Humanity. The same examples are treated with regard to this formula as were related to the formula of the universal law of nature previously and they are given in the same order.


Kant begins with the example of suicide and asks whether the maxim related to it could subsist together with the idea of humanity as an end in itself (Ak. 4: 429). In denying that these are compatible Kant points out that since human beings are not merely things they cannot be used merely as means, and this mere means requirement of the Formula of Humanity is here mentioned for the first time by Allison. Allison finds the application of this requirement in this case to be unclear since he is not sure what end humanity is here being used for. Further, Allison seems to think it is a reply to this argument of Kant's to say that if the self is the source of all value that it is also the source of its own value, a view that cuts against any serious understanding of autonomy and brings out again his failure in this chapter to consider it.


Allison's positive view is that Kant rules out the maxim underlying the case of suicide considered on the grounds that it involves an authorisation to withdraw from obligation, something that is the source of the "contradiction" Kant finds here and enables Allison to prescind from Kant's own reference to the mere means requirement. However the argument is not filled out by Allison and in leaving out the mere means requirement he seems not to support the positive sense of humanity very clearly here.


The case of false promising, by contrast, is one in which Allison can pull out the sense of the mere means requirement but only by conflating it with what Parfit has termed the "consent" requirement, namely by referring to the ability of the other to endorse the end embodied in the action. The discussion of neglecting one's talents appears not to refer to the mere means requirement to Allison but, given that he has seen the formula of humanity as giving only the basis for saying that certain ends should not be acted against and not a positive ground for any specific ends to be accomplished, he cannot see any basis for Kant's claim that reference to humanity should prevent neglect of talents. At least with regard to non-beneficence Allison's reading does partially work since the reference to ends one should not act against is here sufficient to strike down active non-beneficence but it is insufficient to produce a positive claim for beneficence.


In summary, then, Allison's chapter strikes me as problematic for two different reasons. Firstly, the identification of the capacity for humanity purely with a capacity for morality without identifying what this latter capacity consists in or what grounds it is insufficient. It ensures that the relationship between humanity and autonomy does not become clear. Secondly, and as a consequence of the first problem, Allison can give no persuasive account of the discussion of examples Kant gives in the second part of the Groundwork of the application of the Formula of Humanity. So whilst the discussion of the derivation of the Formula of Humanity is an intriguing addition to the secondary literature there are as many problems with Allison's account of humanity as he finds beset his predecessors views.

Allison and Kant on Universal Law

Due to being away traveling in the earlier part of this month it is a little while since I last blogged. My last posting on Allison's book on the Groundwork was about a month previous to this one and concerned chapter 6 where Allison discussed rational agency and the general notion of imperatives. In this posting I will comment on the seventh chapter where Allison gives his account of the two formulas of universal law as they appear in the second part of the Groundwork, and which includes an account of the examples Kant gives there.


The first issue Allison raises in this chapter concerns the claim Kant makes at Ak. 4: 421 that all "imperatives of his duty" can be "derived" from the "single imperative" of universal law that Kant unequivocally identifies with the categorical imperative formula of universal law. The word translated as "derived" is abgeleitet and Allison asks whether Kant here means that the test of the categorical imperative concerns whether all generally recognised duties can be derived from it or whether he has something weaker in mind. Allison also raises a second immediate question concerning Kant's use of the notion of "nature" in the formula of the law of nature and asks what function this reference serves for Kant. 


In addressing this second question Allison turns, unsurprisingly, to the account in the Critique of Practical Reason, of the "typic" of pure practical judgment where Kant gives a general discussion of the notion of practical schematism. Here the notion of natural law is described as serving as a "type" or schema of the general notion of law in the process of formulating imperatives. In the second Critique this leads to the formulation: "Ask yourself whether, if the action you propose were to take place by a law of nature of which you were yourself a part, you could indeed regard it as possible through your will" (Ak. 5: 69). This is indicated to be substantially the same as the formula of the law of nature in the Groundwork by Allison though he does little to use the "typic" to make clear the means by which the formula of the law of nature is justified.


The point that comes out by use of the typic is that actions that cannot meet it are, by virtue of this, morally impossible. However, rather than focus on this point, Allison chooses instead to return to the question of what is meant by the claim that imperatives of duty are "derived" from the reference to the law of nature. This question leads Allison to think of the reference to the law of nature as one that is intended to be "fertile" in the sense that it enables a discussion of how lists of duty are supposedly meant to arise. Despite formulating the alleged task of the reference to the law of nature in this way, however, Allison reaches the conclusion that the most that it can do is indicate the impermissibility of a course of action under a given maxim. In other words, it provides a test of moral permissibility rather than providing for specific determination of duties. 


Allison also defends this reading of what can be accomplished by the reference to the law of nature against other views, principally against the claim of Stephen Engstrom that fundamental duties of justice and beneficence can be directly derived from this reference. Essentially the reason why Allison disagrees with Engstrom appears to be that Allison does not think that the reference to universal laws of nature is sufficient to arrive at a generally acceptable conception of what is rationally universally required. 


In turning to Kant's use of examples, which appear after the formulation of the reference to universal laws of nature, Allison notes some points about Kant's procedure. Amongst other things, it is important on Allison's view to see that the examples include courses of action that run against generally accepted duties. Also the examples are meant to bring out a form of contradiction that will arise in willing the course of action in question. 


The first example is that of suicide but important in considering it is the understanding that the maxim here is one of taking shortening one's life to be acceptable if its longer duration promises more ill than agreeableness. So the maxim is one that rests upon an appeal to inclinations. However Allison takes it that the contradiction that arises from this maxim is a teleological one but also views Kant's argument here as unsuccessful. One of the points that Allison makes here is that there is no way of formulating the argument concerning suicide in terms of a simple reference to universal law simplicter. This seems to entail that Allison views the incorporation of reference to universal laws of nature as requiring some sense of teleology though it is far from clear why this should be so. Indeed, Allison himself accepts that taking a strongly teleological view of nature seems a rather large step in order to show a problem with reference to inclinations in a maxim concerning suicide and yet still thinks that Kant requires this. It appears to me that Allison's treatment of this example is marred in failing to justify the necessity of seeing Kant's treatment of it as having to involve assumptions that are far from evidently required.


Moving on to the example of false promises Kant invokes specific circumstances to make this example a strong one. In the case in question there is a reason why the false promise has a real attraction for the agent which is that they are in clear difficulties. Given these difficulties there is a need for something like the appeal to the device of the typic to test the maxim in question. The maxim then emerges as one in which a promise is to be made that I do not intend to fulfil. It is only within the device of the thought experiment that the problem that such a maxim involves can be clearly stated. It is within the device that a contradiction emerges, not within the maxim simply as such. 


Allison considers the type of contradiction that is meant to emerge from the false promising case, discussing whether it is a strict logical contradiction or, as Christine Korsgaard has suggested, a "practical" contradiction. Whilst the former is suggested to show that the contradiction would render the institution of promising impossible, the latter is rather supposed to show that there is a problem with the end of the agent. Allison favours the latter view though he does not think there is a single form of contradiction underlying all of Kant's examples. In this case, however, Allison's reading leads to the view that it is the "intention qua universal law" that generates a contradiction.


The third example concerning the development of talents is treated by Allison as including two different lines of argument, one that concerns a teleological contradiction and the other a practical contradiction. The former, however, if it is involved at all, is one that runs into difficulties of the same sort that would apply to reading the suicide example in this way. The latter, by contrast, has the difficulty that it could simply amount to a case concerning prudential rather than moral reasoning. The way that Allison avoids the latter is by reference to a conception of "true needs" that are essential to finite rational agency and that would be compromised if talents were not developed. However this leads Allison to reading the third example in a way that is weaker than is standard since it produces the outcome not that we are required to cultivate our talents but only that we not adopt a maxim of completely neglecting them. The fourth example concerning non-beneficence is ruled out by Kant in terms of universal laws of nature but this is again viewed by Allison in terms of "true needs" of finite rational agents. This is again thought to produce a form of practical contradiction in the maxim in question.


After treating Kant's four examples Allison moves on to the decidedly tricky ground of the counter-examples that have been stated in the literature to Kant's account. There are two types of such counter-examples: false positives and false negatives. False positives come in two versions, those based on attributing to an agent a highly specific maxim, on the basis of which a proposed course of action could pass the universalisability test and a second set that don't involve such specific reference. The first type of examples are used in particular by Allen Wood. In these cases the high specificity of the examples is meant to evade the reference to universality. In response to these examples Allison stresses the point that increasing the specificity of the maxim has the consequence of narrowing the scope of universalization without evading the universalizability requirement. The more general problem that such a procedure of false positives is meant to reveal is, however, that actions can be presented under a variety of descriptions and not all of such descriptions exclude universalisation. In response Allison stresses the point that use of such false positives depends on a very specific conception of what "maxims" are, namely, identifying them with intentions or actions rather than general determinations of the basis of conduct.


The second type of false positives, by contrast to the ones based on very specific formulations of maxims, tend to concern what Korsgaard has termed "natural" as opposed to "conventional" actions. Such "natural" actions don't require reference to institutions (such as "promising") and, in not requiring this, are allegedly more open to response by invocation of false positives. So the example of killing babies who disturb one's sleep does not appear to run into an immediate contradiction of either logical or practical type once universalised. The strategies of dealing with these types of example that Allison mentions are not entirely successful as responses. Korsgaard, for example, responds to them by stating that they involve reference to some further end than that immediately suggested by the maxim and that this further end is one that cannot be secured consistently with willing the maxim itself (a kind of "practical" contradiction suggestion). However that requires clear assumptions concerning these further ends and is thus open to the kinds of objections that Allison has mentioned when treating the example of cultivation of talents.


The second strategy in responding to these types of false positives is to invoke the contradiction in the will test rather than the contradiction in conception test. Barbara Herman, for example, favours this response. However, this has the peculiar consequence that the maxim concerning the killing of babies appears now to only violate an imperfect rather than a perfect duty, which is surely false. The third strategy, promoted by Onora O'Neill, is to say that the examples in question presuppose practices that would undercut the agency of those they victimise (which appears to imply some kind of reference to humanity and/or autonomy). Allison takes this strategy to be the best on offer but to be implausible as a reading of the requirements of reference to universal law alone. In making this point Allison argues that the formulas of universal law are only intra-subjective and not inter-subjective. What is meant by this is that the formulas of universal law, on Allison's reading, test only the compatibility of an agent's maxim with the same maxim considered as a universal law whilst an inter-subjective test relates the maxim to its possibility of endorsement by other rational agents. Since Allison views the reference to universal law to only involve the former and not the latter form of universalizability he is correct to see the strategy of O'Neill as not persuasive though the case for seeing the formulas of universal law in this restrictive way is not seriously made in this chapter.


After treating false positives, Allison moves on to false negatives that are used against Kant. These are cases of maxims that would be generally agreed not to be morally objectionable but which, it is argued, would fail Kant's test. They include what Herman terms "timing" problems where we state maxims that include references to doing things at given times (such as playing tennis on occasions when the courts aren't widely used). Again, Allen Wood has invoked many of these cases. As with the false positives the real question being raised by these examples concerns the nature of the description of the maxims that is appropriate. Again, Allison responds by distinguishing maxims from intentions. In the Critique of Practical Reason Kant describes maxims as "propositions that contain a general determination of the will having under it several practical rules" though Allison indicates that the nature of the claim that practical rules fall under a maxim is ambiguous. It is ambiguous as the rules could be seen as deduced from the maxim or that the maxim could be seen as providing the normative criterion for the rules but Allison sees the second as correct.


On this ground Allison revisits the alleged problem with the tennis example and points out that the real question concerns the end for the sake of which the agent is engaging in the activity in question. This accords with his point that we should be focusing not on specific intentions when we consider maxims but instead on general determinations of the will. Maxims are thus viewed as containing grounds that are found in agent's practical interests not in their specific intentions.


However, even on Allison's account there are still some problems left unaccounted for. Assuming with him that maxims are best tested by practical contradiction tests and that universal law formulas are seen in terms of intra-subjective validity, it follows that the example of the killing of the baby that disturbs one's sleep, appears not to be ruled out by reference to universal law. Since this is so it follows that Allison will need a stronger account of Kant's other formulas than he gives for the formulas of universal law if Kant's procedure is to be robust enough to rule out maxims that it would appear clearly counter-intuitive to leave undisturbed.

Allison and Kant on Rational Agency

In my last posting on Allison's commentary on the Groundwork I looked at Chapter 5 which was a loose collection of material roughly relating to the concluding sections of Groundwork I. In this posting I am going to look at Chapter 6 which, conversely, is more tightly focused but is somewhat preparatory to a serious focus on the argument of Groundwork II.


In this chapter Allison is looking at Kant's account of rational agency and how it relates to his description of imperatives. One of the problems that Allison has posed insistently since the opening of his commentary concerns why Kant's argument did not move simply from the discussion of common moral cognition in Groundwork I to the "deduction" of the categorical imperative in Groundwork III? The basic reason that this chapter opens with is that Kant needs to establish the absolute necessity of the supreme principle of morality and that this is the central task of Groundwork II. However there is also a second question about Groundwork II that concerns its internal structure and the apparent multiplicity of formulas of law that it gives. Like Paul Guyer, with whom he otherwise differs, Allison takes the view that the formulas are parts of a progressive description that Kant is giving in Groundwork II, the description, according to Allison, of the concept of finite rational agency.


The account of rational agency opens, according to Allison, at Ak. 4: 412 where Kant speaks of how only rational beings have the capacity to act according to the representation of laws as opposed to simply acting on these laws themselves. What kind of law is this? Allison considers the argument that it is a moral law and adduces two factors in support of such a view: firstly, Kant describes only the categorical imperative (among practical principles) as a law and, secondly, since maxims are freely adopted by agents this has the virtue of placing freedom at the heart of Kant's account. However Allison decides against this reading and prefers the view that what is meant by "law" here is, rather, objective practical principles (both moral and instrumental). 


The key point about the reference to laws in rational agency is, however, that it introduces the notion of the "will". Objective principles as necessitating for wills are commands of reason and the formula of their commands is an imperative (Ak. 4: 413). Once we have this notion of an imperative we can divide the genus of this idea into its sub-species of hypothetical and categorical. To command categorically is to command independently of any given end. 


Allison reviews the contrast Kant draws between two forms of hypothetical imperative in the Groundwork, distinguishing, as he does there, between imperatives of skill and pragmatic imperatives. Further Allison states that hypothetical imperatives are all grounded in an analytic principle with regard to willing, a principle stated by Kant at Ak. 4: 417: "Whoever wills the end, also wills (insofar as reason has decisive influence on his action) the means that are indispensably necessary to it that are in his power". This statement is described by Allison as the "grounding principle" (GP) of hypothetical imperatives but it is notable that it does not contain any sense of inclusion of an "ought". 


Two conditions are introduced on the apparently analytic statement GP by Kant which are that the agent must have knowledge that the end in question could not be attained apart from a given course of action and that the agent must fully or completely will the end in question. As Allison points out, the second of these conditions is important given that it is all too common for agents not to fully will to attain a given end. On the basis of these further conditions Allison fills out the "grounding principle" of hypothetical imperatives further than Kant explicitly did and arrives at what he terms GP1. This has the form: "If A fully wills E and knows that M is indispensably necessary for E and M is in its power, then A will M". 


However there is still a problem with how we move from GP1 to the statement of the hypothetical imperative given that the latter contains an ought-operator and the former does not. Normativity will require some form of prescription which has yet to be stated. As Allison indicates, however, this element of prescription is often not explicitly stated in a law as when a simple traffic law states what one must do, it does not also say that you ought to do what you must do. Ought-propositions are addressed to finite rational agents and such agents also require an understanding of how ends relate to means. If an agent simply thinks an end in relation to means they have a hypothetical connection between the two that stands under the assumption of desiring the end in question. It is the importation of this that brings in the ought-operator.


What Kant takes to be analytic is thus not hypothetical imperatives themselves according to Allison but rather the practical propositions that correspond to them. Since the volition of an agent is presupposed in the statement of a hypothetical imperative and GP1 describes the means of attaining them then this is sufficient to account for the possibility of such imperatives. However, in addition to the generic description of such imperatives Thomas Hill has further argued that there is a general form for all hypothetical imperatives that can be expressed as the Hypothetical Imperative, of which specific imperatives are given examples. It could be taken to abstract from given specific ends in favour of the general way in which instrumental end-setting can be given. Allison rejects this idea though he does so very swiftly without examining the details of Hill's argument and the swiftness of this makes his rejection unconvincing.


Key to the notion of an imperative is constraint so that accounting for an imperative is to describe the grounds of constraint it imposes. With hypothetical imperatives the constraint is comprehended in relation to the end set but categorical imperatives are ones that command, in their unconditionality, move beyond this type of constraint. The necessitation of such categorical imperatives is not grounded in any given volition. However the generic possibility of categorical imperatives is not the province of the argument of Groundwork II but, instead, of Groundwork III.


Given this point Allison moves instead to looking at the derivation of the categorical imperative that is carried out in Groundwork II which culminates in the statement of its formula at Ak. 4: 420-21 and which is glossed in terms of an ought-operator that refers to consistency of maxims in relation to universal law. In the Groundwork I argument the universal law formula was grounded on the relation of imperatives to the good will and the conformity of imperatives to the good will was a sufficient reason for rejecting anything that failed to conform to universal law. The content of the law was filled by reference to the pre-given maxim's of the agent.


In Groundwork II, by contrast, the derivation of the categorical imperative is argued by Allison to follow from analysis of the concept of an imperative with the law being the source of the constraint on volition that must be operative in an imperative. The necessity that is built into the imperative is also assumed to be grounded on the reference to law in general and determinate content to be removed from the law. This leaves us with the simple conception of conformity to law as such. However, the general worry with this argument can be said to have the form that, whilst apparently stating something purely formal, it arrives at a principle with content and that the means by which this is done is unclear. Allison's response refers to the unconditionality of the statement of the law as that which provides us with a general possibility of content. Or, it does so "just in case" the agent takes their maxims to be willed also as universal laws. Key to the whole chapter has been the simple statement that rational agents act according to their representation of laws and the demand that an unconditional imperative provide prescriptive force independently of reference to ends.