CLAS 2109 The Self and Society

Reading Worksheet 4 – Kwame Anthony Appiah, “Autonomy and Its Critics”

Why does the character Stepan Arkadyich (in Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina) attract the concern and criticism of those whom Appiah calls “strong autonomists”?

According to Appiah, what is one of the arguments (in your own words) made by those who claim that the value of autonomy is at odds with that of diversity?

Why does Appiah assert that “we are all Stepan” (48-49)? What point is Appiah making here?

What does Appiah mean, in his discussion of Kant’s ‘two standpoints,’ where he says that “[w]e have to act as if freedom is possible even though we can’t provide any theoretical justification for it” (56)?

Why does Appiah suggest that “the noncoherence of our different theoretical practices” may be a good thing (60)? What does he mean?