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Kant and Stoic Affections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2021

Melissa Merritt Open the ORCID record for Melissa Merritt [Opens in a new window]
Melissa Merritt*
Affiliation:
School of Humanities and Languages, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
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Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

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.

Keywords

KantSenecaCiceroStoic moral psychologypathēmorbi animiemotionsapathy
Type
Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 51 , Issue 5 , July 2021 , pp. 329 - 350
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Canadian Journal of Philosophy

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References

References

References to Kant’s works follow volume and page of the German Academy edition: Kants Gesammelte Schriften (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1900–). Quotations follow those in the following volumes of Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) where available, but are modified on occasion:

Ancient sources are cited in conventional ways, using the abbreviations noted in bold below. Seneca’s De Ira is abbreviated Ira, and appears in Seneca (1928) and (2010). Quotations are drawn from any separately listed English translations (e.g., Cicero 2002, not Cicero 1927).

Kant, Immanuel. 1996a. Practical Philosophy. Translated by Mary Gregor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 1996b. Religion and Rational Theology. Translated by Allen Wood and George di Giovanni.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2000. Critique of the Power of Judgment. Translated by Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2007. Anthropology, History, and Education. Translated by Mary Gregor, Paul Guyer, Robert Louden, Holly Wilson, Allen Wood, Günter Zöller, and Arnulf Zweig.Google Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2015. Lectures on Anthropology. Translated by Robert Clewis, Robert Louden, G. Felicitas Munzel, and Allen Wood.Google Scholar
These title abbreviations are used: Anth = Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View; KpV = Critique of Practical Reason; KU = Critique of the Power of Judgment; MS = Metaphysics of Morals; Rel = Religion within the Boundaries of Reason Alone. Google Scholar
Cicero. 1927. Tusculan Disputations. Translated by King, J. E.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [TD]Google Scholar
Cicero. 1997. The Nature of the Gods. Translated by Walsh, P. G.. Oxford: Clarendon Press. [ND]Google Scholar
Cicero. 1933. De Natura Deorum and Academica . Translated by Rackham, H.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Cicero. 2002. Cicero on the Emotions: Tusculan Disputations 3 and 4. Translated by Graver, Margaret. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [TD]Google Scholar
Diogenes Laertius. 1925. Lives of the Eminent Philosophers. Translated by Hicks, R. D.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [DL]Google Scholar
Epictetus. 1928. Discourses, Books 3–4. Translated by Oldfather, W. A.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Galen. 1981. De Placitis Hippocratis et Platonis. Translated and edited by de Lacy, Phillip. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. [PHP]Google Scholar
Horace. 1926. Satires, Epistles, The Art of Poetry. Translated by Fairclough, H. R.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 1917, 1920, and 1925. Epistulae Morales 3 vols. Translated by Gummere, Richard M.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 1928. Moral Essays. Translated by Basore, John W.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 2007. Selected Philosophical Letters. Translated by Inwood, Brad. Oxford: Clarendon Press. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 2010. Anger, Mercy, Revenge. Translated by Kaster, Robert and Nussbaum, Martha. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 2015. Letters on Ethics to Lucilius. Translated by Graver, Margaret and Long, A. A.. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 2016. Hardship and Happiness. Translated by Fantham, Elaine, Hine, Harry M., Ker, James, and Williams, Gareth. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Stobaeus, Iōannēs. 1884. Anthologium Vols. 1–2, edited by Wachsmuth, Curtius and Hense, Otto. Berlin: Weidmann. [Stob]Google Scholar
Allison, Henry. 1990. Kant’s Theory of Freedom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Annas, Julia. 1992. Hellenistic Philosophy of Mind. Berkeley: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baron, Marcia. 1995. Kantian Ethics Almost without Apology. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Borges, Maria. 2008. “Physiology and the Controlling of Affects in Kant’s Philosophy.” Kantian Review 13 (2): 46–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyle, Matthew. 2016. “Additive Theories of Rationality: A Critique.” European Journal of Philosophy 24 (3): 527–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, Tad. 2003. “Stoic Moral Psychology.” In Cambridge Companion to the Stoics, edited by Inwood, Brad, 257–94. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, Alix. 2020. “A Kantian Account of Emotions as Feelings.” Mind 129 (514): 429–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, John. 1999. “Posidonius on Emotions.” In Reason and Emotion: Essays on Ancient Moral Psychology and Ethical Theory, 449–484. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Copp, David, and Sobel, David. 2002. “Desires, Motives, and Reasons: Scanlon’s Rationalistic Moral Psychology.” Social Theory and Moral Practice 28 (2): 243–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DeWitt, Janelle. 2018. “Feeling and Inclination: Rationalizing the Animal Within.” In Kant and the Faculty of Feeling, edited by Sorensen, Kelly and Williamson, Diane, 67–87. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frede, Michael. 1986. “The Stoic Doctrine of the Affections of the Soul.” In The Norms of Nature: Studies in Hellenistic Ethics, edited by Schofield, Malcolm and Striker, Gisela, 93–110. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Frede, Michael. 2011. A Free Will: Origins of the Notion in Ancient Thought. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Frierson, Patrick. 2014. Kant’s Empirical Psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graver, Margaret. 2007. Stoicism and Emotion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Groß, Felix, ed. 1912. Immanuel Kant: sein Leben in Darstellungen von Zeitgenossen; die Biographien von L.E. Borowski, R.B. Jachmann und A. Ch. Wasianski. Berlin: Deutsche Bibliothek.Google Scholar
Inwood, Brad. 1985. Ethics and Human Action in Early Stoicism. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Inwood, Brad. (1993) 2005. “Seneca and Psychological Dualism.” In Reading Seneca: Stoic Philosophy at Rome, 23–64. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, Charlton, and Short, Charles. (1879) 1958. A Latin Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
McLear, Colin. 2020. “Animals and Objectivity.” In Kant on Animals, edited by Callanan, John and Allais, Lucy, 42–65. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. 2018. Kant on Reflection and Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. 2021. “Nature, Corruption, and Freedom: Stoic Ethics in Kant’s Religion .” European Journal of Philosophy 29 (1): 3–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. Forthcoming. “Kant and Psychological Monism: The Case of Inclination.” In Palgrave Handbook of German Idealism and Analytic Philosophy, edited by Conant, James and Held, Jonas. London: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Naragon, Steve. 2006. “Kant in the Classroom: Materials to Aid the Study of Kant’s Lectures.” Last modified June 3, 2015. https://users.manchester.edu/Facstaff/SSNaragon/Kant/Home/index.htm.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. 1997. “Kant and Stoic Cosmopolitanism.” The Journal of Political Philosophy 5 (1): 1–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schafer, Karl. 2020. “A System of Rational Faculties: Additive or Transformative?” European Journal of Philosophy 109. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejop.12612.Google Scholar
Schapiro, Tamar. 2009. “The Nature of Inclination.” Ethics 119 (2): 229–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schneewind, Jerome. 1996. “Kant and Stoic Ethics.” In Aristotle, Kant, and the Stoics, edited by Engstrom, Stephen and Whiting, Jennifer, 285–301. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Seidler, Michael. 1981. “Kant and the Stoics on the Emotional Life.” Philosophy Research Archives 7: 1109–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherman, Nancy. 1997. Making a Necessity of Virtue: Aristotle and Kant on Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherman, Nancy. 2013. “Moral Psychology and Virtue.” In The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics, edited by Roger Crisp, 744–67. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Shogry, Simon. 2019. “What Do Our Impressions Say? The Stoic Theory of Perceptual Content and Belief Formation.” Aperion 52 (1): 29–63.Google Scholar
Sorabji, Richard. 2000. Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Varden, Helga. 2020. Sex, Love, and Gender: A Kantian Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, Eric Entrican. 2016. “Habitual Desire: On Kant’s Concept of Inclination.” Kantian Review 21 (2): 211–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Allen. 1999. Kant’s Ethical Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Allen. 2011. “Kant and Agent-Oriented Ethics.” In Perfecting Virtue: New Essays on Kantian Ethics and Virtue Ethics, edited by Jost, Lawrence and Wuerth, Julian, 58–91. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wood, Allen. 2018. “Feeling and Desire in the Human Animal.” In Kant and the Faculty of Feeling, edited by Sorensen, Kelly and Williamson, Diane, 88–106. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 1996a. Practical Philosophy. Translated by Mary Gregor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 1996b. Religion and Rational Theology. Translated by Allen Wood and George di Giovanni.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2000. Critique of the Power of Judgment. Translated by Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2007. Anthropology, History, and Education. Translated by Mary Gregor, Paul Guyer, Robert Louden, Holly Wilson, Allen Wood, Günter Zöller, and Arnulf Zweig.Google Scholar
Kant, Immanuel. 2015. Lectures on Anthropology. Translated by Robert Clewis, Robert Louden, G. Felicitas Munzel, and Allen Wood.Google Scholar
These title abbreviations are used: Anth = Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View; KpV = Critique of Practical Reason; KU = Critique of the Power of Judgment; MS = Metaphysics of Morals; Rel = Religion within the Boundaries of Reason Alone. Google Scholar
Cicero. 1927. Tusculan Disputations. Translated by King, J. E.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [TD]Google Scholar
Cicero. 1997. The Nature of the Gods. Translated by Walsh, P. G.. Oxford: Clarendon Press. [ND]Google Scholar
Cicero. 1933. De Natura Deorum and Academica . Translated by Rackham, H.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Cicero. 2002. Cicero on the Emotions: Tusculan Disputations 3 and 4. Translated by Graver, Margaret. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. [TD]Google Scholar
Diogenes Laertius. 1925. Lives of the Eminent Philosophers. Translated by Hicks, R. D.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [DL]Google Scholar
Epictetus. 1928. Discourses, Books 3–4. Translated by Oldfather, W. A.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Galen. 1981. De Placitis Hippocratis et Platonis. Translated and edited by de Lacy, Phillip. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. [PHP]Google Scholar
Horace. 1926. Satires, Epistles, The Art of Poetry. Translated by Fairclough, H. R.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 1917, 1920, and 1925. Epistulae Morales 3 vols. Translated by Gummere, Richard M.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 1928. Moral Essays. Translated by Basore, John W.. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 2007. Selected Philosophical Letters. Translated by Inwood, Brad. Oxford: Clarendon Press. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 2010. Anger, Mercy, Revenge. Translated by Kaster, Robert and Nussbaum, Martha. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Seneca. 2015. Letters on Ethics to Lucilius. Translated by Graver, Margaret and Long, A. A.. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. [Ep]Google Scholar
Seneca. 2016. Hardship and Happiness. Translated by Fantham, Elaine, Hine, Harry M., Ker, James, and Williams, Gareth. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Stobaeus, Iōannēs. 1884. Anthologium Vols. 1–2, edited by Wachsmuth, Curtius and Hense, Otto. Berlin: Weidmann. [Stob]Google Scholar
Allison, Henry. 1990. Kant’s Theory of Freedom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Annas, Julia. 1992. Hellenistic Philosophy of Mind. Berkeley: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baron, Marcia. 1995. Kantian Ethics Almost without Apology. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Borges, Maria. 2008. “Physiology and the Controlling of Affects in Kant’s Philosophy.” Kantian Review 13 (2): 46–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyle, Matthew. 2016. “Additive Theories of Rationality: A Critique.” European Journal of Philosophy 24 (3): 527–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, Tad. 2003. “Stoic Moral Psychology.” In Cambridge Companion to the Stoics, edited by Inwood, Brad, 257–94. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cohen, Alix. 2020. “A Kantian Account of Emotions as Feelings.” Mind 129 (514): 429–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, John. 1999. “Posidonius on Emotions.” In Reason and Emotion: Essays on Ancient Moral Psychology and Ethical Theory, 449–484. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Copp, David, and Sobel, David. 2002. “Desires, Motives, and Reasons: Scanlon’s Rationalistic Moral Psychology.” Social Theory and Moral Practice 28 (2): 243–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DeWitt, Janelle. 2018. “Feeling and Inclination: Rationalizing the Animal Within.” In Kant and the Faculty of Feeling, edited by Sorensen, Kelly and Williamson, Diane, 67–87. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frede, Michael. 1986. “The Stoic Doctrine of the Affections of the Soul.” In The Norms of Nature: Studies in Hellenistic Ethics, edited by Schofield, Malcolm and Striker, Gisela, 93–110. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Frede, Michael. 2011. A Free Will: Origins of the Notion in Ancient Thought. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Frierson, Patrick. 2014. Kant’s Empirical Psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graver, Margaret. 2007. Stoicism and Emotion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Groß, Felix, ed. 1912. Immanuel Kant: sein Leben in Darstellungen von Zeitgenossen; die Biographien von L.E. Borowski, R.B. Jachmann und A. Ch. Wasianski. Berlin: Deutsche Bibliothek.Google Scholar
Inwood, Brad. 1985. Ethics and Human Action in Early Stoicism. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Inwood, Brad. (1993) 2005. “Seneca and Psychological Dualism.” In Reading Seneca: Stoic Philosophy at Rome, 23–64. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, Charlton, and Short, Charles. (1879) 1958. A Latin Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
McLear, Colin. 2020. “Animals and Objectivity.” In Kant on Animals, edited by Callanan, John and Allais, Lucy, 42–65. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. 2018. Kant on Reflection and Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. 2021. “Nature, Corruption, and Freedom: Stoic Ethics in Kant’s Religion .” European Journal of Philosophy 29 (1): 3–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merritt, Melissa. Forthcoming. “Kant and Psychological Monism: The Case of Inclination.” In Palgrave Handbook of German Idealism and Analytic Philosophy, edited by Conant, James and Held, Jonas. London: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Naragon, Steve. 2006. “Kant in the Classroom: Materials to Aid the Study of Kant’s Lectures.” Last modified June 3, 2015. https://users.manchester.edu/Facstaff/SSNaragon/Kant/Home/index.htm.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. 1997. “Kant and Stoic Cosmopolitanism.” The Journal of Political Philosophy 5 (1): 1–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schafer, Karl. 2020. “A System of Rational Faculties: Additive or Transformative?” European Journal of Philosophy 109. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejop.12612.Google Scholar
Schapiro, Tamar. 2009. “The Nature of Inclination.” Ethics 119 (2): 229–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schneewind, Jerome. 1996. “Kant and Stoic Ethics.” In Aristotle, Kant, and the Stoics, edited by Engstrom, Stephen and Whiting, Jennifer, 285–301. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Seidler, Michael. 1981. “Kant and the Stoics on the Emotional Life.” Philosophy Research Archives 7: 1109–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherman, Nancy. 1997. Making a Necessity of Virtue: Aristotle and Kant on Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherman, Nancy. 2013. “Moral Psychology and Virtue.” In The Oxford Handbook of the History of Ethics, edited by Roger Crisp, 744–67. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Shogry, Simon. 2019. “What Do Our Impressions Say? The Stoic Theory of Perceptual Content and Belief Formation.” Aperion 52 (1): 29–63.Google Scholar
Sorabji, Richard. 2000. Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Varden, Helga. 2020. Sex, Love, and Gender: A Kantian Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, Eric Entrican. 2016. “Habitual Desire: On Kant’s Concept of Inclination.” Kantian Review 21 (2): 211–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Allen. 1999. Kant’s Ethical Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wood, Allen. 2011. “Kant and Agent-Oriented Ethics.” In Perfecting Virtue: New Essays on Kantian Ethics and Virtue Ethics, edited by Jost, Lawrence and Wuerth, Julian, 58–91. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wood, Allen. 2018. “Feeling and Desire in the Human Animal.” In Kant and the Faculty of Feeling, edited by Sorensen, Kelly and Williamson, Diane, 88–106. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar