Kant’s categorical imperative is refuted by historical particularity

Evidence

The moral principle that each of my actions should be able to stand as a general maxim is very dubious. It overlooks the lesson of history. Why should my own disinclination to become a doctor be equated with the assumption that there should be no doctors? — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 234

Categorization

• DEFINE: A direct challenge to Kantian universalizability, a cornerstone of Enlightenment moral philosophy the book dismantles.
• DEEPTHINKING: Adorno attacks Kant’s categorical imperative — the very principle critics of his essayism level at him — with a specific historical counterexample; dense and easily misread.
• XREF: connects to: Kant absolutized historical contradictions into nature, thereby affirming the status quo — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 215; Kant’s critical idealism planted seeds for later ideology theory without historicizing knowledge; Historical materialism is fundamentally historicist, not metaphysical (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Kant absolutized historical contradictions into nature, thereby affirming the status quo #expands (0.85) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 215
• Kant’s critical idealism planted seeds for later ideology theory without historicizing knowledge #complicates (0.73)
• Sohn-Rethel sought to derive Kantian categories from the exchange-relation #complicates (0.72) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 326
• Contingency of historical conjunctures is a precondition for political possibility #expands (0.72)
• Historical materialism is fundamentally historicist, not metaphysical #corroborates (0.70)