One of my great difficulties with Kant's moral philosophy is that it suggests that our moral obligations leave us helpless when dealing with evil. “Kant's theory sets a high ideal of conduct and tells us to live up to that ideal regardless of what other persons are doing.” Imagine you are a character in a Shakespearean play and are watching your father getting murdered. He is the King and you aspire that one day you will take his place (Even though you know it won’t happen, because you’re a woman). Your brother takes the initiate to kill him and take his place. I’m sure you would not be thinking oh, it’s fine that he killed your father because being king is a great thing and it doesn’t matter how or why he got there. Most likely you’d be thinking to yourself: How can he become king by murdering my father? This is horrible and unjust. He does not have the entitlement to be king. Even though the people will accept him as king, but know the way he acquired this position was through murder. And they would pretend to like him, but out of fear or resentment, depending, perhaps, if the previous king was good or bad. If your brother had waited to become king, rather than murdering his own father to become king, then the means that he used to get to the end would’ve been better and the people would most likely have accepted him. Emmanuel Kant states: "Act so as to treat people always as ends in themselves, never as mere means." The idea here is that everyone is essentially valuable. We should treat people as having a value all their own rather than merely as useful tools by means of which we can satisfy our own goals or purposes. Other people are valuable not merely insofar as they can serve our purposes; they are also valuable in t... ... middle of paper ... ...her. We may in Kant's view justifiably risk or sacrifice our lives for others. For in doing so we follow our own maxim and nobody uses us as mere means. But no others may use either our lives or our bodies for a scheme that they have either coerced or deceived us into joining. For in doing so they would fail to treat us as rational beings; they would use us as mere means and not as ends in ourselves. I think that how you get to the end matters more than the end itself. Notice that in my very first example I’ve determined that if your brother murdered your father to claim the throne you’d be thinking that it wasn’t just. That’s because, even though he did something great and the whole court should be proud of him, he got to that high position in a horrible way, so instead of everyone adoring him, they despise him. I have many ethical issues with Kant’s Groundwork.
The original argument emphasizes the husband’s perception of himself as a means, which opposes Kant’s view of morality as the treatment of all rational beings as ends. In order for the husband to behave morally, he must treat both himself and his wife as ends. By considering himself as a means for his wife, he breeds contradiction between treating his wife as an end from a moral sense of duty and making an exception for himself. The former suggests that he recognizes the importance of universal morality and viewing all people as ends, but the latter suggests that he applies a different standard to
As Sam Duncan wrote “Kant equates morality with acting freely. When we act on the moral law, we act independently of any impulse…” We all know crimes such as murder or stealing are morally wrong, but it is the decision we chose to make as we are faced with the dilemma of acting on a good or bad decision. No one else is to blame at that particular moment since it is the individual right then and there doing good or
If accurate, this is a debilitating criticism of Kant’s moral theory as he had intended it. Mill’s critique instead classifies Kant’s moral theory as a type of rule utilitarianism. Any action under Kant’s theory is tested as a general rule for the public, and if the consequences are undesirable, then the general rule is rejected. “Undesirable consequences” are, according to the more precise language of Mill’s utilitarianism, consequences which are not a result of producing the greatest happiness. Mill’s analysis hinges on the lack of logical contradiction found in Kant’s theory. Without a concrete incongruity, Kant may be no more than a rule utilitarian. However, Mill is mistaken; the Categorical Imperative does produce absolute contradictions, as will be demonstrated through examples.
Another, more obvious problem with the first step of the categorical imperative is the black and white nature of the world in Kant’s opinion. He simplifies morality to an extreme extent with no room for argument. For example, Kant believes that suicide is wrong, no matter what, because if this became a universal law, “one [would see] at once a contradiction in a system of nature whose law would destroy life by means of the very same feeling that acts so as to stimulate the furtherance of life, and hence there could be no existence as a system of nature” (Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, 31). However, suppose there is a case in which a rich person has an abundance of food, and a poor person, on the brink of death from starvation, has none. Is it truly morally wrong for that person to take food? Can it really be said that this person has done a bad thing, when it is in the pursuit of survival, and comes at the cost of no one? In Kant’s opinion, yes, this man has had a moral failing, and I therefore argue that Kant has changed the makeup of what morality is, inventing his own rules for what is ethical without regard for the thoughts and opinions of other people in different situations from his own. Kant seems to deny the possibility of alternate viewpoints, and that some situations are much more difficult to deal with morally than others, such as in the case of the greater
Immanuel Kant defines his second formulation of the Categorical Imperative as knowing the value of a person. It is demeaning to use a person without his or her consent for self-gratification, especially sexually. Kant describes this as using a person simply to serve a means rather than an end, simply put rather than being a concrete loving act with the end of creating new life sex treated as only “scratching an itch”. The idea that Kant, “must take on the other’s ends for their own sake, not because that is an effective way to advance my goals in using the other,” is a way of saying that a man must care enough about the other person treat them as fairly and justly as he wants to be treated (Soble 228). To Soble the “Kantian sex problem” is at the root rather or not all of Kant’s requirements can be met at all in sexual activity¬¬. As Kant lays out all that goes into the second formulation of the Categorical Imperative he describes taking on one another’s ends, but also what it means to make a person simply an end to one’s own needs.
...emned as a “means to an end.” The public now views the death of the convicted as a way to attain what they want: revenge. The execution is no longer a punishment, but rather part of gaining society’s satisfaction. In this case, the condemned lose the right to their own end, which strips them of their humanity by becoming an object in someone else’s satisfaction and defying Kant’s “Practical Imperative.” As I already mentioned a condemned man dehumanizes himself when murdering another human, however, after the murder takes place the condemned may start a redemption process, and because we know that redemption is a humane process, then we understand that the condemned begins to regain his humanity. Nevertheless, if society commences to use him as a “means to an end,” they once again dehumanize him making it difficult to apply ethics supporting Capital Punishment.
The scenario analyzed for this prompt is highly controversial if seen through the eyes of a true Kantian. Not only does this excerpt put into play nearly every major aspect of Kantian theory, but it also acts as a double-edged sword in defeating most imaginable solutions. Throughout the next few pages, I will attempt to explain to the best of my knowledge what Immanuel Kant would argue given the situation, analyze various scenarios and explain the moral sense of such decisions.
...velop their talents because they would be more likely to attain great things (Kant, G.M.M. Sec. 2, p.37). In other words, this example is clearly used to demonstrate part of the first formulation and the imperfect duties that a person has toward their self considering Kant believes that people simply cannot become good at anything without any practice. Finally, Kant’s last example of the categorical imperative is essentially all about the imperfect duties toward others because it discusses the idea helping others who are in need (Kant, G.M.M. Sec. 2, p.37). In fact, Kant states that society could still exist if people refused to help each other out; however, that is not an ideal world to live in since everyone needs friendship, love, and sympathy from others. In conclusion, a person can only live a moral live by following the Kantian categorical imperatives.
Kant explores the good will which acts for duty’s sake, or the sole unconditional good. A good will is not good because of any proposed end, or because of what it accomplishes, but it is only good in itself. The good will that is good without qualification contains both the means and the end in itself.
Immanuel Kant’s theory of Radical Evil presents a secular position defining evil in away of which the agents performing evil acts can be held accountable. It centres around the concept that evil, specifically evil is performing acts of atrocity rooted from placing self-love ahead of duty. Therefore right action is acting out of duty in obedience with the Universal moral law, and in contrast what can be seen as an evil act is an act carried out with the motivation being self-love or self centred tendencies. Furthermore, choosing to perform an evil act in order for superiority or even evil for the cause of being evil is seen by Kant as diabolical evil, but he denied its possibility in accordance with moral agents. Kant believes that all moral
Modern Kantianism considers acting rationally to be the same as acting ethically. If this is true, one could rationalize a need that is in their own self interest, yet at the same time against the interest of another individual. Since this c...
While Kant’s theory may seem “overly optimistic” (Johnson, 2008) now, it was ruled as acceptable and rational behavior then. Kant believed that any moral or ethical decision could be achieved with consistent behavior. While judgment was based on reason, morals were based on rational choices made by human beings (Freeman, 2000). A human’s brain is the most advanced in the animal kingdom. Not only do human beings work on instinct, but they have the ability to sort out situations in order to make a decision. This includes weighing the pros and cons of decisions that could be made and how they affect others either positively or negatively. This is called rational thought. Kant believed that any human being able to rationalize a decision before it was made had the ability to be a morally just person (Freeman, 2000). There were certain things that made the decision moral, and he called it the “Categorical Imperative” (Johnson, 2008). If someone was immoral they violated this CI and were considered irrational. The CI is said to be an automatic response which was part of Kant’s argument that all people were deserving of respect. This automatic response to rational thinking is where he is considered, now, to be “overly optimistic” (Johnson, 2008).
Kant is a German philosopher who speaks heavily about the importance of individual duty and autonomy of the will within his work, The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. Within the text, Kant guides his readers to live a life of meaning and quality rather than one of little substance and insignificance. His approach to life and how one makes decisions is that of a sound person, who believes and understands that in the end you cannot please everyone, and that as long as you are doing your very best to fulfill your duty you are living a life that has worth and meaning; even if in the end the results are not what you had planned or expected. Unlike Bentham and Mill, Kant teaches his readers that expressing good will and preforming one’s moral duties are the most important factors in leading a happy life, because it produces well-rounded members of society who care about others as well as
First we will start with the historical example of the execution of Jesus. Pontius Pilate was put into a situation where a large crowd had attempted to persuade him that Jesus should be killed instead of a convicted murderer, even though Jesus had done nothing wrong. The majority won and he was killed. The Utilitarians can justify this action because the majority gained happiness from this. On the other hand, those who support Kant’s theory will argue that Jesus had done nothing wrong and his right were clearly violated making the action
While Kant’s position of putting others before oneself and thinking of the consequences of one’s actions creates a noble and righteous view of morality. However, it does have a few concerning loopholes. For example, if someone were to try to carry out an action that would cause no harm to others if everyone else also did it, this would obviously pass under the universal law. However, if the person had to do something considered immoral in order to be able to carry out the action, it would still pass the requirements necessary for an action to be considered to fall under the universal law, as this action has no effect on the primary action that passed under the law. For example, if someone decided that they were going to drive their car to work and hit anyone who stood in the way, this would still fit within the universal law as killing these people would have no effect on getting to work. In addition, if this were established as a universal law and everyone did it, it would not affect the first person from getting to work. Therefore, it fits the universal law. Obviously, murder would not heed to the categorical imperative in any other way other than through this loophole. Kant makes the mistake of assuming that everything will work out through his categorical imperative, but conflicts such as this cause that to be impossible, making it an extensive flaw in his reasoning