Парадоксы моральной свободы

Этическая мысль. 2015. Т. 15. С. 5–26.

Kocherov S.

The question of the moral freedom is considered to be one of the most difficult ethical issues. On the one hand, freedom is regarded as the basis of the morality, being a condition of a choice between the must and the existing, the good and the evil. On the other hand, freedom means making a moral decision that, albeit being arbitrary, is aimed essentially at doing good deeds and assisting others in their well-being. A significant contribution to clarifying the debate was made by Immanuel Kant, who pointed out the difference between freedom as a condition and as a supreme manifestation of the morality. In this regard Kant introduced the concept of the moral freedom as such state and development level of a moral subject that may be defined as moral autonomy, moral lawmaking and moral sovereignty of a personality. The article examines the history of this concept, forms of its manifestation and its basic contradictions; it discusses the historical circumstances of the emergence of a morally free personality and formulates the paradoxes that are connected with exercising moral freedom. Finding solution to these paradoxes is important both to theory and to practice. The article concludes that moral freedom, if viewed as ability for moral lawmaking, characterizes the degree to which one acquires their moral “nature”.

Keywords: свобода воли, free will, автономия личности, moral freedom, moral sovereignty, autonomy of the personality, moral lawmaking, моральная свобода, нравственный суверенитет, моральное законодательство