To put it mildly, Kant is confusing. I’m not sure if it is the language barrier since the original was written in German, or if it is such a complex topic that I am getting lost. I watched several youtube videos in addition to the readings to help my understanding (which I have linked below). That being said, I am understanding the basic arguments that Kant is trying to make. The main point of the argument is that “a free will and a will under moral laws are one and the same” (AK 4:447). Kant says this because, to have free will, the will cannot be governed by a law of nature. For instance, if humans only did actions following what they desired, then that would not be free will. A truly free will comes from within and is not impacted by external factors.
Kant also considers the cause behind actions and how that relates to free will. To be rational beings, humans must be able to rationalize why they do certain things. Reason causes people to act without external factors. If a person sees themselves as free and their choices as their own, then they have free will (AK 4:448). A free-will must be governed under some rationale or reason. This rationale is a moral law. This means that if the choices decided by a human being made with free will, then they must also be made with moral law being considered. Since moral law is considered when making choices, just as free will is, then they are the same.
Motivation plays a key role in Kant’s work, especially in Section I, and he discusses again in section III how motivation plays into morality. Kant is interested in why humans are interested in choosing moral action. The correlation between free will and moral law has been established, but it does not explain why humans follow a moral law or do the right thing in a given circumstance (AK 4:450).
Normally, I would reserve my last paragraph for analyzing the text as a whole and interpreting what it means to me. Honestly, I cannot in good conscience do that this week. Everything about this reading confused me from beginning to end, I do not feel like I truly understood it. I do not think I have ever read a text so much and understood so little of it. Videos and other sources helped with understanding what Kant believes in general, but the text is still somewhat of a mystery for me. I hope I will be able to look back on this piece and understand it, but for now, I am still a little lost.
Kant, Immanuel. Kant: Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. Translated by Mary J Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1998.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1GNJ8hq5R8
