Quotessence
Home / Authors / Allen W. Wood
Allen W. Wood

Allen W. Wood Quotes

Professor

Filter quotes by topic

AllThinkingMoralIfsHumansWayReasonFormTheoryPhilosophyRationalCapitalismPeopleActionDoeFactsHumanityPhilosopherProblemEndsSelf

Famous Allen W. Wood Quotes

“Kantian ethical theory distinguishes three levels: First, that of a fundamental principle (the categorical imperative, formulated in three main ways in Kant's Groundwork); second, a set of duties, not deduced from but derived from this principle, by way of its interpretation or specification, its application to the general conditions of human life - which Kant does in the Doctrine of virtue, the second main part of the Metaphysics of Morals; and then finally an act of judgment, through which these duties are applied to particular cases.”

WayFirstsHumansDoeThreeLevelsMoralPrinciplesCasesVirtueConditionsParticularDutyTheoryJudgmentFundamentalsDoctrineHuman LifeInterpretationEthicalApplicationMetaphysicsImperativesFundamental PrinciplesGroundworkSpecificationsCategorical Imperative
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image

“Kant's description of most ethical duties reads more like a description of moral virtues and vices. Once we see this, we see that Kantian ethics is indeed a kind of virtue ethics, and that it does not "divide the heart from the head" (to anticipate one of your later questions) but instead recognizes the deep truth that reason and emotion are not opposites.”

HeartKindDoeReasonEmotionMoralVirtueDutyEthicsOppositesVicesDescriptionEthicalDividesAnticipateMoral VirtuesReason And Emotion
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image

“Kant does not think there is anything wrong with being beneficent from sympathy. He thinks we have a duty to cultivate sympathetic feelings by participating in the situations of others and acquiring an understanding of them. He thinks we also have a duty to make ourselves into the kind of person for whom the recognition that something is our duty would be a sufficient incentive to do it (if no other incentives were available to us). That's what he means by "the duty to act from the motive of duty".”

IfsThinkingKindMeanPersonsDoeFeelingsWould BeUnderstandingSituationDutyAvailableRecognitionSufficientMotiveIncentivesSympatheticParticipating
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image

“Kant does not think that along with choice of an action we also choose in each case the motive from which we do it. He thinks all is well if I act beneficently, realizing that it is my duty but also having sympathetic feelings for the person I help. But I ought to strive to be the sort of person who would still help even if these feelings were absent. And it is such a case that he presents when the sympathetic friend of humanity finds his sympathetic feelings overclouded by his own sorrows, and still acts beneficently from duty.”

IfsThinkingWellsPersonsDoeStillsHelpingFeelingsActionHumanityChoicesRealizingCasesDutyOughtSorrowStriveMotiveAbsentSympathetic
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image

“I think if there were to be a solution to the problem of free will, it would have to be a compatibilist one. Unfortunately, from that it does not follow that there is such a solution. Many philosophers find this an unwelcome message, and as often happens in philosophy, they punish the messenger by ascribing to him an entirely imaginary but untenable position.”

IfsThinkingDoePhilosophyProblemHappensPositionMessagesSolutionsPhilosopherFree WillImaginaryMessengersUnwelcome
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image

“It is actually a nice question how far Descartes himself endorses the monological and metaphysically dualistic theory of mind associated with his name and his legacy in early modern philosophy. But Fichte does reject this tradition, by suggesting that an immaterial thinking substance is an incoherent notion, and a rational being whose rationality was not developed through communication with others is a transcendental impossibility.”

ThinkingMindDoePhilosophyNamesNiceModernTheoryCommunicationTraditionNotionRationalLegacySubstanceRejectsRationalityImpossibilitySuggestingTranscendentalModern Philosophy
Author:Allen W. Wood
Create image