Kantianism
Moral Reasoning
- Aim: Equip students to become critically minded citizens who have the ability to think through the big moral and political questions we all confront as citizens
Kant (Deontology)
- Rejects utilitarianism: They were half right- of course we seek to avoid pain, and seek pleasure. But to think that pain and pleasure drives our behavior.
- Thinks that the individual person has a dignity that commands our respect- because we are rational beings, capable of reason.; and autonomous being- capable of acting and choosing freely. This sets us apart from physical creatures with appetites—animals.
- Freedom: Not absence of obstacles to getting what we want. Eg: Slave to satisfying those appetite and impulses.
1. Autonomy
- Kant’s freedom: To act freely = to act autonomously = to act accordingly to a law I give myself (not laws of nature, cause & effect).
- Opposite of autonomy = Heteronomy: To act according to desires I haven’t chosen myself. (laws of nature, case & effect) Eg: Dropped ball- ball not acting freely, acting according to law of gravity. If we act on inclination or pursue pleasure- we act as means to the realization of ends given outside us. We are instruments rather than authors of the purposes we pursue.
- To act freely is not to choose best means to given end, is to choose end itself for it’s own sake. (That’s smth humans can do and balls can’t) If we act autonomously i.e according to a law we give ourselves, we do smth for it’s own sake as an ends to itself. We seize to be instruments to purposes outside us—we become an ends to ourselves.
- This capacity to act freely gives life it’s dignity- regarding persons not as means but ends in itself. That’s why it’s wrong to use people for the sake of other people’s well-being or happiness. This is the reason why utilitarianism goes wrong, why it’s important to respect the dignity of a person and to uphold their rights.
What gives an act its moral worth?
If it cant be directed to
- Aim: Equip students to become critically minded citizens who have the ability to think through the big moral and political questions we all confront as citizens
Kant (Deontology)
- Rejects utilitarianism: They were half right- of course we seek to avoid pain, and seek pleasure. But to think that pain and pleasure drives our behavior.
- Thinks that the individual person has a dignity that commands our respect- because we are rational beings, capable of reason.; and autonomous being- capable of acting and choosing freely. This sets us apart from physical creatures with appetites—animals.
- Freedom: Not absence of obstacles to getting what we want. Eg: Slave to satisfying those appetite and impulses.
1. Autonomy
- Kant’s freedom: To act freely = to act autonomously = to act accordingly to a law I give myself (not laws of nature, cause & effect).
- Opposite of autonomy = Heteronomy: To act according to desires I haven’t chosen myself. (laws of nature, case & effect) Eg: Dropped ball- ball not acting freely, acting according to law of gravity. If we act on inclination or pursue pleasure- we act as means to the realization of ends given outside us. We are instruments rather than authors of the purposes we pursue.
- To act freely is not to choose best means to given end, is to choose end itself for it’s own sake. (That’s smth humans can do and balls can’t) If we act autonomously i.e according to a law we give ourselves, we do smth for it’s own sake as an ends to itself. We seize to be instruments to purposes outside us—we become an ends to ourselves.
- This capacity to act freely gives life it’s dignity- regarding persons not as means but ends in itself. That’s why it’s wrong to use people for the sake of other people’s well-being or happiness. This is the reason why utilitarianism goes wrong, why it’s important to respect the dignity of a person and to uphold their rights.
What gives an act its moral worth?
If it cant be directed to