LECTURE NOTES #10 (WEEK 10)
Required Textbook Readings to Accompany these Lecture Notes:
· The Elements of Moral Philosophy: Chapter 9, "Are There Absolute Moral Rules?"
· "The Categorical Imperative" -- an excerpt from Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals.
Previously, we learned about the difference between Deontology and Consequentialism:
Deontology (df.): the morality of an action does not depend on its consequences; sometimes you should perform an action even if it would have bad overall effects, and sometimes should not perform an action even if it would have good overall effects.
· For example, a Deontologist could say (but doesn’t necessarily have to say) that it is always wrong to kill an innocent person, no matter what the specific circumstances, and no matter what good consequences might result from doing so. And a Deontologist could say (but doesn’t necessarily have to say) that it is always wrong to steal, no matter what the situation is.
· The name “Deontology” comes from the Greek word "deon", meaning duty or obligation.
Consequentialism (df.): whether or not an action is moral depends only its consequences (in other words, only on its effects); if it has good consequences, then it is moral, and if it has bad consequences, then it is immoral. Nothing else is relevant to whether the action is moral.
· There are two forms of Consequentialism: Ethical Egoism (the right thing to do is whatever benefits you the most) and Utilitarianism (the right thing to do is whatever results in the best overall consequences, including increased happiness and well-being for the most people).
The main focus of this module will be the form of Deontology developed by the great Prussian philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804).
Kant believed that some moral rules are ABSOLUTE, meaning that they have no exceptions whatsoever.
For example, he thought that “You should never lie” is a moral rule with no exceptions—he thought that it is always immoral to lie, no matter the circumstances and no matter the consequences.
This is completely different than the approach a Utilitarian would take when thinking about lying … or about anything else.
Because they are Consequentialists, Utilitarians believe that whether an action is moral always depends on its consequences and on nothing else. On their view, there is no such thing as an action that is immoral independent of its effects, and so there is no such thing as a kind of action (telling a lie, stealing, killing … etc.) that should never be done, no matter what.
So Utilitarians do not think that there are absolute moral rules.
[10.2.] Anscombe’s Rejection of Consequentialism.
But before we turn to Kant, let’s quickly examine the example that kicks of EMP ch.9: the British philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe (1919-2001; sometimes referred to as G.E.M. Anscombe, which stands for Gertrude Margaret Elizabeth) rejected Consequentialism and Utilitarianism, saying that there are some actions that are always immoral, no matter what the consequences.
One example given in EMP ch.9 sec.1: boiling a live baby. Anscombe maintained that even if you could save one million lives by boiling an infant, it would still be immoral to do so.
Anscombe also believed that the United States' use of atomic bombs to destroy the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II was immoral.[1]
She did not base this claim on the idea that the bombings resulted in more harm than benefit—she may well have believed that the bombings actually did result in more lives being saved in the long run (because they resulted in the war ending earlier than it otherwise would have).[2]
Her point was that those good consequences are irrelevant for morality. Killing innocent people is always wrong, no matter what consequences might result.
[So Anscombe illustrates the view that we should not base the morality of an action on its consequences. But it is unclear whether Anscombe intended to adopt Deontology. She seems to have favored an approach to ethics that doesn’t focus on the morality of individual actions at all: Virtue Ethics.[3] This approach dates back to the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle (384–322 BCE), who is covered in our Ancient Philosophy course (PHIL 3100). Virtue Ethics is discussed in EMP ch.12—we will not be covering it in this course.]
To explain his form of Deontology, Kant first pointed out that there are two different ways that we use the word "should" (and its synonym "ought"):
(i) Sometimes, we use "should" to talk about obligations that depend on desire: if you want x, then you should do a (where a stands for some action). For example:
· If you want to go to law school, you should study for the LSAT.
· If you want to run a marathon, you should train for it.
· If you want to improve your tennis game, then you should play tennis regularly.
In these examples, you have an obligation to do something because you have a specific desire; it is only because you want x that you ought to do a. In order to escape the obligation to do a, you need only stop desiring x.
Kant calls these kinds of "should" statement …
Hypothetical Imperatives* (df.): principles or rules that you are obligated to follow because you have some relevant desire; e.g., if you want to improve your skills as a baker, then you should bake more often.
*By itself, the word "imperative" refers to a command, order, or rule. Hypothetical imperatives are hypothetical because they are based on the assumption that there is something that you want: hypothetically speaking, if you want to go to law school, then you should study for the LSAT.
On Kant’s point of view, hypothetical imperatives DO NOT express MORAL obligation. They don’t have anything to do with morality. He explains what they are in order to make a contrast between them and the second kind of “should” statement. It’s that second kind of statement that does express MORAL obligation.
(ii) We also use "should" (and "ought") to talk about obligations that do not depend on desire. This second use of "should" expresses things that you are just plain obligated to do, period. For example,
· you should not kill innocent people.
You cannot escape the obligation not to kill innocent people simply by changing your desires—in fact, you cannot escape this sort of obligation at all. You ought not to kill innocent people, period.
Kant calls this second kind of should statement …
Categorical Imperatives* (df.): principles or rules that everyone is obligated to follow, no matter what; e.g., you should not kill innocent people.
By itself, the word "categorical" means absolute, without exception or qualification.
Kant believes that "should" or "ought" statements that express moral obligation are all categorical imperatives—no moral rule is a hypothetical imperative.
In other words, Kant believes that all moral rules are categorical imperatives: they tell you that you should do something, and it is irrelevant whether you want to attain some goal by doing so.
Hypothetical imperatives are relatively easy to understand: they are possible because we have desires.
But how are categorical imperatives possible? I.e., how can we be obligated to do something, period, whether or not we want to do it?
Kant's answer: categorical "should"s—including moral "should"s—are possible because we have reason—because we are rational beings who can think about reasons for and against doing things and then decide whether or not to do them based on those reasons.
This is because all categorical imperatives (and therefore all moral rules) can be derived from a single principle that all rational beings must accept. On Kant's view, if you are rational, then you will accept this one central principle of behavior. All categorical imperatives follow from this central principle; so once you accept the central principle, you will come to see what other rules you should obey.
The one rule or principle that all rational beings must accept is:
The Categorical Imperative: "Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." (Kant, Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant p.1; quoted at EMP p.137)
The Categorical Imperative (capitalized, singular) is different than the individual categorical imperatives (lower-case, plural). The individual rules of morality, like “Don’t lie” and “Don’t steal”, are categorical imperatives … and on Kant’s view, they all flow from The Categorical Imperative, which is the central idea of his moral theory.
Kant says, not simply that you must accept the Categorical Imperative in order to be moral, but that you must accept the Categorical Imperative in order to be rational. If you do not accept it, then you are behaving, not just immorally, but irrationally.
[What is quoted above is Kant's first version of the Categorical Imperative. In the next Learning Module, we will consider a second version of the Categorical Imperative.]
[10.2.3.] A Process, and an Example: Lying.
The Categorical Imperative can be understood as providing a two-step process for deciding whether an action is moral:
Step 1: Figure out what "maxim" (a rule or principle of behavior) you would be following were you to perform that action.
This seems pretty easy… if the action is doing a, then the rule will simply be the rule that says to do a. For example, if the action you are considering is giving money to a charity, the maxim will be "Give money to a charity." If the action is stealing a bicycle, the maxim will be "Steal a bicycle."
Step 2: Figure out whether you, as a rational being, can will for that maxim to "become a universal law," i.e., whether you can rationally will for everyone to follow that maxim, all the time.
· If you can, then the maxim is "universalizable" and the action is morally permissible.
· If you cannot, then the maxim is not "universalizable" and the action is immoral.
Let’s apply these two steps to Kant’s example: lying. Suppose you are thinking about lying to someone about something…
Step 1: Figure out the “maxim” of your action. In this example it would be: It is OK to lie.
Step 2: Figure out whether you, as a rational being, can approve of that maxim being followed by everyone. Kant says that you cannot. Here’s why:
· Presently we assume that other people mean to tell us the truth unless we have some specific reason to think that they are being dishonest. This is why we trust what our friends and family tell us, and what we see and read in the news: there is a general presumption of honesty.
· But this would change if everyone adopted the rule “It is OK to lie.” This rule is self-defeating: if everyone were to begin lying whenever they wanted to, then people would stop believing one another, so it would do no good to lie, and people would stop lying.
· If everyone were to begin following the rule, then eventually no one would be following it any more. This is why no rational being can will that everyone follow the rule: to will that everyone follow it amounts to willing that everyone begin lying AND cease lying. It is to will a contradiction.
contradiction (df.): a statement that either says or implies both that something is the case and that that same thing is not the case (p and not p). For example:
· Cheese is made from milk, and it is false that cheese is made from milk.
· Atlanta is the capital of Georgia, and Atlanta is not the capital of Georgia.
· I am over six feet tall and under six feet tall.
· Everyone should begin lying, and everyone should stop lying.
No rational being can will that a contradictory rule be adopted by everyone.
This is why Kant thought that lying is always immoral: it follows a rule that no rational being can will to become a universal law.
The Categorical Imperative rules out a number of other different maxims as being immoral to follow. Kant details four of them in Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals.
1. "For love of myself, I make it my principle to shorten my life when by a longer duration it threatens more evil than satisfaction" (Kant p.1). In other words, the maxim is: I will end my life in order to improve it, i.e., in order to make things better for myself.
· On Kant's view, this maxim is contradictory: "One immediately sees a contradiction* in a system of nature whose law would be to destroy life by the feeling [namely, love or concern for oneself] whose special office [i.e., purpose] is to impel the improvement of life" (Kant p.1).
· So what Kant is saying is this: it is contradictory to try to improve one's situation by ending one's own life… that doesn't make one's situation better; it ends it! It is like attempting to renovate a house by burning it to the ground. The following is a contradiction: “I am going to improve my life, and I am going to end my life.”
· So committing suicide in order to improve your life violates the Categorical Imperative and is therefore immoral, according to Kant.
2. "When I believe myself to be in need of money, I will borrow money and promise to repay it, although I know I shall never do so" (Kant p.2). For example, suppose that you need money to buy drugs for your sick child. You have no realistic prospects for earning the money, and you do not have enough collateral to honestly borrow money from a bank. So you forge documents that show that you own a house and a car that you can use for collateral. The bank gives you a loan based on those forged documents, and you take the loan, knowing that you will never be able to repay it.
· You cannot will that the maxim "When you need money, lie in order to get a loan" become a universal law, because such a law would be self-defeating: if everyone followed this rule, then eventually no one would have any reason to believe anyone else was making such a promise in good faith – so people would stop lending money.
· As Kant puts it: "For the universality of a law which says that anyone who believes himself to be in need could promise what he pleased with the intention of not fulfilling it would make the promise itself and the end to be accomplished by it impossible; no one would believe what was promised to him but would only laugh at any such assertion as vain pretense" (Kant p.2).
· So in adopting this maxim, you would really be adopting a contradiction: "Everyone lie to borrow money, and everyone stop lying to borrow money." And no rational being could will for this maxim could will this.
· The problem is not that this would have bad consequences. Maybe it would have bad consequences, e.g., no one would be able to open a business because banks no longer make business loans, and this would have a negative impact on our economy and on people's well-being. But as a Deontologist, Kant does not think consequences are relevant for morality.
· The problem is that if you will that this maxim become a universal law, you are willing (a) that everyone follow it, AND you are willing that (b) that everyone stop following it – and that is contradictory. This is why no rational being can will that it become a universal law.
· So promising to repay a loan when you have no intention of repaying violates the Categorical Imperative, and is immoral.
3. A man "finds in himself a talent which could, by means of some cultivation, make him in many respects a useful man. But he finds himself in comfortable circumstances and prefers indulgence in pleasure to troubling himself with broadening and improving his fortunate natural gifts. Now, however, let him ask whether his maxim of neglecting his gifts, besides agreeing with his propensity to idle amusement, agrees also with what is called duty." His maxim is this: I will "let [my] talents rust and resolve to devote [my] life merely to idleness, indulgence, and propagation—in a word, to pleasure" (Kant p.2).
· No rational being can will that this maxim become a universal law or that "it should be implanted in us by a natural instinct." This is because a rational being will necessarily recognize that any talent a person has, has been "given to him for all sorts of possible purposes." (Kant p.2) As Kant scholar J. Kemp puts the point: "To refuse to develop any of one's talents would be irrational; it would be failing to take rational means to the achievement of any of one's [goals], and all of us must have some such [goals]."[4]
4. "Let each one [i.e., each person] be as happy as heaven wills, or as he can make himself; I will not take anything from him or even envy him; but to his welfare or to his assistance in time of need I have no desire to contribute" (Kant p.2). The maxim that Kant is considering here is: I will ignore the well-being and needs of others.
· You cannot will that this become a universal law, because as a rational being, you would not want others to ignore your well-being when you are in need: "instances can often arise in which he would need the love and sympathy of others, and in which he would have robbed himself, by such a law of nature springing from his own will, of all hope of the aid he desires" (Kant p.2).
So the Categorical Imperative implies that you should follow these rules:
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perfect duties (may never be violated, no matter what) |
imperfect duties (can be overridden or outweighed by a perfect duty) |
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duties to oneself
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1. You should never commit suicide in order to avoid suffering.
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3. You should cultivate your own talents. |
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duties to others
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2. You should never promise to repay a loan when you know you won't be able to. |
4. You should attend to the well-being and needs of others. |
Maxims (1) and (2) express "perfect duties"—they do not allow for any exceptions whatsoever. No matter what the circumstances or the consequences, it is never permissible to violate them.
OPTIONAL VIDEO
"The Good Life: Kant" (Wi-Phi, 5:53)
This provides a very broad overview of Kant's entire moral philosophy and shows how his Categorical Imperative is connected with some of his other ideas about morality.
We have seen that Kant took the Categorical Imperative to imply the following specific rules of morality:
· Never commit suicide in order to improve your life.
· Never promise to repay a loan when you know you won’t be able to.
· Cultivate your own talents.
· Attend to the well-being and needs of others.
We have also seen that Kant thought the following maxim was also implied by the Categorical Imperative: "Never tell a lie."
On Kant's view, you are always obligated to avoid lying, even if it means telling an inquiring murderer the location of his next victim (see the story about the Inquiring Murder, in EMP Ch.9 sec.3… note that Kant uses the story of the Inquiring Murderer to give a second argument against lying, one that does not depend on the Categorical Imperative).
OPTIONAL VIDEO
"Kant's Axe" (1.33)
This short, animated clip explains Kant's position on lying.
How could Kant possibly defend such a claim? One of the arguments he gave can be stated as follows:
Kant’s “Categorical Imperative” Argument Against Lying (EMP p.138):
AN EXPLANATION OF PREMISE 3… Why think that “It is okay to lie” is a non-universalizable rule?
· Presently we assume that other people mean to tell us the truth unless we have some specific reason to think that they are being dishonest. This is why we trust what our friends and family tell us, and what we see and read in the news: there is a general presumption of honesty.
· But this would change if everyone adopted the rule “It is okay to lie.” This rule is self-defeating: if everyone were to begin lying whenever they wanted to, then people would stop believing one another, so it would do no good to lie, and people would stop lying.
· If everyone were to begin following the rule, then eventually no one would be following it any more. This is why no rational being can will that everyone follow the rule: to will that everyone follow it amounts to willing that everyone begin lying AND cease lying. It is to will a contradiction.
If this argument is sound, then it is always immoral to lie, no matter what the circumstances. If it is not sound, then what exactly is wrong with it? Is it invalid? Or does it have a false premise? Or both?[5]
Kant assumed that the maxim we should consider when wondering whether we should lie is always: “It is OK to lie.”
But why use this very general maxim? Why not use a more specific maxim, one that describes in more detail what’s going on in the case at hand?
For example, suppose you are lying in order to save the life of an innocent person (as in Kant’s own Case of the Inquiring Murderer – see EMP p.139). In that situation, you could just as easily say that the maxim of your action is: “It is OK to lie in order to save an innocent life.”
This maxim can be rationally willed to be adopted universally, since it is not self-defeating like “It is OK to lie.”
· If everyone were to begin following this rule, then we would not reach a point where no one is following it anymore.
· In fact, nearly everyone would already follow this rule if put in a position where they could save an innocent life by lying.
So Kant’s own theory supports lying in order to save an innocent life!
More generally, the challenge posed by Anscombe is as follows. If you’re going to have an ethical theory based on rules, then how do you know how general or how specific to make the rules? Kant offers us no guidance in answering this question.
His own rigoristic convictions on the subject of lying were so intense that it never occurred to him that a lie could be relevantly described as anything but just a lie (e.g. as “a lie in such-and-such circumstances”). His rule about universalizable maxims is useless without stipulations as to what shall count as a relevant description of an action with a view to constructing a maxim about it.[6]
[10.6.] The Valuable Lesson in Kant's Ethical Theory.
Although James Rachels does not accept Kant's claim that the Categorical Imperative is the basis of all morality, he does think that we can derive a valuable lesson from Kant's ethical theory:
Morality requires consistency, in that it applies to everyone in the same way. Its demands are the same for everyone. No one is exempt from moral rules. To think that some moral rules don't hold for you but do hold for others would be to violate this requirement.
An example: One way of being inconsistent is to accept a fact as a reason that justifies you doing x, but not to accept it as a reason that justifies someone else doing x. Illustrations:
· Suppose I am at your house, get thirsty, and drink your beer without your permission. I cannot turn around and blame you if you do the same thing at my house on a later occasion.
· Applying this lesson to the case of the Inquiring Murderer: Suppose that you think that it is right to lie to the Inquiring Murderer in order to keep him from discovering where your friend Harold is hiding. So you lie and the murderer runs off into the night. But the next day, Harold is being chased again, and once again runs to your place to hide. This time you are not home, and your roommate Maude answers the door. Maude lies to the Inquiring Murderer, just like you did the night before. You cannot blame Maude for doing exactly what you did the night before; i.e., you cannot hold her blameworthy for lying to the Inquiring Murderer. There is no relevant difference between the first situation and the second; the situations are identical except that you answer the door in one case and Maude answers in the second. To say that what you did was right but that what Maude did was wrong is to be inconsistent.
According to Rachels, Kant did not recognize that the claim that "moral rules are absolute" is ambiguous (i.e., it has more than one meaning, and it is not clear which one is intended).
"Moral rules are absolute" can mean either:
1. Moral rules apply the same to everyone; morality doesn't differ from person to person [this is the lesson that Rachels thinks is true].
2. Moral rules always take the form: "Never do x, no matter what" [Rachels thinks this is false].
According to Rachels, Kant's mistake was in accepting (2) rather that (1).
[1] "Mr. Truman's Degree" is the pamphlet in which Anscombe argued against the granting of an honorary degree by Oxford University to Harry S. Truman, based on his decision to drop nuclear weapons on Japan.
[2] According to the Radiation Effects Research Foundation, between 90,000 and 166,000 people died as a result of the bombing of Hiroshima and another 60,000 to 80,000 died due to the bombing of Nagasaki. According to the United States Department of Energy Office of Heritage and History Resources, Hiroshima was a militarily relevant target. In addition to its 300,000 civilians, 43,000 Japanese soldiers were there. Little Boy, the uranium bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima, "detonated 1,900 feet above the city, directly over a parade field where soldiers of the Japanese Second Army were doing calisthenics." Fat Man, the plutonium bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki, detonated 1,650 feet in the air about midway between two of the principal targets in that city: the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works and the Mitsubishi-Urakami Torpedo Works.
[3] Interpreters of Anscombe's work disagree about whether she really did mean to advocate a virtue-based approach to ethics. See Julia Driver, "Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe," The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2014 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
[4] Commentators disagree about how best to understand this example. What I have suggested here is the explanation provided by J. Kemp. Here is a longer quotation: "What chiefly distinguishes man from the rest of creation, according to Kant, is his possession of freedom; this in turn depends on his possession of reason, not in the sense that he is capable of theoretical activity, but in the sense that he can set ends or purposes before himself (whereas the rest of creation can merely fulfil passively the purposes of nature). And this gives its point to the expression… 'For as a rational being he necessarily wills...'. Whatever a man's private aim or purpose in life may be, the fact that he has such a purpose is a sign of his rationality, even though all men, being imperfectly rational, have some purposes which they would not have if they were perfectly rational, and fail to have some which they would then have. Now any human purpose requires the exercise of some talent or capacity for its fulfilment; for a talent or capacity just is the ability to take appropriate means to given ends. Man's ability to conceive of purposes would be of no value, and his freedom would be incomplete, if he were not also endowed with the capacity for discovering and adopting the best means for the attainment of those purposes. Hence to refuse to develop any of one's talents would be irrational; it would be failing to take rational means to the achievement of any of one's aims or purposes, and all of us must have some such aims or (as we should more naturally say) desires. But why, it might be asked, should I not restrict my efforts to developing those talents which will enable me to live a more pleasant life; why should I worry about developing my moral capacities or increasing my ability to help others ? Because, Kant would reply, you are a man and a rational being, and to restrict the development of one's capacities to those which provide an increase of pleasure for oneself is to put oneself on a level with the beasts, to behave in an inhuman and irrational way. It is because of this that a man cannot rationally assent to being a member of an order of nature in which self-development was universally neglected. Moreover, the use of reason, as manifested in the deliberate cultivation of one's talents, in order merely to promote one's own happiness is unlikely to be successful, human nature being what it is: 'the more a cultivated reason concerns itself with the aim of enjoying life and happiness, the farther does man get away from true contentment.'" "Kant's Examples of the Categorical Imperative," Philosophical Quarterly 8 (30), 1958, 63-71, p.69.
[5] Rachels discusses another argument Kant gave for this conclusion, based on the idea that we can never be absolutely certain what the consequences of our actions will be; see EMP pp.132–33.
[6] G.E.M. Anscombe, “Modern Moral Philosophy,” Philosophy 33 (124), 1958, 1-19, p.2.