The Kantian Duty to Oneself as Self-Judge and Its Importance

Kant discusses conscience when addressing one’s duty to oneself as self-judge. Most likely, this duty is the duty to cultivate conscience. For him, conscience is the condition of all duties, and duties to oneself are a condition of all duties. This might be taken to suggest that the duty to oneself as self-judge is a primary duty that can be a condition of all duties. However, Kant also suggests that cultivating conscience can be seen as an indirect duty. This has been taken to imply that cultivating conscience can have only instrumental value – that it cannot be a direct duty to the self, but merely a means to discharging duties to others. I wish to highlight the importance of this duty by arguing that we need not presuppose that cultivating conscience is either a duty to oneself or an instrument for fulfilling other duties. In my view, the duty to cultivate conscience is morally relevant in its own right and an instrument that is constitutive of our moral self-improvement. This is where the importance of the Kantian duty to oneself as self-judge lies.