On Fri, 9 Jul 1999, Yoshie Furuhashi wrote: > *Pain* is the one feeling that confirms morality for Kant; other feelings, > especially pleasures, negate it. Though Kant also has a subterranean utopian side, e.g. the theme of Glueckseligkeit (bliss) in Critique of Practical Reason, which keeps sneaking back in (kind of like the servants in Shakespeare's plays) no matter how many times he tries to write it out. Still, one shouldn't forget that the substance of Kant's argument -- that Reason ought to be reasonable, that it ought to be prepared to defend its logic before a collective jury -- contains a powerfully progressive element, i.e. the notion of equality before the law, that we're all potential lawmakers and not merely obedient subjects. -- Dennis
