Ethical Doctrine
If Kant's reputation as a philosopher owed solely to his
To understand Kant's ethics, you must attend to several matters. For one, you must understand what he means by a good will and how he argues that the morality of an action has nothing to do with what is attained by the action. Second, to possess a good will means to act from a motive of duty. Third, an agent acting from duty acts in accord with the moral law or the categorical imperative.
Kant was raised in a strict pietist household, a then-popular Pentecostal reform movement that stressed intense religious devotion, personal humility, and a literal reading of the Bible. He thus received a stern education that was strict, punitive, and disciplinary and favored Latin and religious instruction over mathematics and science.
A Good Will
Kant begins his little book
A will is good, Kant says, not because of what it achieves. It is good solely because of its willing. In other words, it must be “good in itself” without regard for consequences. To illustrate his notion of a good will, he compares the morality of two merchants.
The merchants in question perform the same action by giving the correct change to their customers. Suppose you find out that one gave the correct change because he didn't want to suffer a bad reputation by cheating customers. Suppose further that the other gave the correct change because he thought it was his moral duty to do so. Which merchant's action had moral worth? Only the action done from a motive of duty had moral worth. The other action revealed a selfish concern with one's own business reputation and thus possesses no moral worth. Thus, for Kant actions leading to identical consequences do not have the same moral worth. The goodness of an action has everything to do with its motive (Kant calls it a “maxim”) and nothing to go with what the action produces.
Acting from Duty: The Categorical Imperative
An agent acting from duty acts with respect for the moral law, according to Kant. This is the only attribute of a good will. Kant's basic moral principle is “Act according to that maxim which you can at the same time will to become a universal law.” This is his famed categorical imperative.
It has also been called his universality principle. It requires that we act in a manner that we would will everyone to act. He gives four illustrations of duties to show how the imperative applies.
It is widely believed that Kant lived only a strict and predictable life, which includes the oft-repeated story that neighbors would set their clocks by his daily walks. This is true only in part. As a young man Kant was a gregarious socialite and he remained fond of attending and hosting dinner parties for most of his life.
Perfect and Imperfect Duties
Kant's first illustration concerns self-preservation: the duty not to commit suicide. Kant instances “a man reduced to despair by a series of misfortunes” but enough in possession of his reason to ask whether it would be “contrary to duty to take his own life.” Could the maxim of his action become a universal law of nature? No, for agents possess self-love and must use this self-love to improve life. It would be a contradiction to use self-love to end one's life. With this example you can see that Kant permits no exceptions. No agent, no matter how dire his circumstances, is permitted to end his life. Kant calls such obligations without exception “perfect duties.”
Kant's second illustration concerns a person who intends to borrow money and make a false promise to repay it. It might be prudent to make such a promise; that is, it may benefit the agent. But the real question is whether the false promise would be consistent with duty. Here one may inquire whether the maxim of making a false promise should become a universal law. The answer must be “no,” since no one would then put any trust in promises, but instead would ridicule all statements beginning with “I promise” as vain pretences. The obligation to keep promises — and to tell the truth generally — is another perfect duty. Unlike the duty to self-preservation, which is a “duty to oneself,” the obligation to keep promises is a duty to others.
The third illustration concerns the duty to develop one's talents. If a person possesses a faculty or talent that would be useful, would it be contrary to duty to neglect such a talent? Yes, for ethics are grounded in rationality and rational beings will that their faculties should be developed, since “they serve him and have been given him for all sorts of possible purposes. The duty to develop one's talents is an “imperfect” duty to oneself. An “imperfect” duty is one with exceptions. Which of two talents an agent develops — and when and how the agent develops it — is up to him.
Finally, just as agents are not obligated to develop every faculty and talent they possess, so too they are not obligated to give to others in every instance. There is some leeway for the agent to pick and choose who he will benefit. But he cannot will to live a life where he benefits no one. “It is impossible that such a principle should have the universal validity of a law of nature,” Kant says. “Such a will would contradict itself, since many cases might occur in which one would have need of the love and sympathy of others, and in which, by such a law of nature, sprung from his own will, we would deprive himself of all hope of the aid he desires.” No man is an island; it is inconsistent for you to will to help no one, since you would then be cutting yourself off from the aid of others, should you ever need it.
