Is “Good Enough” Good Enough?—Bringing Freud to Kant Without Anachronism

Abstract

Abstract Attempts have been made to naturalize Kant’s account of the rational will and good willing by way of Freud’s account of the superego. This paper argues that such efforts ignore the infantile legacy of the superego, although its origin story is nonetheless congenial to Kant’s larger moral project. Some more speculative points of contact between Freud and Kant are then explored.