Happiness, Competition, and Not Necessarily Arrogance in Kant

Abstract

Abstract Kant held that human beings are competitive and not very good at living together in harmony. He also held that the principle of one’s own happiness is the central opponent of the principle of morality. According to Allen Wood, these claims are related: the competitive tendencies Kant attributes to human nature reveal, according to Wood, that the very shape of our human idea of happiness is derived from a deep-seated arrogance, incompatible with morality. I argue, by contrast, that although Kant’s discussion of human nature reveals that human happiness is complicated by interpersonal comparisons and tensions, these are not immoral (or derived from immorality) and require no claims of innate human arrogance for their explanation. Consequently, these aspects of human nature are not themselves the reason that Kant considers our desire for happiness to be in conflict with our morality.