Johann August Heinrich Ulrich, Eleutheriology or On Freedom and Necessity, Jena, 1788

Summary

In his Eleutheriology or On Freedom and Necessity (1788), Ulrich is concerned with the prospect of the concept of transcendental freedom carving out conceptual space between necessity and chance. He notes the ingenuity of Kant’s restriction of natural necessity to appearances and his attempt to locate freedom in a sphere independent of temporal conditions. However, the denial of natural necessity to things in themselves does not entail that the intelligible character is not necessarily determined in a way independent of temporal conditions. Ulrich presses this issue with respect to those instances in which pure reason does not effectively determine the will, i.e. with respect to immoral action. He asserts that there either is a ground sufficient for the exercise or omission of reason’s efficacy, or not. If there is such a ground, then reason is necessarily determined and Kant is ultimately a determinist even with respect to the intelligible character. If there is not, then whether we act morally or immorally is the result of chance, which is irrational.