Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

The Force of an IdeaIn-Between Psychology and Moral Philosophy: Christian Wolff’s Principle of Natural Obligation

The Force of an Idea: In-Between Psychology and Moral Philosophy: Christian Wolff’s Principle of... [In this article, I survey the relation between Wolff’s conceptions of empirical psychology and obligation. He tries to distinguish his positions from the voluntaristic concept of obligation defended by Pufendorf and Thomasius, both of whom based obligation of the natural law on god’s will. This leads Wolff to derive obligations from the nature of the human soul. He himself thinks this to be adequate and without alternative; therefore, he claims that empirical psychology provides the foundation of moral philosophy. In doing so, Wolff links the identification of the psychological motive of the will with the natural obligation, a claim which turns out to be his weak point. Furthermore, Wolff’s ideas are related to his controversy with Hallensian pietists. I will broach the issue of this controversy using the example of the problem of indifference. On the other hand, Wolff makes a substantial contribution to an autonomous understanding of morality through his theory of moral obligation.] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

The Force of an IdeaIn-Between Psychology and Moral Philosophy: Christian Wolff’s Principle of Natural Obligation

Part of the Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Book Series (volume 50)
Editors: Araujo, Saulo de Freitas; Pereira, Thiago Constâncio Ribeiro; Sturm, Thomas
Hüning, Dieter
The Force of an Idea — Jul 17, 2021
Download PDF
20 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/springer-journals/the-force-of-an-idea-in-between-psychology-and-moral-philosophy-mTnOKrmAgh

References (24)

Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Copyright
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
ISBN
978-3-030-74434-2
Pages
153 –173
DOI
10.1007/978-3-030-74435-9_10
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[In this article, I survey the relation between Wolff’s conceptions of empirical psychology and obligation. He tries to distinguish his positions from the voluntaristic concept of obligation defended by Pufendorf and Thomasius, both of whom based obligation of the natural law on god’s will. This leads Wolff to derive obligations from the nature of the human soul. He himself thinks this to be adequate and without alternative; therefore, he claims that empirical psychology provides the foundation of moral philosophy. In doing so, Wolff links the identification of the psychological motive of the will with the natural obligation, a claim which turns out to be his weak point. Furthermore, Wolff’s ideas are related to his controversy with Hallensian pietists. I will broach the issue of this controversy using the example of the problem of indifference. On the other hand, Wolff makes a substantial contribution to an autonomous understanding of morality through his theory of moral obligation.]

Published: Jul 17, 2021

Keywords: Christian Wolff; Samuel Pufendorf; Natural obligation; Psychology; Moral philosophy; History of philosophy

There are no references for this article.