Pure practical reason

Pure practical reason is reasoning that deals with what ought to be; namely, what actions we ought to do, appearing in <a href="/facts/Immanuel_Kant/vIxjdy6I">Immanuel Kant</a>'s <a href="/facts/Critique_of_Practical_Reason/oqWqgN9j">Critique of Practical Reason</a> and <a href="/facts/Groundwork_of_the_Metaphysics_of_Morals/kzAB0mLM">Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals</a>.
Being the opposite of impure (or sensibly-determined) practical reason, it is the reason that drives actions without any sense-dependent incentives. Human reasoning chooses such actions simply because those actions are good in themselves; this is the nature of <a href="/facts/Good_faith/oSeufTYc">good will</a>, which Kant argues is the only concept that is good without any justification, it is good in itself and is a derivative of a transcendental law which affects the way humans practically reason (see <a href="/facts/Practical_philosophy/hY8JtmY6">practical philosophy</a>). The possibility of pure practical reason is explored in the <a href="/facts/Critique_of_Practical_Reason/oqWqgN9j">Critique of Practical Reason</a> where he tackles the question of whether reason by itself, independently of empirical conditions, can be a source of knowledge about what we ought to do, or whether the knowledge about what we ought to do that is given by reason can only be empirically conditioned.

<ul><li>Immanuel Kant, Kritik der praktischen Vernunft, Stuttgart 1961, "Vorrede".</li>
<li>Immanuel Kant, Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2004, p. 106.</li></ul>

Pure practical reason open-in-new

Pure practical reason