Is autonomy sufficient for freedom

Alderwick, Charlotte

Abstract

In this chapter I show that the Kantian notion of autonomy, understood as rational self-determination, collapses when it is taken up in a system which posits nature as rationally structured, such as those we find in the early post-Kantian idealists . This notion of autonomy, within the Kantian system, is a key element of human freedom: rational agents are free in that their determination originates in reason (autonomy). This ability of agents to self-determine is unique, on Kant’s account, as natural causality is heteronomous; beings in sensible nature are determined externally rather than internally by the self-imposed moral law. The early post-Kantians took this conception of freedom as autonomy seriously, and it forms the basis for their conceptions of human freedom. However, the dualism between freedom and nature was not preserved in these post-Kantian systems. The dualisms in Kant’s philosophy were seen as deeply problematic, for reasons that are well-known : the divide characteristic of transcendental idealism between the natural world and the intelligible world also entails a divide between the normative and the natural; the rational and the natural; and renders problematic the ability of agents to act freely within the world of nature.

• Online Publication Date: May 18, 2023
• Publication Date: May 18, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jan 20, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: May 19, 2025
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Book Title: Freedom After Kant
• Chapter Number: 6
• ISBN: 9781350187757
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/7978362
• Publisher URL: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/freedom-after-kant-9781350187757/
• Related Public URLs: https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/product/Freedom-After-Kant-by-Joe-Saunders-editor/9781350187757
• Contract Date: Oct 1, 2021