Book contents
- Kant’s Early Critics on Freedom of the Will
- Kant’s Early Critics on Freedom of the Will
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the Edition and Translation
- Chronology of the Translated Texts and Kant’s Major Works
- Abbreviations
- Historical and Systematic Introduction
- I Freedom and Determinism
- II Freedom and Imputability
- III Freedom and Consciousness
- IV Freedom and Skepticism
- Leonhard Creuzer, Skeptical Reflections on Freedom of the Will with Respect to the Most Recent Theories on the Same, Giessen, 1793
- Friedrich Carl Forberg, On the Grounds and Laws of Free Actions, Jena and Leipzig, 1795
- Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Review of “Skeptical Reflections on Freedom of the Will with Respect to the Most Recent Theories on the Same by Leonhard Creuzer, 1793,” Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung 303 (1793), Cols. 201–205
- Salomon Maimon, “The Moral Skeptic,” Berlinisches Archiv der Zeit und ihres Geschmacks 2 (1800), 271–292
- V Freedom and Choice
- Appendix: Biographical Sketches
- Glossary
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index of Persons
- Index of Subjects
Friedrich Carl Forberg, On the Grounds and Laws of Free Actions, Jena and Leipzig, 1795
from IV - Freedom and Skepticism
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 March 2022
- Kant’s Early Critics on Freedom of the Will
- Kant’s Early Critics on Freedom of the Will
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the Edition and Translation
- Chronology of the Translated Texts and Kant’s Major Works
- Abbreviations
- Historical and Systematic Introduction
- I Freedom and Determinism
- II Freedom and Imputability
- III Freedom and Consciousness
- IV Freedom and Skepticism
- Leonhard Creuzer, Skeptical Reflections on Freedom of the Will with Respect to the Most Recent Theories on the Same, Giessen, 1793
- Friedrich Carl Forberg, On the Grounds and Laws of Free Actions, Jena and Leipzig, 1795
- Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Review of “Skeptical Reflections on Freedom of the Will with Respect to the Most Recent Theories on the Same by Leonhard Creuzer, 1793,” Allgemeine Literatur-Zeitung 303 (1793), Cols. 201–205
- Salomon Maimon, “The Moral Skeptic,” Berlinisches Archiv der Zeit und ihres Geschmacks 2 (1800), 271–292
- V Freedom and Choice
- Appendix: Biographical Sketches
- Glossary
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index of Persons
- Index of Subjects
Summary
In On the Grounds and Laws of Free Actions (1795), F.C. Forberg responds at length to Leonhard Creuzer’s skeptical concerns with Kant’s account of free will. Forberg observes that theoretical reason demands that the activity of free will be conceived of as determined by a sufficient ground in accordance with a law. By contrast, practical reason demands that we presuppose that freedom pertain to both moral and immoral action. Whereas Creuzer is skeptical that these demands can be reconciled, Forberg argues that their compatibility is secured by the Critical philosophy. Forberg maintains that the principle of sufficient reason threatens freedom only if the relation between ground and what is grounded is temporal. However, if the principles which ground actions are intelligible and therefore atemporally related to actions, then the ground itself can be conceived of as within the subject’s control. Moreover, whereas laws of nature command natural powers on the condition of a temporally preceding cause, unconditional laws of intelligible powers are not bound by this condition. Thus, there is no demonstrable contradiction in positing that an intelligible power could be subject to an unconditional law and nevertheless possess freedom to act in conformity with or contrary to that law.
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- Kant's Early Critics on Freedom of the Will , pp. 178 - 206Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022