Kant And The Fate Of Autonomy: Problems In The Appropriation Of The Critical Philosophy (modern European Philosophy)

"In this reinterpretation of Kant and the post-Kantian response to his Critical philosophy, Karl Ameriks argues that such a view of Kant rests on a series of misconceptions. He demonstrates that the thought of Kant's successors (such as Fichte and Hegel) was determined by a radical Enlightenment conception of autonomy developed by Karl Reinhold, and that this conception entailed a serious distortion of Kant's more modest approach. The influence of Reinhold continues to mar current interpretation of Kant. By providing the first systematic study of the underlying structure of the reaction of Kant's Critical philosophy in the writings of Reinhold, Fichte, and Hegel, Karl Ameriks challenges the presumptions that dominate popular approaches to the concept of freedom, and to the interpretation of the relation between the Enlightenment, Kant, and post-Kantian thought." "A landmark study, this book will be of particular interest to all students of Kant as well as those in fields such as intellectual history, political theory, and religious studies concerned with issues of autonomy and modernity."--Jacket. Introduction: Kant and the Fate of Autonomy. A. One Story of the Decline and Fall of Absolute Autonomy. B. A Road Map to the Main Stages of Kant and After -- 1. Kant's Modest System. A. Preliminary Overview of the Modern Context of the Critical Philosophy. B. Kant's Answer: Philosophy as a Modest Science. C. Kant's Immediate Successors: Contrasting Reactions to Modesty. D. Systematic Modesty and Practical Philosophy -- 2. Reinhold's Contribution. A. The Gospels Revised: Preliminary Overview of Four Critical Doctrines in a New "Improved" Version. B. Reinhold's First Doctrine: Philosophy as Public and Certain. C. Reinhold's Second and Third Doctrines: Philosophy as Rigorous and Bounded. D. Reinhold's Fourth Doctrine: All for the Sake of Self-Determination. E. The End of Reinhold's Project: Shipwreck with Spectators -- 3. Kant, Fichte, and Short Arguments to Idealism. A. Kant's Program Reviewed. B. Reinhold's Modifications of Kant Reviewed. C. Fichte's Radicalization of Reinhold's Modifications. D. Hegel's Reaction Previewed -- 4. Kant, Fichte, and the Radical Primacy of the Practical. A. The Many Meanings of "In the Beginning Was the Act" B. Three Senses of the Primacy of Pure Practical Reason. C. The Practical Foundation of Philosophy in Fichte's Texts. D. Ambiguities in Interpreting Fichte as a Practical Foundationalist. E. Does Fichte's Idealism Avoid Being "One-Sided"? It has been argued that Kant's all-consuming efforts to place autonomy at the center of philosophy have had, in the long-run, the unintended effect of leading to the widespread discrediting of philosophy and of undermining the notion of autonomy itself. The result of this 'Copernican revolution' has seemed to many commentators the de-centring, if not the self-destruction, of the autonomous self. In this major reinterpretation of Kant and the post-Kantian response to his critical philosophy, Karl Ameriks argues that such a view of Kant rests on a series of misconceptions. By providing the first systematic study of the underlying structure of the reaction to Kant's critical philosophy in the writings of Reinhold, Fichte and Hegel, Karl Ameriks challenges the presumptions that dominate popular approaches to the concept of freedom, and to the interpretation of the relation between the Enlightenment, Kant and post-Kantian thought