ON THE CONCEPT OF OBLIGATION AND THE DIVIDED SELF IN KANT'S ETHICS (MORALITY, PHENOMENON, METAPHYSICS, SARTRE, NOUMENON)

The aim of this dissertation is to demonstrate that the very conditions which Kant argues constitute the obligation of each individual to will the actualization of the universal moral law in the world and in one's own personality lead to the overall ruin of the Kantian practical reason. To this end we investigate (a) that feature of persons--the divided self--which gives rise to moral obligation, and (b) the postulates, which allegedly make the fulfillment of obligation possible. One of the central problems in Kant's critical ethics is how to account for moral obligation in terms of a self divided into noumenal and phenomenal aspects. This problem leads to a crisis when moral consciousness comes to understand the irreconcilable gulf which lies between its atemporal self and its empirical temporal self. Thus our thesis is that Kant, having established autonomy of the will on the ground of a transcendent self, fails, despite the introduction of the moral postulates, to explain the ultimate harmony of the noumenal and phenomenal aspects of the self. Kant attempts to preserve the autonomy of Willkur by placing its possibility in an order not subject to the "mechanism of nature." But while thus preserving the integrity of freedom, Kant makes it difficult to explain the manner in which an atemporal decision can establish virtue in the temporal personality. This dissertation examines the Kantian cirtique of heteronomous will and his alternative theory of autonomous will by focusing on the differences between the ethics of Kant and Hume. We then analyze in detail the problem of explaining moral obligation on the basis of a divided self. Here we criticize the Hegelian interpretation of moral consciousness with the aim of articulating the central antithesis within the divided self. This dissertation, in conclusion, indicates a path away from, but always in dialogue with, Kant's practical reason. We finally reject the atemporal (noumenal) self and the abstract universal (kingdom of ends) and raise questions about any future metaphysics of morals.