Kant's Moral Platonism: An Analysis

others’ actions upon us or our interests, but because as a result of the process of speculative evaluation we conclude that a wrongful act remains unethical no matter who does it or what is the consequence; it is unethical on its face. However, the problem remains as to whether an unrelated thirty party’s action is immoral. Even though we can employ the speculative evaluation process we initially employed repeatedly, ultimately we face an infinite regress. To avoid this regress we must conclude that all stealing of grain by any and all agents is wrong. However, we cannot explain this charge of wrongness any further and are once again reliant on Kant’s Prize Essay explanation that we know the good as a result of a psychological feeling.

Even though these two approaches may have appeal, they possess problems. The first approach leads to a harsh conclusion on whether certain acts are right or wrong based on aggregate results.

The first trend is well known as the moral Platonism which is implied in the transcendental dialectic, and then implicated in the canon of pure reason. The second trend typically known as ‘formalism,’(the foundation of his transcendental philosophy) is an ethic relying on the notion of a law. Since Kant’s moral Platonism is indirectly opposed to formalism, by considering formalism more closely we can better analyze Kant’s tendency toward this trend.

Initially, Kant compares formalism with science. In this analogy found repeatedly in both the Second Critique and Groundwork Kant points to both moral law and scientific law. Moral law as a law of obligation prescribes how we ought to act and is both necessary and universally valid; it commands our behavior categorically. Scientific law, on other hand, explains phenomena and is also necessary and universally valid, at least with regard to the phenomena it