Moral Status Phần 5 ppt

kindly or benevolent feelings, but rather that such emotions must

not be what directs the will towards the performance of duty. To act

from a good will is to act from morally sound principles, and to do

this because it is what reason requires.

But how are we to know which principles of action are morally

sound? Kant proposes a single universal principle, from which all

other moral principles may be derived. This principle, he says, ‘is of

such widespread significance as to hold, not merely for men, but for

all rational beings as such—not merely subject to contingent condi￾tions and expectations, but with absolute necessity’.17 He calls this

principle the Categorical Imperative, by contrast with those impera￾tives that are hypothetical, i.e. that hold only when the agent has cer￾tain goals.

Kant offers several formulations of the Categorical Imperative,

which he regards as logically equivalent. One of the most important

of these is the Formula of Universal Law, which requires that we act

only upon principles that it is rational to want everyone to act upon

at all times. In Kant’s words, ‘I ought never to act except in such a

way that I can also will that my maxim should become a universal

law.’18 The ‘maxim’ is the principle upon which one acts, whether or

not one has ever consciously formulated that principle. The

Categorical Imperative requires us to act only upon maxims which

any rational being could, without contradiction, agree to act upon

all of the time.

One example which Kant uses to illustrate the universalizability

requirement is of a person who obtains money by making a false

promise of repayment. The maxim of such an action, Kant says,

contradicts itself when proposed as a universal moral law, because if

everyone made false promises for personal gain, the very institution

of promising would be destroyed.19 Since it is irrational to will the

universalization of a self-contradictory maxim, we must conclude

that it is always morally wrong to make a false promise.

This formulation of the Categorical Imperative has faced serious

objections. Perhaps the most damaging is that Kant provides no

principled way of determining which elements of the situation may

legitimately be included within our formulation of the maxim of an

action. Thus, it is nearly always possible to formulate a maxim under

Personhood and Moral Rights 97

17 Ibid. 67. 18 Ibid. 19 Ibid. 85.

chap. 4 4/30/97 3:09 PM Page 97

which an action falls, which a rational being could without self-con￾tradiction will to become universal law. For instance, if you wish to

make a false promise in order to obtain money, you may formulate

the maxim that it is permissible to make a false promise when the

circumstances are exactly like the ones in which you find yourself.

This is a maxim that could be universalized without self-contradic￾tion, since there will be very few cases in which a rational being is in

exactly the same situation that you are; hence the institution of

promise making would be in little danger if that maxim were uni￾versally followed. But the objections to this formulation of the

Categorical Imperative need not concern us further, since there is

another formulation which is more directly relevant to Kant’s de￾fence of the Personhood Only view.

Persons as Ends in Themselves

A second formulation of the Categorical Imperative is what Kant

calls the Formula of the End in Itself. In his words,

man, and in general every rational being, exists as an end in himself, not

merely as a means for arbitrary use by this or that will: he must in all his

actions, whether they are directed to himself or to other rational beings,

always be viewed at the same time as an end.

20

To treat persons as ends in themselves is to treat them as having

‘dignity’, or ‘intrinsic value’. This is a value ‘which is exalted above

all price, and so admits of no equivalent’.21 Because persons are

ends in themselves, their autonomy must be respected, not just as

one component of utility, but as something that imposes strict con￾straints upon the ways in which they may be treated. There is noth￾ing wrong with treating persons as means to ends that they have

accepted; we do this in all co-operative human activities. It is, how￾ever, wrong to treat persons as if they were mere means, things that

we are entitled to use towards ends that are not their own. Because

we could not rationally agree to being treated as mere means, max￾ims that allow us to treat other persons as mere means cannot con￾sistently be willed to become universal law; thus, the two

formulations of the Categorical Imperative turn out to be substan￾tially equivalent.

98 An Account of Moral Status

20 The Moral Law, 90. 21 Ibid. 96.

chap. 4 4/30/97 3:09 PM Page 98