  The same would hold for all other properties of thinking beings. Since Kant also sometimes viewed immortality, i.e., personal continuity beyond death, as a foundation of morality, morality could also be at risk. So Kant had powerful motives to maintain that one does not know oneself as one is. Yet, according to him, we seem to know at least some things about ourselves, namely, how we must function, and it would be implausible to maintain that one never conscious of one’s real self at all. Kant’s response to these pressures is ingenious.