kantian ethics

• Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-imposed immaturity: 'Kant'
• Enlightenment thinkers like Kant

  • Wanted to solve the problem that those of different faiths could never come to agreement
  • Religious warfare had been greatly destructive in Europe
  • Kant's solution was to base religion and ethics on reason, not faith
• Reason is universal in that everyone has it, but not everyone shares the same faith
• Kant's ethics


  • If ethics could be based on reason, a more harmonious society would follow
  • There would at least be the hope of coming to agreement through rational discussion
• Faith-based morality


  Pushes laws on people as if they were children
• Kant's view


  Humanity was ready for greater autonomy, figuring out and following the moral laws themselves through their own reason and choice
• This new enlightened stage of civilisation would make global co-operation possible
• Rational will of the individual


  • Can choose to align itself with universal laws
  • Not arbitrary laws forced on them by authority, but laws whose authority consists in the citizen's autonomous adoption of them due to their rationality
• Kant's ethics and philosophy in general was in large part a reaction to Hume's empiricist ethical anti-realism
• Hume denied that right and wrong existed, concluding that morality reduced to personal feelings
• Kant's view


  • Reason discovers universal laws, e.g. of maths & physics
  • A moral law discoverable by reason will also be universal
  • It will apply to all people in all situations, i.e., it will apply 'categorically'
• Basing morality on reason

  • Means it is not based on subjective desires
  • Morality is not contingent on our personal feelings, meaning it's not hypothetical, it's categorical
• Test of whether an action is morally right


  Whether it could be done by anyone, whether it could be done by anyone in any situation regardless of their personal feelings
• Universalizable actions


  Are our duty
• Kantian ethics


  • Deontological, meaning 'duty-based'
  • Moral action depends on doing the right action with the right intention, regardless of personal feelings, the situation or the consequences
• Good will


  • Held by a person who has the right intention when performing their duty
  • We should act purely out of a sense of duty, leaving out personal feelings/desires and just do 'duty for duty's sake'
• Morally valid motivation for an action

  Respect for the moral law
• Categorical imperative


  Something we have a duty to always do (you should do X)
• Hypothetical imperative


  A moral action that a rational will adopts for reasons other than duty (you should do X if you want Y)
• All imperatives command either hypothetically or categorically. The former present the practical necessity of a possible action as a means to achieving something else which one desires … The categorical imperative would be one which presented an action as of itself objectively necessary, without regard to any other end: 'Kant'
• If the action is good only as a means to something else, the imperative is hypothetical; but if it is thought of as good in itself, and hence as necessary in a will which of itself conforms to reason as the principle of this will, the imperative is categorical: 'Kant'
• Kant's universal absolutist ethics was very influential on our current theory of human rights
• Kant even invented the idea of the United Nations
• First formulation of the categorical imperative

  Act only according to that maxim by which you could at the same time will it become a universal law
• Contradiction in conception


  We should only act on an ethical principle if it is logically possible for everyone to act on it
• Contradiction in will


  A maxim like "always refuse help from others" does not lead to a contradiction in conception, but it contradicts our rational will to achieve ends
• Second formulation of the categorical imperative

  Always treat persons, whether others or in yourself, always as an end, never merely as a means
• Rational agents


  • Have and seek goals which Kant called 'ends'
  • To treat a person as if they were a mere means to an end is irrational
• Third formulation of the categorical imperative

  • A reminder to always act on the moral law
  • If everyone followed Kant's ethics we would live in a 'kingdom of ends', a world of rational beings where everyone was treated as an end
• Postulates


  Things you have to assume to be true in order to have a basis for reasoning about ethics
• Kant's three postulates


  • God
  • Immortality (of the soul in an afterlife)
  • Free will
• Kant's view on free will

  Without free will, we could not be responsible for our actions and thus surely ethics would be pointless
• Kant's view on God and immortality

  • Good people are not always rewarded in life, and some times bad people do seem to be rewarded
  • For ethics to work, there needs to be justice
  • There must be a God who lets us in to an afterlife where good people are rewarded with happiness
• Strengths of Kantian ethics

  • Its ethical clarity
  • Kant's precise rules and method for figuring them out is available to all rational beings
  • It doesn't assert rules upon people from an external authority
  • People can recognize the rationality of moral rules through their own reason
  • This engages the autonomy of the individual in the way required for a civilised democratic society
• Kant's principle of 'ought implies can'


  We must be capable of doing an action for it to be our duty
• Sartre thinks there can't be any objective guidance for our ethical views, so Kantian ethics cannot provide the moral clarity needed by the enlightenment conception of an autonomous individual
• Kant's response to clashing duties

  • If we think there are clashing duties, we are haven't used our reason properly
  • He distinguished between perfect duties, where there is only one way of fulfilling them, and imperfect duties, where there are multiple ways of fulfilling them
• Perfect duties


  Never clash because they are negative, i.e., simply involve refraining from certain actions (stealing, lying, etc)
• Kant's response to clashing duties is not fully successful, as there may be situations where one duty cannot be fulfilled
• Kant's critique of consequentialism


  • We cannot control consequences, so we cannot be responsible for them
  • Consequences cannot be relevant to our moral decision-making