Best Sontipat Supanusonti Perspective Dr. Ivy Helman Explain Kants categorical imperative.

Why should the imperative be todays standard of morality or why should it not? According to Kant, human beings occupy a special place in creation, and morality can be summed up in one ultimate commandment of reason, or imperative, from which all duties and obligations derive. He defined an imperative as any proposition that declares a certain action, or inaction, to be necessary. A categorical imperative denotes an absolute, unconditional requirement that asserts its authority in all circumstances, both required and justified as an end in itself. It is best summed in its first formulation, Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." (Immanuel Kant. Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals pg. 30) While the imperative may be applicable in some situation, I do not believe it should be todays standard of morality as it allows for no exceptions, and thus are not practical enough in todays globalized world. Immanuel Kant outlines the Universal Law Formation of the Categorical Imperative as a method for determining morality of actions. This formula is a two parts test. First, one creates a maxim and considers whether the maxim could be a universal law for all rational beings. Second, one determines whether rational beings would will it to be a universal law. Once it is clear that the maxim passes both prongs of the test, there are no exceptions.

To best understand the imperative, I believe it is best illustrated using one consistent hypothetical situation. As a paramedic faced with a distraught widow who asks whether her late husband suffered in his accidental death, you must decide which maxim to create and based on the test which action to perform. The maxim when answering a widow's inquiry as to the nature and duration of her late husbands death, one should always tell the truth regarding the nature of her late husband's death (Maxim one) passes both parts of the Universal Law Formation of the Categorical Imperative. Consequently, according to Kant, Maxim one is a moral action. The initial stage of the Universal Law Formation of the Categorical Imperative requires that a maxim be universally applicable to all rational beings. Maxim one succeeds in passing the first stage. We can easily imagine a world in which paramedics always answer widows truthfully when queried. Therefore, this maxim is logical and everyone can abide by it without causing a logical impossibility. The next logical step is to apply the second stage of the test. The second requirement is that a rational being would will this maxim to become a universal law. This is derived mainly from Kants Second Formulation of the categorical imperative, Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means to an end." (36) In testing this part, you must decide whether in every case, a rational being would believe that the morally correct action is to tell the truth. First, it is clear that the widow expects to know the truth. A lie would only serve to spare her feelings if she believed it to be the truth. Therefore,

even people who would consider lying to her, must concede that the correct and expected action is to tell the truth. By asking she has already decided, good or bad, that she must know the truth. What if telling the truth brings the widow to the point where she commits suicide, however? Is telling her the truth then a moral action although its consequence is this terrible response? If telling the widow the truth drives her to commit suicide, it seems like no rational being would will the maxim to become a universal law. The suicide is, however, a consequence of your initial action. The suicide has no bearing, at least for the Categorical Imperative, on whether telling the truth is moral or not. Likewise it is impossible to judge whether upon hearing the news, the widow would commit suicide. Granted it is a possibility, but there are a multitude of alternative choices that she could make and it is impossible to predict each one. To decide whether rational being would will a maxim to become a law, the maxim itself must be examined rationally and not its consequences. Accordingly, the maxim passes the second test. (37) Conversely, some people might argue that in telling the widow a lie, you spare her years of torment and suffering. These supporters of white lies feel the maxim should read, when facing a distraught widow, you should lie in regards to the death of her late husband in order to spare her feelings. Applying the first part of the Universal Law Formation of the Categorical Imperative, it appears that this maxim is a moral act. Certainly, a universal law that prevents the feelings of people who are already in pain from being hurt further seems like an excellent universal law. Unfortunately for this line of objection, the only reason a lie works is because

the person being lied to believes it to be the truth. In a situation where every widow is lied to in order to spare her feelings, then they never get the truth. This leads to a logical contradiction because no one will believe a lie if they know it a lie and the maxim fails. (41) Perhaps the die-hard liar can regroup and test a narrower maxim. If it is narrow enough so that it encompasses only a few people, then it passes the first test. For example, the maxim could read, When facing a distraught widow whose late husband has driven off a bridge at night, and he struggled to get out of the car but ended up drowning, and he was wearing a brown suit and brown loafers, then you should tell the widow that he died instantly in order to spare her feelings. We can easily imagine a world in which all paramedics lied to widows in this specific situation. That does not necessarily mean that it will pass the second test however. Even if it does pass the first test, narrowing down maxim can create other problems. For instance circumstances may change and the people who were originally included in the universal law, may not be included anymore. Consequently you many not want to will your maxim to be a universal law. Likewise, if one person can make these maxims that include only a select group of people, so can everyone else. If you create a maxim about lying to widows that is specific enough to pass the first test, so can everyone else. (32) One must ask if rational beings would really will such a world in which there would be many, many specific, but universal, laws. In order to answer this question, one must view oneself rationally, and not oneself in certain specific situation. You must consider that you could be the widow in the situation rather

than the paramedic, and then decide whether you would will such a universal law. Hence, if we cannot use maxims that are either too broad nor too narrow; neither too vague nor too specific, then what is the right maxim? The best way to find the right size maxim is built directly into the categorical imperative itself: if the categorical imperative directs us to act as we would will to be universal, then we should choose the size of our maxims such that we would will that size of maxim to be universal. This form of reasoning will foster a feeling of properness in the choosing of actions and fully respects personal perspective in the same way that the original categorical imperative does. Taking the Categorical Imperative as a whole, I believe there is some feature of it that would be suitable for todays world. Kants theory, in my opinion, provides for correct ethical code, because it applies reason as an instrument for locating universal moral principle, and emphasizes individual wellbeing as its essential value. Moreover, since it instructs for the ethical decision to be derived from logic, the categorical imperative stays to be the subject for constant improvement and could recognize the emergence of a better moral principle. In addition, one could support this principle with the fact that no other good feature of human nature is intrinsically good under any good will, which is the essential tool of the categorical imperative principle. However, I believe that in practice, Kants categorical imperative will be unrealizable. First, a problem with the idea that moral actions are only those that can be universalized: a monk taking his vows of celibacy, charity, silence, and so on would be difficult to paint as immoral and yet, if his principles were universalized,

humanity would quickly and quietly pass away. As such, Kant would have to deem his principles morally unacceptable. Likewise a lady who gave all her money to charity and embarked on a life of austerity, this act would surely have some moral worth and yet, if it were universalized, then the very act of charity would lose its value and society cease to function, and as such, Kant would have to deem it impossible to will and therefore immoral. Furthermore, under Kant's theory we can only position ourselves for the benefit of universal good thereby denying ourselves the opportunity to live by any other code. If we deny codes of conduct, we could easily deny our religions. Kant believed we could not rely on religion because the belief in God cannot be concretely proven. Kant purposely disregards religion in his theory. He declared that wisdom could only be valid if it is applied to the world as we know it. In other words, we can only use what we know and we should not dwell on things we can absolutely prove or see with our own eyes. I feel that religion is an integral part of morality in todays world and thus, this is another reason why Kants Categorical imperative is not practical in todays world. In conclusion, Kants theory is effective in creating a logical map in deciding whether or not an action can be called moral. I find that Kants theory fails because of his unwillingness to budge from his viewpoint that there are exceptions to certain moral rules and guidelines that his theory and the categorical imperative do not allow for. While Kant was a respectable Philosopher, I believe that there will never be just one ethical theory that we all agree on. This is part of being free which was an important aspect of Kant's ethical theory.