Autonomous
Independence or freedom, arriving at moral judgement through reason.
Absolute
Fixed truth applies to all situations
Autonomous individual
A person who is free to choose.
A priori
Can be known without human experience.
a posteriori knowledge
Knowledge gained after experience
Copernican Revolution
The dramatic change, initiated by copernicus, that occurred when we learned that Earth is a planet orbiting the Sun rather than the center of the universe and the solar system revolves around the sun
Duty
A motive for acting in a certain way
Deontology
A moral system based on duty. What is moral is what you have a duty to do.
Prescriptive
A statement makes a rule about how people should behave
Descriptive
Simply stating how things are
Empiricism
The idea that knowledge can only be gained by analysing sensory experiences of the material world.
Moral law
In Kantian ethics a rule for how you should act, based on a maxim.
Categorical Imperative
Something human being are duty-bound to do, whatever the circumstances.
Goodwill
Making a moral choice expresses goodwill
Kingdom of Ends
A world in which people do not treat others as means but only as ends
Non-Empirical
Knowledge not gained through senses, but by logical reason alone
Maxim
A moral principle, subjective in the origin, which demands practical application.
Relativism
The theory that there are no universal truths; truth is relative to the subject and can vary from person to person and society to society.
Reason
The capacity for consciously making sense of things, applying logic
Summum bonum
The highest good, which is only achievable in the moral community.
Teleology
Designed for or directed towards a final end.
Transcendent Idealism
Kant's theory that humans construct knowledge by imposing universal concepts onto sensory experiences.
Universalisability
The principle that moral values are universal and therefore universally applicable.
Meta
The area o