Kantian Ethics Flashcards
What is Kantian ethics?
Kantian ethics is a deontological moral theory that emphasizes duty and the rational will. Kant believed that enlightenment, or humanity’s emergence from self-imposed immaturity, could be achieved by basing ethics on universal reason rather than faith, enabling peaceful global cooperation.
Reason and Universal Laws
Kant argued that reason reveals universal laws, much like mathematical and physical laws. A moral law, discoverable by reason, must apply to all people in all situations—categorically, not conditionally based on desires or consequences.
Duty and the Good Will
The foundation of morality lies in the “good will,” which is the intention to act morally purely because it is one’s duty, not out of personal desires. Happiness is conditionally good, but only a good will is unconditionally good.
Hypothetical vs. Categorical Imperatives
Hypothetical Imperatives are conditional, e.g., “If you want X, do Y.”
Categorical Imperatives are universal commands, e.g., “Do X.”
Moral actions must be guided by categorical imperatives.
Three Formulations of the Categorical Imperative: Universalisability
Act only according to maxims that can be willed as universal laws. For instance, lying is immoral because if everyone lied, truth would cease to exist, which creates a contradiction in the very concept of lying.
Three Formulations of the Categorical Imperative: Treating Others as Ends
Always treat people as ends in themselves, not merely as means to an end. This means respecting their autonomy and goals.
For example, treating a waiter with respect while being served is acceptable as long as they are also treated as an individual with their own purposes.
Three Formulations of the Categorical Imperative: Kingdom of Ends
Act as though you live in a world where everyone treats others as ends and follows the moral law.
Postulates of Kantian Ethics
God, Immortality, and Free Will are essential for Kant’s ethics, as they ensure justice and the possibility of moral responsibility.
Kant believed that without these assumptions, ethical actions would be meaningless, and moral justice would be impossible in the present life.
Strength: Clarity and rationality
Kantian ethics is praised for its clarity and rationality. It offers precise moral rules that can be recognized by all rational beings, empowering individuals to follow moral guidelines through their own reason. This respects the autonomy of individuals and fosters a civilized, democratic society, as moral rules are not imposed from an external authority.
Criticism: Clashing duties
A challenge arises when duties conflict, such as in the case of a soldier deciding whether to fight in a war or stay home to care for a sick parent. Both duties can be seen as universalizable, and neither involves treating someone as a mere means.
Kant’s theory, however, struggles to provide clear guidance when duties clash, especially since his ethical framework requires that we can perform both duties.
Sartre’s Criticism
Existentialist philosopher Sartre argued that Kantian ethics cannot offer objective moral clarity in such situations, as it fails to resolve conflicts between duties.
He used the soldier example to demonstrate that Kant’s framework can leave individuals with competing duties without clear resolution.
Kant’s Response to Clashing duties
Kant would argue that if duties clash, the person has not used reason properly. He distinguished between perfect duties (those with only one way to be fulfilled, like telling the truth) and imperfect duties (those with multiple ways to be fulfilled, like caring for a sick relative or fighting for one’s country).
Kant suggests that duties like these do not truly clash because there are multiple ways to fulfill them, offering flexibility and the possibility of reconciliation.
Perfect Duties
Perfect Duties (e.g., not lying or stealing) are negative duties that cannot clash because they only require refraining from certain actions. Since there’s no action to take, they don’t conflict with other duties.
Criticism of Kant’s Response to Clashing duties
Despite Kant’s distinction between perfect and imperfect duties, it can still be argued that some situations may force individuals to choose between duties, particularly when only one option is feasible. For instance, the soldier might only have the means to fulfill one duty, no matter how many options are theoretically available.
This suggests that Kantian ethics may not always provide the moral clarity it claims, particularly in real-life situations where duties are not easily reconcilable.
Kant’s Critique of Consequentialism
Kant’s deontological ethics opposes consequentialism, as he believes consequences should not determine moral actions. For example, in the “murderer at the door” scenario, where lying could save a life, Kant argues that lying is morally wrong regardless of the outcome.
He believes we cannot control consequences, so they should not factor into moral decision-making. If we lie, even if the victim is at the door, and later the victim is safe there unknowingly, we could be responsible for their death. For Kant, duties are absolute and not contingent on consequences.
Weakness: Consequences Have Moral Value
Kant’s approach often contradicts people’s moral intuitions, as many would agree that lying to save a life is morally acceptable.
Kant’s argument that we cannot control consequences is seen as flawed, since we can predict and influence outcomes to some extent.
This is where consequentialist theories like Utilitarianism differ, focusing on maximising happiness and taking consequences into account.
Consequentialists like Bentham and Singer argue that moral obligation is to act in a way that maximises utility, with the best effort to predict outcomes.
Evaluation Defending Kant on consequentialism
A defense of Kant might argue that each person is ultimately responsible for their own actions, not for others’ actions. In the “Nazi” scenario, lying would mean taking responsibility for someone else’s actions, which Kant argues is morally wrong. Allowing bad actions for the “greater good” could corrupt people, and it’s better to stick to duty, even if it leads to undesirable consequences.
Evaluation Criticising Kant on consequentialism
Critics, like Hegel, argue that Kant’s view of individuals as isolated agents overlooks the interconnectedness of people in society. We are responsible for others’ actions to some extent, as social life is about relationships and mutual influence.
Kant’s individualistic perspective fails to reflect the reality of human interdependence.
Kant’s View: Emotions are Unreliable
Kant argues that emotions are unreliable and cannot serve as moral motivation because they are fleeting and inconsistent. For Kant, moral actions are grounded in reason and duty, not emotions.
Acting out of emotion isn’t wrong, but it isn’t morally good either. If someone helps another because they feel like it, they aren’t acting out of moral duty. Only actions performed out of a sense of duty are morally good.
According to Barbara Herman, emotions can only lead to right actions by chance, as they don’t provide a moral interest in the rightness of actions.
Weakness: Emotion Can Have Moral Value (William’s and Stoker)
Critics like Bernard Williams, influenced by Aristotle, argue that Kant’s view is too narrow. He distinguishes between ‘morality’ (following rules) and ‘ethics’ (a broader view of becoming virtuous through emotions and relationships).
Michael Stocker supports this, noting that acting purely out of duty can seem unnatural. For instance, a friend visiting a sick person because it’s their duty feels implausible and emotionally distant.
Williams and Stocker argue that emotions like love and friendship naturally motivate virtuous actions and can be cultivated to reliably guide moral behavior. They criticize Kant for presenting a false dichotomy—acting either out of duty or selfish desires—when virtue ethics offers a middle ground where emotions can motivate morally good actions.
Evaluation Defending Kant on emotions
In defense of Kant, his primary concern is not why we visit friends in hospitals but ensuring that we treat others as ends in themselves.
Emotions are secondary to moral duties for Kant, and he argues that society needs clear moral laws that emotions can influence, but should not override. Unlike virtue ethics, which lacks clear guidance, Kant’s framework provides impersonal, universal rules necessary in modern society.
Evaluation Critiquing Kant
Stocker’s critique is effective in showing that emotions can lead to moral actions more than just by luck. Cultivated feelings, like love and friendship, can reliably motivate moral behavior.
Thus, emotions have moral value and can be linked to ethical actions in a way that Kant’s framework does not fully acknowledge.
Criticism: Kant relies too much on reason
There are limits to human reason.
Our minds experience the world through categories that we impose. We cannot experience the ‘noumena’ and issues such as the existence of God are beyond our ability to provide proof.
Morality does not come within a sphere of reason. Our moral duties are a priori synthetic, we are able to work them out using our reason.
Situation ethics would reject the claim that ethics should be based on duty and reason, Kant’s reason may not give us the right answers. Agape is better motivation.
Philippa Foot’s Critique
Philippa Foot accepts that there are categorical imperatives but disagrees with Kant’s assertion that it is irrational to disobey them.
She points out that not all categorical imperatives are irrational to disobey. For example, social rules like etiquette (e.g., “don’t eat with your mouth open”) are categorical imperatives, but it isn’t considered irrational to break them.
Foot argues that Kant fails to provide a compelling reason why disobeying his categorical imperative is irrational, suggesting that their authority might stem from social conditioning rather than reason.
Foot concludes that moral judgments are only rationally binding if we accept them as our end. Therefore, morality is hypothetical, not categorical, and we would only act morally if it aligns with our personal goals. This weakens Kant’s claim to an objective, universal morality derived from reason.
