„Zwei Dinge erfüllen das Gemüt mit immer neuer und zunehmender Bewunderung, je öfter und anhaltender sich das Nachdenken damit beschäftigt: der bestirnte Himmel über mir und das moralische Gesetz in mir.“ („Two things fill me with constantly increasing admiration and awe, the longer and more earnestly I reflect on them: the starry heaven over me and the moral law within me.”) Kant: Der Kritik der praktischen Vernunft.
To avoid conflicting notions as to what this quote says, I offer the German original to avoid getting hung up on semantics. Philosophy begins with wonder Aristotle tells us, so if Kant is immersed in perpetually increasing wondering about this, we know that it is important. The starry heaven is something which we immediately see on a clear dark night with the vastness of it all. But a better look is through the Hubble telescope, where we learn that there are more galaxies than people. Curious isn’t it we are not even a speck compared to the vastness of the universe. Once one comes to that realization, one becomes very humbled by it all.
To avoid conflicting notions as to what this quote says, I offer the German original to avoid getting hung up on semantics. Philosophy begins with wonder Aristotle tells us, so if Kant is immersed in perpetually increasing wondering about this, we know that it is important. The starry heaven is something which we immediately see on a clear dark night with the vastness of it all. But a better look is through the Hubble telescope, where we learn that there are more galaxies than people. Curious isn’t it we are not even a speck compared to the vastness of the universe. Once one comes to that realization, one becomes very humbled by it all.
But in accordance with the purpose of Kant, we should concentrate on the latter wonder (Bewunderung) that Kant gives us – the Moral Law within. One could pack the quotation with Theological concepts about the nature of Divine Transcendence and also Immanence, but clearly for Kant the moral law is internal. To put Theological matters aside for a time, one is faced with the prospect of realizing one’s own morality internal to one’s own humanity. A good friend once wrote in a speech that she came to the realization that we are all human, but what she meant by human was not the usual notion of our imperfection as human beings, but something more – something more in line with Kant. Her realization was earth shaking – her earth.
So what is the moral Law, Kant tells us in the second formulation of the Categorical Imperative:
„Handle so, daß du die Menschheit, sowohl in deiner Person, als in der Person eines jeden andern, jederzeit zugleich als Zweck, niemals bloß als Mittel brauchest“. (“Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.”) - Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten. This is often called the law of respect or the law of Humanity; I prefer the latter.
So my friend is absolutely right in her intuition, at least as far as Kant is concerned. Although I have broken the moral law, in this sense, many times and forgot the humanness (Menschheit) of myself and others, my excuse has often been “I’m only human”. But that’s not it is it? The excuse uses a negative sense of humanness, while the moral law is humanness in a positive sense. I of course recognize the moral law when I hear it or read it, but often in my weakness I fail to live up to it. Many of us –too many- do not live up to it, perhaps because we don’t recognize it or can’t comprehend it. We fail to recognize the humanness of each other, and we also fail to understand that we ought (it is imperative) to treat others as ends unto themselves and never solely as means to our own purposes. It is difficult to obey and at times of increased desire for our own ends, more so, because we forget that others also have ends and are ends unto themselves. SO, to conclude that is what it is, in essence, to be human - to be autonomous, free and have our own ends. It is absolutely imperative to recognize that in ourselves and others. Our humanness is something to be revered, or reverenced. So if you fail, own up to your failures, and don’t use your human nature as an excuse, it is your human nature that gives you the moral law and we ought to reverence that fact - that law of morality. Once we realize the humanness of each and every one of us, we become very humbled by it all.
But WHO in today's world ever thinks about moral law or what we ought to do? Academics? Theologians? Judges? Us mere mortals have not the time nor the inclination to think on that plane. BUT everyone OUGHT!
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