IMMANUEL KANT
Immanuel Kant was a German Philosopher, who lived from 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804. To be precise, he was born on April 22, 1724, Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia) and (died February 12, 1804, Königsberg), German philosopher whose comprehensive and systematic work in epistemology (the theory of knowledge), ethics, and aesthetics greatly influenced all subsequent philosophy, especially the various schools of Kantianism and idealism.
Kant lived in the remote province where he was born for his entire life. His father, a saddler, was, according to Kant, a descendant of a Scottish immigrant, although scholars have found no basis for this claim; his mother was remarkable for her character and natural intelligence. Both parents were devoted followers of the Pietist branch of the Lutheran church, which taught that religion belongs to the inner life expressed in simplicity and obedience to moral law.
Kant believed that reason is also the source of morality, and that aesthetics arise from a faculty of disinterested judgment. Let us note that he attempted to explain the nexus between reason and human experience(empiricism) and to move beyond what he believed to be the failures of traditional philosophy and metaphysics. He wanted to put an end to what he saw as an era of futile and speculative theories of human experience, while resisting the skepticism of thinkers such as Hume. He regarded himself as showing the way past the impasse between rationalists and empiricist.
In Kant's ethics, his theory can be said to be an example of a deontological moral theory because according to these theories, the rightness or wrongness of actions does not depend on their consequences or outcomes but on whether they fulfill our duty. The only motive that can endow an act with moral value, he argues, is one that arises from universal principles discovered by reason. The categorical imperative is Kant’s famous statement of this duty: “Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.”
According to Kant a good person is someone who always does their duty because it is their duty. It is fine if they enjoy doing it, but it must be the case that they would do it even if they did not enjoy it. The overall theme is that to be a good person you must be good for goodness sake.
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