module 2. lu4 lecture kantian ethics sp2013

7/29/2019 Module 2. LU4 Lecture Kantian Ethics Sp2013

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Kantian Ethics

(Rachels, The Elements of Moral Philosophy , Ch. 9 & 10)

I. The Context for Kants Philosophy (Ethics)

A. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) spent his whole life in the university town Knigsberg,

Germany (after WW II, Knigsberg became a part of Russia and is now called

Kaliningrad). It has been said that Kant was so regular in his habits that some ofcitizens of Knigsberg set their clocks by his daily afternoon walk. Kant was

thoroughly immersed in the academic culture of his home town. He attended the

University of Knigsberg where he studied the rationalist metaphysics of Leibniz andWolff, as well as mathematics and physics, especially the work of Newton. He was

also deeply interested in the field of natural science and most of his early publications

dealt with this subject. Following his university education he served as a family tutorfor several years. In 1755, he was awarded what would be the equivalent to a

doctoral degree and received permission to become a lecturer at the University.

There were many failed attempts to win a professorship and Kant turned down

several opportunities to teach in areas outside philosophy. Finally, in 1770, he wasappointed professor of logic and metaphysics at Knigsberg and for the next ten years

published nothing. It was during this hiatus from publishing that Kant worked to

formulate what would become his mature philosophy.

B. In order for us to gain an appreciation of Kant and his philosophical approach, it is

necessary that we understand the philosophical context in Europe at the time. The

Renaissance (roughly 14th - 16th century) ushered in a new era of revitalized interest inall things scientific and philosophic; this period spelled the end of strict medieval

authoritarianism (e.g. Scholasticism) in all areas of common life, especially the areas

of religious practice and academic pursuits. The Modern period of philosophycoincides with the Renaissance and the first major philosopher of the period is

Frenchman, Ren Descartes (1596-1650). Descartes is best remembered for his

methodical doubting of all his beliefs learned on the basis of received authority orderived from his own sensory experience. He continued this methodological doubt

until he arrived at a belief that he found to be indubitable (incorrigible). That one

belief that escaped his process of doubt was I think, therefore I am (Latin, cogito,ergo sum). With this indubitable foundational belief and his clear and distinct

criterion of truth, Descartes set about to reconstruct his world of knowledgepreviously lost as a result of his methodological doubting. Descartes was the first of a

series of philosophers collectively referred to as the Rationalists. The Rationalistsheld human reason in very high regard. They viewed the mind to be the primary

source of knowledge and argued that the mind had access to fundamental truths in

and of itself, without any dependence on sensory experience. These fundamental a

priortruths provided the foundation for all other knowledge and from these all other

truths (including truths about the world of experience) could be deduced. Some of


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the rationalists espoused the theory ofinnate ideas, a theory stating that the

fundamental truths are not only discoverable by the mind absent sensory experience,

but are hardwired in the mind from its origin. Among the other major philosophers

associated with rationalism are Benedictus de Spinoza (1632-1677) and GottfriedWilhelm, Baron von Leibniz (146-1716) whose philosophy was, as previously noted,

an early influence on Kant. Together, these three philosophers are often referred to asthe Continental Rationalists since all of them lived on the European continent.


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C. A second group of philosophers came along a little later and advanced a view of

knowledge counter to that of the rationalist. These philosophers, often called the

British Empiricists, rejected the theory of innate ideas, and each argued in their own

way that human knowledge is derived only through our sensory interaction with theworld. The British Empiricists are, Englishman, John Locke (1632-1704), Bishop

George Berkeley (1685-1753) from Ireland, and Scotsman, David Hume (1711-1776). According to these Empiricists, the mind has no innate ideas, no buildingblocks of information out of which the structure of human knowledge may be erected.

Locke claimed that the mind was a blank tablet (a tabula rasa) at birth and only

acquires the ideas that eventually populate it and account for knowledge as the sensesprovide input about the world outside the mind. However, a problem was lurking in

the midst of this theory of ideas, as Lockes epistemology is sometimes called. If all

that we know is limited to the ideas in our mind that are formed by virtue of sensoryexperience, then it appears that the mind cannot really know anything about the extra-

mental world (the world independent of the mind). Bishop Berkeley noted this

skeptical tendency toward the extra-mental world in Lockes philosophy and accepted

it wholeheartedly. In an effort to safeguard Christian belief against the threat ofatheism, he simply denied that physical objects (things in the extra-mental world)

exist except as they are being perceived by a mind. His famous dictum is esse est

percipi to be is to be perceived. Berkeleys immaterialism is an extreme radicalform of empiricism that not only denied we could have knowledge of an extra-mental

world, but went on to say that the extra-mental world did not even exist independent

of a perceiving mind. David Hume likewise accepted the skeptical tendencies inLockes brand of empiricism and even acknowledged the increasing skepticism about

human knowledge in Berkeleys view. He then extended that skeptical strategy well

beyond the extra-mental world going so far as to deny that we could have knowledge

of any thing that did not come to us by means of an impression on our senses or the

idea generated by such an impression. This led Hume to claim that we cannotrationally defend our belief in anything that does not come to us through some

impression or idea things such as the self, other minds and God. In addition, Humeargued that we cannot rationally defend our purported knowledge of concepts like

that ofcause and effecton the basis of this exclusively empiricistic point of view.

What we assume to be one event causing another event (i.e. cause and effect) is,Hume claims, merely the constant conjunction regularly observed between two

events, one following after the other. Humes empiricism seems to lead to an even

more radical view than that of Berkeley. For Hume, the mind becomes just a series of

disconnected impressions and ideas which have no connection at all with what we allseem to believe is a continuing, conscious Self and a physical world separate and

distinct from that self. It is this radical point of view to which Humes empiricismultimately leads that Kant says awakened him from his dogmatic slumber andpropelled him on his project of trying to find a satisfactory synthesis of the best of

rationalism and empiricism.

II. Kants Synthesis


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A. Kants aim was to develop a system of philosophy that captured the commonsensical

aspects of empiricism that account for human knowledge based at least partly on the

data from human sensory experience. On the other hand, Kant wanted to avoid the

extreme and non-commonsensical skepticism that seems inherent in the (radical)empiricism of his day. His early rationalist tendencies were not easily set aside; he

sought for a theory that would, at the same time, rescue the mind from theannihilation wrought by Humes philosophy and better explain the minds role inordering our sensory perceptions of the world beyond the mind. Kant saw the power

of Humes reasoning and could not deny out of hand his illuminating analysis of the

concept of causation. While Kant agreed that we cannot derive concepts like causeand effect from experience, he countered that this claim does not mean that such

concepts are merely irrational (nonrational?) inventions of custom as Hume

concluded. Kant asserts that concepts like this are hardwired in our mind and wecannot help but employ them. In fact, were it not for the disposition of the mind to

order sensory experience by means of these original and natural concepts (like that of

cause and effect) there would be no such thing as experience, all we would have

would be a jumble of sensory induced impressions without any meaning or context(the Hume alternative).

B. According to Kant, our view of the world is structured by these a priori (i.e. prior tosensory experience) concepts in the mind. Kants philosophy is often referred to as

Transcendental Idealism because he espoused that these transcendent mental concepts

create our world by ordering the raw data of sensory experience. That is, Kantargued from the existence of knowledge as a fact of human experience to the

(necessary) conditions that make such knowledge possible. However, like his

empiricist counterparts, Kant is stuck with a position that seems ultimately to deny

the possibility ofknowingthe world in any meaningful way independent of the

minds creative/interpretive activity. All we know, Kant says, is the world as-it-appears, or thephenomenal world, and those appearances are always shaped by the

concepts in the mind. We can never know, he continues, the objects of the world(what he calls the things-in-themselves) from which the sensory data emanates

because we cannot get outside of our reliance on the minds concepts to order and

organize that sensory data which eventuates in human sensory experience. We mayhave clues or hints about the world of things-in-themselves (the noumenal world,

in Kants terminology) but we can neverknow that world. Kants attempted synthesis

of rationalism and empiricism which claims that human knowledge has as much to do

with the minds organizational activity as it does the inputs received through sensoryexperience is often called the Copernican Revolution in philosophy. [We will see

how this shift plays out when we consider Kants solution to the age-old problem offreedom of the will and determinism in Chapter 3 of the Grounding.]


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III. Kants Moral Project

A. If all humans depended upon the same a priori categories to order and compose what

we call human knowledge, then it seemed to Kant that there must be some commonfoundation for moral knowledge discoverable by human reason. In his first major

ethical work Kant explains his ultimate goal for his moral theory: the seeking outand establishing [of] the supreme principle of morality.

B. Such a supreme moral principle cannot be found by studying human nature or human

activity (as, for example, the Subjectivists or Ethical Egoists might argue) as these are

all constrained by the contingent, hypothetical situations in which they arise. What isneeded, Kant claims, is an a priori investigation (a transcendental inquiry) into the

concepts of pure reason. Such an investigation will not only benefit the speculative

interests of philosophy, but will help to establish a guide and supreme norm to aidein correcting practical moral judgments and actions. This guide and supreme norm

would be universally applicable to all rational beings, providing an absolute

foundation for moral judgments. Kant called this supreme norm the CategoricalImperative.

C. Everything in nature, Kant asserts, works according to laws. For most of nature

this means merely the mindless imposition of such laws as a determination for somemovement (e.g. an apple falls from a tree in virtue of the imposition of the law of

gravity on that apple). But rational beings are unique, according to Kant, since they

alone have the power to act according to [their] conception of laws. Kant oftenuses the word principle for that law on which a rational being chooses to will a

particular action. He describes the will as a faculty of choosing only that which

reason, independently of inclination, recognizes as being practically necessary, i.e., as

good. Kant calls an objective principle (of practical reason) that necessitates the willa command, and the formula (practical statement) of the command, he calls an

imperative. Imperatives are always expressed by an oughtstatement; this, Kant says,

is indicative of the objective law of reason to a will that is not necessarilydetermined by this law because of its subjective constitution, in other words, our

wills are not perfect in following the dictates of practical reason; we are infected with

weakness of will

D. Kant goes on to distinguish between what he calls hypothetical and categoricalimperatives. An imperative is categorical in that it applies to all rational beingsuniversally and unconditionally because it points toward an action that is objectively

necessary in itself, without reference to another end, that is, it represents that whichis good in and of itself (intrinsic good) and not merely as some means to a particular

end. A hypothetical imperative, on the other hand, points toward some action that isgood for the purpose of securing some other end (i.e. something I do in an effort to

gain something else). Because the list of possible ends is infinite there are an infinite

possible number of hypothetical imperatives that might serve as principles of action.


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E. Leaving aside the hypothetical imperatives, Kant turns his attention to the possibility

of finding a categorical imperative. Since experience presents to us only the

conditional and contingent, this imperative can only be ascertained via an a priori

investigation. The categorical imperative, Kant says, alone purports to be apractical law in the sense that it alone is an unconditioned command and only

such a command carries with it that necessity which demanded from a law. It is thecharacteristics of universality and necessity that distinguish the categoricalimperative; hence, Kant says, there is only one categorical imperative and it is this:

Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it

should become a universal law. Kant offers several examples how one mightappropriately apply the categorical imperative, for example, a man in despair, acting

out of self-love, asks whether it is morally good for him to commit suicide and

shorten his time of despair. According to the categorical imperative this is a morallybad action because if the maxim when in despair, then commit suicide were to

become universal law it would lead to a contradiction in that the principle of self-love

in this one case supports the destruction of life, while in (most) other cases it supports

the preservation of life.

D. While there may be only one categorical imperative, Kant offers at least five variant

formulations of that categorical imperative. [Rachels focuses his discussion on onlythe second (Ch. 9) and third (Ch. 10) formulations of the Categorical Imperative.]

They are as follows:

1. The Formula of Universal Law

Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it

should become a universal law.

2. The Formula of the Law of Nature

Act as if the maxim of our action were to become through your will a universal lawof nature.

3. The Formula of the End in Itself

Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the

person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as means.

4. The Formula of Autonomy

From this there now follows the third practical principles of the will as the supreme

condition of the wills conformity with universal practical reason, viz., the idea of the

will of every rational being as a will that legislates universal law.

5. The Formula of the Kingdom of Ends


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For all rational beings stand under the law that each of them should treat himself and

all others never merely as means but always at the same time as an end in himself.

Hereby arises a systematic union of rational being through common objective laws,

i.e., a kingdom that may be called a kingdom of ends (certainly only an ideal),inasmuch as these laws have in view the very relation of such being to one another as

ends to means.

IV. Rachels Response to Kant

A. Rachels first critique of Kants moral view has to do with the absolute nature of

the moral rules derived from the Categorical Imperative, for example, the rule that one

ought never to lie. Problem cases like that of the Case of the Inquiring Murder,

mentioned by Rachels, seem to show quite clearly that no rule can be applied absolutely,

without any exception.

1. Kant responded to this criticism by arguing that we never have enough

knowledge about the consequences of our actions to determine when a

particular violation of a universal rule would be warranted. Therefore, we

must continue to govern our action by the rule derived from the

Categorical Imperative.

2. Rachels responds that Kant has made a mistake in this defense of his view.

By claiming that we do not have sufficient knowledge of the consequences

of an exception to the universal rule, Kant seems to suggest that we would

morally responsible for any bad consequences that follow from breaking a

rule. But, Rachels responds, it seems that Kant is not willing to entertain

the possibility that we might also be morally liable for any bad

consequences that follow from our unwavering adherence to a universal

rule. This inconsistency regarding moral responsibility is, in Rachels

opinion, very detrimental to Kants view.

B. Another criticism offered by Rachels is that Kants moral view does not offer a

way to settle the question when moral rules conflict. The Case of the Inquiring Murder

seems to present the situation where the rules Always tell the truth and Always protect

innocent human life (both of which Kant takes to be moral rules derived from the

Categorical Imperative) are in conflict. Why prefer the rule for truth telling over that of

the protection of innocent human life, as Kant suggests? Rachels, and many other critics

of Kant, claim that there is no good rationale for settling this kind of conflict between

universal rules.


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C. While Rachels offers some specific criticisms of Kants moral view, he does, in

the end, applaud Kants focus on the power and place of moral reasons in the formulation

and evaluation of moral judgments. With regard to moral reasons, consistency demands

that if they apply in one case, they must also apply in all other similar cases. This

suggests that Rachels is at least open to some form of universalism (perhaps evenabsolutism) when it comes to moral theory. Moral reasons, if they are valid at all, are

binding on all people at all times. This is a requirement of consistency; and Kant was

right to think that no rational person may deny it. (p. 134)

http://www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gaskilld/ethics/Kantian%20Ethics.htm
http://www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gaskilld/ethics/Kantian%20Ethics.htmhttp://www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gaskilld/ethics/Kantian%20Ethics.htm

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