Idea Transcript
notes for PHL-162, week 10
Immanuel Kant For Utilitarians, what is the only thing that is intrinsically good? Answer: HAPPINESS. For Virtue Theorists, virtues (like honesty, bravery, patience) are intrinsically good. For Kant (311): • it’s not talents (intelligence, wit, et. al.) – they can be used for a bad end • not gifts of fortune (power, riches, health) – likewise • not happiness (the happiness of an evil person is not good) The only intrinsic good is a GOOD WILL. Q: What is a will? A: One’s capacity of choice, the thing that is supposed to be free (hence “free will”), the possession of which makes us different from lower animals that only act on instinct. Q: What is a GOOD will? A: One that is guided by REASON Why Reason? One answer: because it’s no good at getting us happiness (see 313) – instinct is much better suited for that. But “reason is imparted to us as a practical faculty, i.e., as one which is to have influence on the will…so… its true destination must be to produce a will, not merely good as a means to something else, but good in itself” Q: How should reason guide the will to make it good? A: THE FIRST PROPOSITION OF MORALITY (314) – An action must be done from a sense of duty, if it is to have moral worth That is, actions are only good if they are done from duty (in accordance with duty is not enough – see examples on 315 • overcharging dealer • maintaining one’s life • being charitable • loving one’s neighbor (“practical” not “pathological” love (316-17) Q: why does an action done from duty have moral worth? A: THE SECOND PROPOSITION OF MORALITY (317) – An action done from duty derives its moral worth not from the purpose which is to be attained by it [this would be consequentialist] but from the maxim by which it is determined 1
notes for PHL-162, week 10
Q: what is a maxim? A: the maxim of an action is the rule you are acting as if you’re following. That is, you can work out the maxim of your action by imagining that there is a law that makes everyone act as you are doing. Thus, an action is right when it is following a duty, and a dutiful action is one that is motivated by following a law. Thus, THE THIRD PROPOSITION OF MORALITY (317) – Duty is the necessity of acting from respect for the law. So, good action is action that is motivated by law-following. But will any laws do? And where does reason come in? Answer: no, only good laws are the right motivation, and reason can tell us which are the good laws. How? By working out which are the laws that everyone can follow, because morality applies equally to everyone. This brings us to a distinction between types of imperative (which are reasons to do things, or “shoulds”. There are two types: 1. Hypothetical – that is, dependent on some greater goal: “you SHOULD do x… if you want y” For example, you SHOULD go to college IF you want a good job 2. Categorical – that is, without any qualification: “you JUST SHOULD do x!” Kant believes that moral imperatives are categorical, because otherwise morality would depend on your desires and not be absolute and duty-driven. Every moral rule, therefore is a categorical imperative. But there is also a “supreme” moral rule that can help us work out all the lesser ones. This is the Categorical Imperative, which comes in three versions. First Formulation of the CI (323): Act only on that maxim whereby thou canst at the same time will that it should become a universal law. Four test cases (1 & 2 are PERFECT duties, 3 & 4 are IMPERFECT): 1. Man contemplating suicide (323) 2. Man contemplating lying to borrow money (324) 3. Man doesn’t want to develop his talents 4. Man could help others with his money (325) Perfect duties: “Some actions are of such a character that their maxim cannot without contradiction be even conceived as a universal law of nature” Imperfect duties:
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notes for PHL-162, week 10
“this intrinsic impossibility is not found, but still it is impossible to will that their maxim should be raised to the universality of a law of nature, since such a will would contradict itself” (325) Second Formulation of the CI (327) So act as to treat humanity, whether in thine own person or in that of any other, in every case as an end withal, never as a means only
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