DP Barrett - Kantian
Ethics
“There
is only one categorical imperative. It is: act only according to that maxim by
which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal
law.”
Kant’s key principle is called
The Categorical Imperative and it states
that you should only perform an action if you could agree that everyone be
permitted to act in that way:
"Act
only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it
should become a universal law."
Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of The Metaphysics of
Morals
The Categorical Imperative is
essentially a rationalised (and complicated) version of the Golden Rule common
to moral systems such as Christianity: treat others the way you want to be
treated. The Categorical Imperative insists that before you perform an action
you should ask yourself the question ‘would I be happy for everyone to act in
this way?’ If the answer is ‘yes’ then I may go ahead and perform the action; if
the answer is ‘no’ then clearly I think the action is wrong, and shouldn’t be
done by anyone, and so I should not do it either. This is what we call the test
of universalisation: if an action
can be done by everyone then it is acceptable, whereas if I would not want it
universalised then I should not do it myself. This is a negative test because it
only shows us what is immoral and ought not to be done.
Kantian Ethics has
impartiality and equality at its heart and it appeals to Reason for its foundations rather than
religion or other sources such as governments and personal emotions. Kant
believes that as rational agents we are all equal because we all have our own
minds, thoughts, and goals in life. There is no valid reason to suppose that you
are better than other people, and there is no valid reason to suppose that the
rules which apply to everyone else should not also apply to you. We are all
capable of rationalising our actions, so if I think it is acceptable for me to
act a certain way then surely it would also be possible for everyone else to
justify acting that way too. For example, if I think it is acceptable for me to
steal then it is also acceptable for everyone else to do it. If I would not wish
that to be the case then I should not act that way myself. Breaking rules which
I think should apply to everyone (which therefore includes myself) would be
inconsistent and irrational, even self-contradictory.
Kantian Ethics attempts to
appeal to objective criteria for
telling us what is right or wrong independent of any culture, tradition, or
personal preference. Indeed, Kant saw himself as putting moral principles on a
par with mathematical truths. Like Utilitarianism it is a Universalist moral theory, meaning that
it rejects Cultural Relativism and instead offers a way of making moral
decisions which should be followed by everyone in the world.
Interpretations of the
Categorical Imperative
There are actually several
different ways of interpreting Kant’s Categorical Imperative. Here we will
briefly look at three interpretations, although there are others, some of which
are very technical and complicated.
The first interpretation, and
perhaps most common, is that certain actions cannot be universalised because
they would have bad consequences for society. For example, if we were to say
that everyone is allowed to kill and steal then this would lead to a horrible
state of affairs where there would be nothing but constant fear and death, and
it may well mean the end of the human race. This interpretation essentially sees
the Categorical Imperative as calling for us to ask “what if everyone did that?”
However, this is not actually the interpretation that Kant intends at all,
because it is clearly a teleological view based on avoiding bad consequences;
this view is more like the thinking behind Rule Utilitarianism.
A second interpretation runs
something like this: “I do not want to be harmed, so I cannot universalise a
rule saying that things such as killing and stealing are allowed, because then
they could happen to me too, and indeed happen to those I care about. Therefore,
I will not kill or steal, these things are wrong.” This is a fair interpretation
of Kant because it relates to what people could rationally will to be the case,
and it yields good practical results because it would surely lead to a wholesale
ban on actions such as murder, theft, rape, slavery, and so on. It is, however,
slightly tainted by self-interest, whereas Kant would endorse
impartiality.
A third interpretation,
similar to the last, runs like this: “I believe that I have value and that I
should not be harmed; other people are no different from me and therefore they
also have value and should not be harmed. I do not want to be stolen from or
killed, and nor does anyone else, so this cannot be universalised.” This
interpretation is closest to what Kant intends because it is impartial and
because Kant thought of us as having duties to other people, and not just to
ourselves; we should always act with goodwill towards others because others have
value. This again would mean that actions such as theft, murder, and abuse are
all prohibited because no one could will that they be universally
allowed.
The Second Formulation of The
Categorical Imperative
Kant offers a second version
of the Categorical Imperative, which he takes to basically add up to the same
idea:
"So act
that you treat humanity, both in your own person and in the person of every
other human being, never merely as a means, but always at the same time as an
end."
Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of The Metaphysics of
Morals
This means that you should
never abuse other people in order to achieve your own goals; you should not use
people as a means to an end, but see them as ‘ends in themselves.’ Each person,
including yourself, has value, and this indicates that they are not to be
abused. Each person has their own thoughts, feelings, and goals in life, just
like yourself, so you should not abuse them and deprive them of their goals for
the sake of achieving your own ends.
It is normal to use other
people as a means to an end in life, for example, when I buy food I am using the
shopkeeper as a means to the end of feeding myself. However, I must recognise
that the shopkeeper has his own life and goals, such as earning the money to
feed his own family. I must therefore dutifully respect his needs and goals, and
so not steal the food. To treat other people as a means to an end is essentially
treating them like they are just an object, a mere resource for you to use
without any consideration for their own goals and feelings. Just as I am to
respect the shopkeeper and pay him for what I take, so too he must respect me
and give me the correct goods and change. By insisting that we never use other
people as a means to an end Kant is ensuring that numerous harmful practices are
prohibited, such as stealing from other people, rape, making false promises, and
slavery. It also rules out Utilitarian ideas about using people, possibly even
abusing people, for the sake of “the greater good.”
Another interpretation of The
Categorical Imperative
There is another
interpretation of the Categorical Imperative which is highly technical and is
based on the idea that some ways of acting are actually contradictory. Kant
specifically endorsed this interpretation of the Categorical Imperative, and
gave the following examples:
1.
Suppose I wish to steal
something and so I act on the maxim ‘it is acceptable to steal other people’s
property.’ Kant argues that this involves a contradiction. The notion of
stealing presupposes the notion of property, but the very idea of property is
that a particular item belongs to particular person and cannot be taken from
them. If we were to universalise stealing there would be no such thing as
property, and thence no such thing as stealing, so arguably stealing is
contradictory.
2. Suppose I wish to borrow £50 and promise to pay it back, but I intend not to keep my promise. Here my maxim is ‘I will make false promises.’ If we were to universalise this and allow everyone to make false promises then we would arrive at an absurd contradiction. In order for promises to be made there must be trust, but if we know that false promises can be made as and when anyone feels like it then there can be no trust, so there can be no promises. Effectively it would be impossible to universalise the maxim ‘I will make false promises’ because under such conditions promises couldn’t be made at all, let alone false ones.
GWF Hegel argued that this
interpretation of the Categorical Imperative was weak and hollow, because it
presumes that promise making and property are good things to be protected,
whereas it would be perfectly possible to imagine a society without these, e.g.
a society where there is no private property and everything is shared. Once it
is established that promising is good we can argue that promises need to be kept
and anything that contradicts promising is bad, but we can’t just assume
promising is good and needs to exist.
Kant’s rejection of
consequentialism
Deontological theories reject
the importance of consequences in making moral decisions. Kant rejected the role
of consequences for several reasons. Firstly he thought that it was not possible
to accurately predict the consequences of your actions, for example, you could
try to help someone by lying for them and this might actually make the situation
worse, so it was better just to stick with the principle of truthfulness. Secondly, Kant argued that if you saw a man
drowning and dived in to the sea to save him, but failed, we would still praise
you for attempting to save the man, so the actual consequences of an action
aren’t what makes it praiseworthy, what matters is acting with good will. Lastly, Kant thought of
rational beings as each being intrinsically valuable, you cannot put a price on
the value of their life, and therefore it cannot be right to use or destroy
people to achieve goals. Teleological thinkers often justify sacrificing
individuals for the sake of their goals, wither these be personal goals or
Utilitarian goals for the good of the public at large, but in Kant’s view
persons simply cannot be used in this way, they demand respect at all times and
are not to be abused.
Good will and
duty
Kant placed a great emphasis
on the motives for performing an action, and in his Groundwork of The Metaphysics of Morals
he wrote: “The only thing that is good without
qualification or
restriction is a good
will.” Kant thought of good will as
being a willingness to do your duty, come what may. Kant argued that you should
perform a moral action because it was the right thing to do, and out of a sense
duty, not for any non-moral reason such as to please God, avoid punishment, or
receive money. For Kant emotions, compassion, and inclination are morally
irrelevant and actions based on them are not moral actions.Imagine a shopkeeper who is fair and honest in his dealings and always gives his customers the right change, but only does this because he thinks it is the best way to operate his business for his own profit, after all, if he gets a reputation for dodgy dealing then his profits will suffer. Kant would argue that whilst he is doing the right thing he is doing it for the wrong reasons, and therefore that his action is not morally praiseworthy. If his only motive is profit, and he sees a chance to make a profit by defrauding a customer, then surely he would do it? Meanwhile, surely morality demands that you do the right thing and respect other people regardless of what you get out of it? Hence actions are only moral if motivated by duty.
Hypothetical Imperatives &
Categorical Imperatives
In Kant’s view good deeds come
from a sense of obligation: the duty to obey a moral rule whether you want to or
not. In other words, he thought that moral rules were categorical imperatives
rather than hypothetical imperatives. Hypothetical imperatives are optional, and
take the format ‘if you want x then do y’ for example, ‘if you want to do well
in your exams, then study hard’ or ‘if you want to get to Wales from London then
take the M4.’ These are pieces of
practical advice and if you don’t want to do well in your exams or go to Wales
you can ignore them. Kant argued that moral principles are not hypothetical
imperatives because they are not optional. We should not say ‘if you want to
live in a peaceful society, then do not kill’ but rather we should simply say
‘do not kill.’ This imperative is categorical because it is not option, there is
no ‘if’ and it does not depend on your desires or inclinations.
Perfect and Imperfect
Duties
According to Kant the
Categorical Imperative leads to two kinds of duty, perfect duties and imperfect
duties. Perfect duties are obligatory and must be obeyed by all people; they are
generally negative because they consist in not harming other people, or indeed,
in not harming oneself (Kant was against suicide). It would not be possible to
universalise things like killing or stealing or lying, or slavery, so we have
perfect duties not to do these things.
However, although we do have
strict obligations not to harm other people, it seems that there is no strict
obligation to actually help others. It would be perfectly possible to
universalise the rule “look after your own needs and never help other people.”
But Kant argues that few of us would actually want to universalise such a
principle. If you would want other people to help you then it is inconsistent
and hypocritical not to help others when they need it. Indeed, the principle ‘I
will take help but never give any’ cannot be universalised, that would actually
be impossible, because if nobody gave any help there would never be any to take.
Kant believes people have a right to seek their own ends, so long as they do not
hurt others; the positive duty to help other people, therefore, is optional and
so is ‘imperfect.’ However, Kant’s morality strongly encourages us to help
others since most of us would want to be helped.
Criticisms of Kantian
Ethics
There are numerous criticisms
of Kant’s moral theory, not least amongst which are the accusations that it is
too strict and impractical. What follows are the major criticisms. As you read
these, consider what a Kant could say to defend his moral theory.
1) Kant’s
Absolutism
The major problem with Kant’s
philosophy appears to be that it is inflexible and impractical because it
appears to take an absolutist stance on various actions: you should never lie,
never kill, never steal, always keep your promises, and so on. But surely in
some situations actions which are not normally allowed might be justified, such
as lying to save a life, yet Kant denies this insisting that you should never
lie:
"If you have by a lie hindered
a man who is even now planning a murder, you are legally responsible for all the
consequences. But if you have strictly adhered to the truth, public justice can
find no fault with you, be the unforeseen consequence what it may."
Immanuel Kant, On a Supposed Right to Tell Lies from Benevolent
Motives
However, there is a second way
of reading the Categorical Imperative which would allow for a degree of
relativism to the situation, such as lying to save a life. If we look carefully
at the Categorical Imperative we can see that it is not the specific action that we are called upon to
universalise, but the principle or maxim which brings us to this
action:
"Act
only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it
should become a universal law."
Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of The Metaphysics of
Morals
The principles on which we act
vary depending on the situation, for example, there are various different
reasons for killing: you might kill in self-defence, or for revenge, or for
personal financial gain, or again you might execute a murderer, or shoot an
enemy soldier in war. Each of these examples of killing is performed based on a
different principle, for example, the soldier may be acting on a principle of
protecting innocent lives or serving his country, and the executioner may be
acting on a principle of justice. Kant did not say that all killing was wrong
and that it should never happen, indeed, quite the opposite because he supported
the death penalty:
"If an offender has
committed murder, he must die. In this case, no possible substitute can satisfy
justice. For there is no parallel between death and even the most miserable
life, so that there is no equality of crime and retribution unless the
perpetrator is judicially put to death."
Immanuel Kant, The Metaphysics of
Morals
Kant viewed the death penalty
as justice, since no prison term could equate to the loss of life; he was
against killing as a deterrent and wished for the killing to be humane, but none
the less, in this situation killing is allowed: a relativist view. When it comes
to killing we are not meant to ask the simplistic question ‘would I wish for
killing to be universally allowed’ but instead we are to ask more specific
questions such as ‘would I wish for killing in self-defence to be universally
allowed.’ It may well be true that just about everyone would rule out killing
for selfish gain, but most people would happily allow a right to kill in
self-defence to be universalised, and the same applies to lying to save a life.
Indeed, Kant makes it clear in the following comment that the situation and
context does indeed make a difference to what can be done and what
cannot:
"For an action to be morally
valid, the agent – or person performing the act – must not carry out the action
unless he or she believes that, in the same situation, all people should act in
the same way."
Immanuel Kant, Groundwork for The Metaphysics of
Morals
It seems that Kant was
inconsistent in his application of the Categorical Imperative because sometimes
he focused on the action to be universalised and at other times he focused on
the maxim or principle, allowing the context to play a role. Though Kant did
argue that lying should never be permitted, he later retracted this statement in
favour of a relativist approach.
2) Principles can
clash
In many ways this problem is
part of the former problem, it is perhaps just a different way of putting the
same point. Suppose again that you are hiding your brother because someone wants
to kill him. The man comes to your door and asks whether your brother is home or
not. Do you tell the truth or lie?
Surely this is not just a simple matter of whether you should be honest
or not, but we actually have a clash between two principles. On the one hand
there is the principle that you ought to save life, then on the other hand there
is the principle that you ought to tell the truth. It seems that whatever you do
you are in the wrong: whatever you do you will be breaking an important
principle.
According to WD Ross (1877 – 1971) in order to solve
the problems with deontological approaches to morality we need identify the
different duties that we have, and decide which duty is more important in this
specific situation. The duty which sticks out as most important is the prima facie duty, and it is the one we
should stick to. Ross identified six different kinds of duty:
- Duties of fidelity – keeping promises and making up for past mistakes.
- Duties of gratitude – repaying debts, e.g. being kind to your parents who raised you.
- Duties of justice – where we act to bring about equal distribution of happiness.
- Duties of beneficence – acting to better other people, e.g. charity or education.
- Duties of self-improvement – acting to better your own life, e.g. business interests.
- Duties of non-malificence – refraining from doing harm to others.
The problem with WD Ross’
approach is that it is not always easy to see which principle should be looked
upon as the most important. If keeping a promise will mean that someone will get
hurt then should I keep the promise or not? If I have an opportunity to improve
my own situation, or to improve that of another person, then which is to take
priority? It seems sensible to say that some duties are more important than
others, but it is not clear how we should go about ranking them, and this may
make the ranking subjective. Indeed, it may be that in order to rank the duties
we will start having to think about the consequences, and if we do this then we
are departing from a deontological perspective.
3) Universalisation can be
subjective
Kant’s first formulation of
the Categorical Imperative demands that the principle or maxim that you act on
must be universalisable, capable of being followed by all. All this really means
is that you should only do x if you think that other people should also be
allowed to do x. However, seemingly different people will universalise different
moral rules.
The average person would say
that ‘I may use violence to protect myself’ is a perfectly universalisable
maxim, self-defence seems justified, even if it requires the ultimate force of
killing. However, a pacifist would be unwilling to universalise any kind of
violence at all. As a person raised in a Western society you may well say that
you would not universalise the maxim ‘those who have dishonoured their parents
may be killed’, but a person raised in a society with honour killings may well
be happy to universalise this and say that anyone who brings shame on their
family deserves to die. As far as they are concerned it is simply a form of the
death penalty being used on those who have committed a seriously wrong act,
dishonouring the family that gave them life in the first place. What counts as
universalisable seems to be quite subjective between different individuals and
different cultures.
4) Anything can be
universalised
Universalisation does not seem
to be enough to ensure that moral rules are stringent, especially if the context
is allowed to play a role. Julian
Baggini gives the following example: Constance has fallen in love with her
best friend’s rich husband, and she finds herself with the opportunity to leave
her own husband and run away with him. Normally she wouldn’t get involved with
adultery at all, after all, she wouldn’t like it if someone cheated on her, so
she could not universalise adultery. But life is more complicated than that.
When we lock criminals up we are not saying ‘I too wish to be put in prison’ but
only ‘I too should be put in prison if I am in the same circumstances as these
criminals.’ Context is everything. So she reasons to herself ‘would I allow
everyone to commit adultery if it makes them really rich and really happy?’ She
decides that the answer is ‘yes’ – a small amount of adultery in the world under
these circumstances wouldn’t be such a bad thing, so she goes ahead and does
it.
As Richard Norman puts it, Kant’s idea of
universalisation of principles seems to just indicate that we have to be more
subtle in the formulation of our maxims in order to get to do what we want.
Norman argues that the second formulation (treat other people as “ends in
themselves”) is a much stronger principle because it directly gives us reasons
not to harm other people and gives a strong indication that rational beings
deserve rights.
5) Morality has become cold and
emotionless
Many people view Kant’s
philosophy as cold and emotionless because he says we should be motivated by
good will and duty rather than out of inclinations. Suppose that two teenaged
brothers received news that their old auntie was in hospital and was seriously
ill. The first brother really likes his auntie and so goes to see her out of
this inclination with a smile on his face. The second brother doesn’t like his
auntie at all, but out of a sense of duty he goes to visit her all the same
because he knows it is the right thing to do. Kantian Ethics seems to suggest
that the second brother, who acted out of duty, is the morally good one. The
first brother only visits because he likes his auntie, and if he didn’t like her
he wouldn’t go. The second brother goes even though he doesn’t want to, he is
motivated by duty, and that’s what morality is all about: doing the right thing
whether you want to or not, regardless of whether you get something out of it or
enjoy it. This makes morality seem cold and emotionless, as if it is all about
rational calculation rather than any kind of care or love. As Friedrich Schiller
put it when mocking Kantian Ethics, since helping friends out of inclination is
not virtuous “you
must seek to despise them and do with repugnance what duty bids you.”
However, this might be called
a misinterpretation of Kant; Kant says there is nothing wrong with caring about
people, and acting on that care, it is just that a truly good person should do
something even if he does not want to.
6) Kantian duty is
impersonal
This criticism is connected
with the former criticism about morality becoming cold and emotionless. Before
Kantian Ethics the idea of duty was bound up with specific relationships: you
had duties to your family, to your employer, to your society or king, and to
your God. Kant makes duty in to a generalised concept based on reason rather
than emotion and relationships with others. Like other Enlightenment
philosophies (such as Utilitarianism) there is an emphasis on impartiality, and
there is no conception of specific duties to specific people. Under Kantian
Ethics staying faithful to your partner, for example, is simply a matter of
keeping your promises, and not hurting their feelings because you would not want
yours hurt; effectively you are to treat your spouse the same way as you treat
anyone else and emotions, compassion, and personal links aren’t meant to come in
to moral decisions at all.
7) Kantian Ethics stands in
the way of progress
According to teleological
theories such as Utilitarianism we should perform the action which brings about
the best consequences. For Utilitarians morality is all about improving the
world, and sometimes it will be necessary to do some quite awful things to
people to achieve this, for example, in order to discover a cure for a disease
which is affecting millions of people, you might have to do some very painful or
even deadly experiments on a small number of people. Or again, in order to find
the whereabouts of a massive bomb you might well have to torture the bomber to
get him to reveal his secrets. Whilst a Utilitarian will say that these things
have to be done for the greater good, a Kantian will insist that these are
examples of using people as a means to an end and so they can never be
universalised or justified. But surely this stands in the way of important
social goals which many people would argue are worth the sacrifice and abuse;
can we really say ‘we can’t torture this man as that means treating him as a
means to an end’ when the consequence will be the deaths of thousands of other
people? A Utilitarian would say that this was putting the needs of the few
before the needs of the many, and that it was a case of following the rules
without a regard for the bigger picture.
Summary
Kant’s most important contributions to moral philosophy have been his two formulations of the Categorical Imperative, a law which Kant believed all rational people had to agree with. The first formulation tells us only to perform an action if it can be universalised, i.e. if it can be done by everyone. Some say that this is an unhelpful principle as practically anything can be universalised under one maxim or another. The second formulation states that we should treat other rational beings as ‘ends in themselves’ and so respect them and not merely use them like things to achieve our own goals. Whilst this would give people rights and protection from abuse, this may also be impractical and prevent the achievement of social goals.
Kant’s morality is generally
interpreted in absolutist terms, providing strict duties to be followed in all
circumstances, but this leads to numerous problems because it might be argued
that sometimes actions like lying or stealing are necessary, and often that
different principles or duties can clash. Another interpretation is that an
action is acceptable depending on whether you think anyone could perform it in a
particular situation; this opens up the door to a more relative approach to
morality, but then it becomes difficult to know where to stop.
Suggested further
reading:
Michael Palmer, Moral Problems
Robert Bowie, Ethical Studies
Nigel Warburton, Philosophy: The Basics
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