First, I must apologize for being only 2 WHOLE DAYS late on this...I figured, though, that I would still post since people have until Tuesday to comment.
My bad!!!
Anyway...
After discussing each of the three formulations of Kant's Categorical Imperative, I was slightly disheartened by the seeming inapplicability of this Imperative to tough, real-world, ethical dilemmas. Specifically, we discussed the issue of abortion. One of the complications we stumbled upon in our discussion of the issue (besides our lack of knowledge about being able to consider fetuses as having "humanity" yet or not) was that we did not know how to deal with the circumstances of pregnancy. The possibility of the mother not being able to completely control getting pregnant forced the class to consider the abortion as not only a possible necessity for saving the mother's life but also as an opportunity for the mother to choose for herself if she wanted a child. My point here is that we had to take into account our flawed world--possible immoral acts (like rape) surrounding the moral dilemma--in order to address the dilemma. If we did not take those circumstances into account, we could have looked at the problem of abortion the way James brought up: we could have said for certain that the time a woman got to choose whether or not she wanted a child was at the time of conception.
So the reason the topic of abortion is a dilemma at all is because our world is messy--because it is not a "kingdom of ends" or a perfect, moral world. How can we, then, see this issue in terms of the Categorical Imperative? Even keeping promises is a complicated issue because of surrounding circumstances. If we could say that people ONLY promised to do good things or ONLY promised to help out good people, then we would have no problem saying that keeping promises is ALWAYS the right thing to do. But the fact of the matter is, it's not. Breaking a promise to help someone on a test by cheating, or breaking a promise to help Bob make a bomb to kill his neighbors, are both promises that I would consider moral to break. But to do so, according to Kant, would be to break the First Formulation of the Categorical Imperative, since extending "breaking promises" to a universal law would be irrational since it would eliminate the usefulness of a promise.
This leads me to wonder how much good the Categorical Imperative can really do for us. How is one to conduct him/herself as based on a universal law or as one would in a "merely possible kingdom of ends" when he/she is in a completely singular situation in a flawed, messy world? Can this imperative actually be used at all? Or is it nice to have but relatively dormant in its usefulness to us?
I agree with you that the categorical imperative becomes somewhat messy in the real world. But I think the point of it really is that even when we do something we wouldn't will as a universal law, we still acknowledge that it is immoral.
ReplyDeleteI have to say that although it is extremely difficult in most cases to do exactly what is considered moral or "right," it's still extremely important to have guidelines or moral laws. Because otherwise the world would be without any moral structure or any basic reasoning to begin though processes concerning moral dilemmas. You're right that many people do not abide by these moral laws in most moral cases, but I believe that's because the world is full of factors that we cannot control, yet control our thinking and reasoning in important moral dilemmas. But it's still important to have moral laws, otherwise humanity would be at a loss to what is morally right and wrong.
ReplyDeleteI would say I agree with Megan. Just because the rules cannot be followed exactly in every circumstance does not mean that they are not important. Maybe calling them laws would be strong, but as far as guidelines to determine the morality of one's action, I would that the Categorical Imperative is useful. Even if one fails to live up fully to it, I would say that attempting to do so and coming close to it will produce someone who is more moral overall than one who simply dismissed the idea of a moral code because it couldn't be followed 100% in every circumstance.
ReplyDeleteWhen I debated a similar topic with my roommate, he mentioned the term equivocal justice, which seems to describe Kant's approach to this issue- if, for example, I promised to tell a lie, I would subsequently be forced to either lie or break a promise. My understanding of Kant's analysis of this situation is that both choices are immoral, but there is a preferably just solution. I think Kant would say that rationality and logic are needed to conclude which choice fits the situation better. In response to your questions, I think Kant intended his philosophy for use in our flawed world, but his advice is to take the approach of a rational person thinking rationally, even if it's to conclude the better of two bad choices.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Aaron that Kant intended his philosophy for use in our flawed world. Though hundreds of years have passed, Kant's world was full of complicated, seemingly unsolvable moral dilemmas just as ours is today. Furthermore, Kant places much more emphasis on the end, not the mean– that is, the circumstances revolving around an issue do not determine its moral worth. Instead, the motive which lies behind an action determines its worth, as long as it may apply to a universal maxim that we could will to be a universal law. Given Kant's basic foundations, I believe that the Categorical Imperative can in fact be very useful in our world. Although certain circumstances complicate decision-making, once we pinpoint those universal laws, the extent to which we live by them determines our moral goodness.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with only focusing on the categorical imperative when studying Kant is that it does leave him very flat, removed, and theoretical. In order to get a more full picture of Kant's ethics, it is necessary to read "The Metaphysics of Morals" and pay close attention to the Doctrine of Virtue where Kant describes the duties that we have to ourselves and the duties we have to others and some of the consequences of these duties. Suddenly Kant is no longer so far removed from the world but addresses many real world issues. The Categorical Imperative does however allow us a universal test for judging the morality of actions. That's not a very small achievement or at the very least not a small claim.
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