Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher of the Enlightenment and one of the defining figures in the history of Western philosophy. Born in Königsberg in 1724, Kant spent his life as a scholar and teacher, producing major works in metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, religion, and the philosophy of science. His critical philosophy transformed modern thought by asking how human reason structures knowledge, moral obligation, and judgement. His most influential works include Critique of Pure Reason, Critique of Practical Reason, Critique of Judgment, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, and Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason.Kant's moral philosophy is especially associated with duty, autonomy, rational agency, universal law, and the categorical imperative. In Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, he argues that morality cannot rest merely on desire, happiness, authority, or consequence, but must be grounded in reason itself. The work remains one of the most studied texts in ethics and modern philosophy, central to discussions of deontology, human dignity, moral law, freedom, and the obligations rational beings owe to one another.