Kant Freedom Of Will

9 Pages 2143 Words

antian philosophy is normative and not descriptive in order to lend clarity to the thesis.
Initially, the definition of free will mandates the absence of coercion. Freedom from a definitional standpoint requires an action to be completely free. While agents may subject themselves to natural, moral or political legislation, the agent must not be subjected to any particular law in order to make a truly free decision. Kant argues that in subjecting oneself to law, agents voluntarily limit their own freedom but freely chooses the limitation. This is asserted by the Kantian ethic and is by no means explicated in his writings. In fact, he surmises not only that this occurs but also that it is legitimate. However, a deeper analysis reveals the more complex equation. A moral agent is incapable of limiting their own liberty or freedom (for the time being the terms are equivocal) to law or another agent. J.S. Mill posits this in his theoretical application of the Harm Principle. Of course, it is somewhat pedestrian to refute Kant with Mill but in this particular situation!
Kant presumes a voluntarily infringement of freedom that can not be rationalized within his writings. The underpinnings of Mill’s analysis need not be overstated here for “brevity’s” sake. In short, Mill claims that no moral agent can sell him or herself into slavery or likewise end their own life because in doing so, the agent destroys the conceptual basis of liberty or freedom. Ultimately, freedom as a prepolitical claim that is inherent to all individuals can not be bartered away. In addition, even Locke claims that limiting one’s own natural rights is immoral because an agent can only transfer that which he owns and the ownership of his natural rights belongs to God. To allow freedom to be limited in this way would violate two tenets of the Kantian ethic. Fir...