Justification of Morality as a Problem of the Kantian Ethics

Abstract

This article deals with the problem of morality in the ethical system of Kant and historical transformation of his ethical ideas. At the first stage, we show the prerequisites of the problem. At the second stage, we explore the place of this problem in Kant’s ethical system and the method of solving it. Kant’s assertion of religious postulates is thought of as a specific way of justifying morality. At the third stage, we propose a reconstruction of the historical fate of the doctrine of postulates, in particular, its refraction in the thought of Nietzsche and Dostoevsky. The analysis allows to establish the significance of religious postulates as a necessary part of Kant’s ethical system that protects morality from devaluation; and to reconstruct the logic of the transition from Kant’s ethical system to the ideas of Nietzsche and Dostoevsky. Kantian religious postulates, on the one hand, ensure the unity and integrity of moral experience, but, on the other hand, they contradict to the logic of the modern thinking. The transition from Kant’s ethical absolutism to the radical doubt in morality in the thought of Dostoevsky and Nietzsche seem to have been inevitable. The author concludes that the solution of problem of the justification of morality cannot be found within the framework of the modern philosophical thought.