Habitual Desire: On Kant’s Concept of Inclination

Wilson, Eric Entrican

doi:10.1017/s1369415416000030

Cited by 65 publications

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“…The human being is not free only when he acts out of respect for the moral law, and otherwise 14 See Wilson (2016) and Wood (2018, 100) for similar accounts of inclination. One difference between them is that Wilson does not question the received view of Kant as a psychological dualist, while in a related context Wood (2011, 76-7) does.…”

Section: Metaphysical Dualism Does Not Entail the Non-rationality Of Inclinations And Desiresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Kant and Stoic Affections

Merritt

2021

Can. J. of Philosophy

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I examine the significance of the Stoic theory of pathē (and related topics) for Kant’s moral psychology, arguing against the received view that systematic differences block the possibility of Kant’s drawing anything more than rhetoric from his Stoic sources. More particularly, I take on the chronically underexamined assumption that Kant is committed to a psychological dualism in the tradition of Plato and Aristotle, positing distinct rational and nonrational elements of human mentality. By contrast, Stoics take the mentality of an adult human being to be rational through and through, while recognising that this rationality is not normally in a state of health or excellence. I show how Kant’s account of affections—chiefly the “affects” and “passions” that he identifies as targets of a duty of apathy—draws substantive lessons from his Stoic sources, and how he accepts on his own terms the monistic principles of Stoic moral psychology.

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Section: Metaphysical Dualism Does Not Entail the Non-rationality Of Inclinations And Desiresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Kant and Stoic Affections

Merritt

2021

Can. J. of Philosophy

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“…4 4 I am also assuming that these are dispositional states. As Wilson (2016) notes, this is needed to account for central features of inclinations, such as their ability to be shaped by practice (an important feature for Schapiro's account); but it is in tension with the dominant way Schapiro speaks of them, as occurrent states. …”

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“…6 6 An alternative, sketched in the work of Iris Murdoch (following Simone Weil), conceives of the will as instead engaged in a life‐long activity of loving attention and discernment, capable of becoming attached to (better or worse) objects, and of transforming one's desires in a way that affects not only the person's decisions, but the space of alternatives available to the agent, and the manner in which they appear to her in the moment of choice (Murdoch, 1970). The writings of John McDowell are the most developed version of this view, which, as Jennifer Whiting (2022) argues, has Aristotelian origins. …”

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“… (Schapiro, forthcoming).4 I am also assuming that these are dispositional states. AsWilson (2016) notes, this is needed to account for central features of inclinations, such as their ability to be shaped by practice (an important feature for Schapiro's account); but it is in tension with the dominant way Schapiro speaks of them, as occurrent states.5 This is consistent withMarcus's (2021) suggestion that these states also differ in their epistemic profile.6 An alternative, sketched in the work of Iris Murdoch (following Simone Weil), conceives of the will as instead engaged in a life-long activity of loving attention and discernment, capable of becoming attached to (better or worse) objects, and of transforming one's desires in a way that affects not only the person's decisions, but the space of alternatives available to the agent, and the manner in which they appear to her in the moment of choice(Murdoch, 1970). The writings of John McDowell are the most developed version of this view, which, as JenniferWhiting (2022) argues, has Aristotelian origins.7 Thanks to the participants of the Georgia State reading group on Feeling Like, to Tamar Schapiro for generous discussion of her views, and to Eric Wilson for incisive comments on a draft.…”

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Feeling Like It: A Theory of Inclination and Will. TamarSchapiro. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2021, 192 pp. ISBN‐13:9780198862932 hb £55.00

Glasscock

2022

European J of Philosophy

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Sometimes we feel like doing things we might not do. An irresolute exerciser, I frequently feel like laying on the couch instead of jogging; angered by bad referee calls, I sometimes feel like yelling at the TV; and a committed teacher, I often feel like writing extensive comments on students' paper. States of this sort, that motivate you "while leaving you free to act on or not," are what Shapiro calls "inclinations" (p. 10). The class thus includes a multitude of states, such as primal and complex emotions, feelings, desires for general or particular things, and even our core commitments. Despite otherwise important differences between these states, the aim of Shapiro's book is to offer a unified account of inclinations and their implications for rational agency.The book constitutes the culmination of a series of pioneering writings questioning a long-standing tendency to ignore inclinations. The reasons for neglect are complex. Partly, I suspect, it had to do with (early) Davidson's still influential idea that all desires (or "pro-atittudes") play the same role in the explanation of action; partly, Bratman's classic work drawing out the importance and distinctiveness of intentions led to an unfortunate neglect of other desiderative states. By contrast, Schapiro persuasively shows that our understanding of agency will be incomplete without an account of inclination.Schapiro addresses the topic through what she dubs the "Kantian method." 1 Instead of seeking a causal or mechanistic explanation of some phenomenon, the aim of the Kantian method is to render an activity intelligible from the standpoint of a "participant to the form of activity in which the participant is engaged" (p. 21). For example, instead of looking for causal antecedents that may explain what distinguishes an action from other events, the Kantian method focuses on understanding the concepts that the agent must employ if she is to act at all. Schapiro's central examples are the concepts of means and ends. To act at all, the agent must grasp (at least implicitly) these concepts, making it possible to engage in an a priori inquiry about them that exploits this understanding. Since she takes inclinations to be equally essential to agency, Schapiro's discussion centers on questions that an agent can address just by reflecting on her own agency, and she eschews attempts to approach the question via scientific methods.Despite my sympathy for the main parts of this methodology, I have two quibbles. First, unlike Schapiro, I think of the scientific and the "Kantian" methods as complimentary rather than rivals, exerting mutual pressure on each other; presumed conceptual truths can be enriched, corrected, and refined through empirical insights. All the more so for a topic like inclinations, since it is not fully a rational phenomenon. 2 Second, Schapiro distances herself from Anscombe, whom she criticizes for inquiring into agency from "our standpoint as knowers" rather than agents (pp. 23-4n20). However, this criticism presupposes a dichotomy between th...

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The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015

2019

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Habitual Desire: On Kant’s Concept of Inclination

Cited by 65 publications

References 37 publications

Kant and Stoic Affections

Kant and Stoic Affections

Feeling Like It: A Theory of Inclination and Will. TamarSchapiro. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2021, 192 pp. ISBN‐13:9780198862932 hb £55.00

The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015

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