Beauvoir rejected Kantian ethics for presupposing a closed voluntarist circularity
Evidence
Beauvoir objects to Kant’s formulation of moral obligation— in particular, to Kant’s assumption of the existence of separate determined beings and completely determining obligations. Kant presupposes a determined being (complete and identical to itself) who has no reason to obey any ethical having-to-be. In that context, what would it mean, she asks, for a determined being to determine itself? Only one faculty, under Kant’s formulation— namely, willpower— would be capable of justifying consciousness’s passage from being to having to be. Indeed, willpower would be both the condition according to which the problem of being and obligation is stated, and the way that it is resolved (through the construction of bridges between the One and the Other). Th at is what defi nes, for her, the circle of voluntarism! — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 428
Categorization
- DEFINE: Explains the technical objection Beauvoir mounts to Kant: voluntarism defines the being/obligation problem with willpower and resolves it with willpower.
- SEED: An essay comparing Beauvoir’s anti-voluntarism with the contemporary ‘moral luck’ debate (Williams/Nagel) would find rich resonances.
- XREF: connects to: Kantian disinterested aesthetic pleasure descends from magical fetish worship — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Reflections from…, 250; Sartre’s invented-value ethics lacks the general evaluative power of Kantian universalization — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 188; Sartre rejected both deontological and consequentialist ethics as too indeterminate — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre: The Riddle of…, 213 (+5 more)
Broader Connections
- Beauvoir rejected Kantian respect as an inadequate moral guide
#corroborates(0.90) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 479 - Beauvoir rejects both Kantian duty and Marxist necessity as decision grounds
#corroborates(0.85) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 480 - Grounded, engaged generosity outranks abstract Kantian virtue.
#corroborates(0.80)