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Full-Text Articles in Philosophy
Hawthorne’S Human Nature And Sin: Criticisms Of Puritanism And Progressivism, Oscar Martinez
Hawthorne’S Human Nature And Sin: Criticisms Of Puritanism And Progressivism, Oscar Martinez
Theses and Dissertations
One of America’s greatest authors, Nathaniel Hawthorne lived in a time of rapid scientific, material, and intellectual advancement. However, unlike many of his peers who went all-in on utopian reform movements, Hawthorne took a cautious and reserved approach to progress even though he supported the idea abstractly. Using six tales written acrossHawthorne’s career, this work will examine what each has to say about Hawthorne’s belief in human nature and why he takes such a skeptical position against movements aiming to fundamentally reshape people and society. The tales from the 1830s, “The Gentle Boy,” “Young Goodman Brown,” and “The Minister’s Black …
Beyond Depraved: Villainy And Self-Deception In Kant's Taxonomy Of Evil, Kevin Alexander Korczyk
Beyond Depraved: Villainy And Self-Deception In Kant's Taxonomy Of Evil, Kevin Alexander Korczyk
Theses and Dissertations
Kant’s account of evil has often been criticized for being overly restrictive in that it seems unable to account for profoundly immoral acts such as those committed by the Nazis. In response, most defenders of Kant have attempted to gerrymander his original categories of evil such that they become expansive enough to account for these cases. In this paper, I argue that such defenses fail because they rule out the possibility of immoral acts committed intentionally and in full knowledge of their immorality. However, I also show that there is room in Kant’s ethics for an additional category of evil …
Kant On Radical Evil, Kyoung Min Cho
Kant On Radical Evil, Kyoung Min Cho
Theses and Dissertations
The purpose of this thesis is to propose an interpretation of Kant’s claim that the human being’s evil nature is the effect of the free power of choice. I suggest that if his concept of free choice is properly understood, Kant’s claim should be interpreted as follows: the human being’s radical evil is the effect of a failure to use freely the power of choice that determines its fundamental disposition, a failure that is to be presupposed as universal for all human agents. According to this reading, we are evil by nature since evil lies in our fundamental disposition. Still, …