This Element explains Kant's distinction between rational sympathy and natural sympathy. Rational sympathy is regulated by practical reason and is necessary for adopting as our own those ends of others which are contingent from the perspective of practical rationality. Natural sympathy is passive and can prompt affect and dispose us to act wrongly. Sympathy is a function of a posteriori productive imagination. In rational sympathy, we freely use the imagination to step into others' first-person perspectives and associate imagined intuitional contents with the concepts others use to communicate their feelings. This prompts feelings in us that are like their feelings.

Contrary to what Kant scholars might think, Kant has a theory of rational sympathy which is essential to his ethics.

Book Information
ISBN 9781009371179
Author Benjamin Vilhauer
Format Paperback
Page Count 74
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press