Preview

Gone Baby Gone Essay

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
524 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Gone Baby Gone Essay
“Gone Baby Gone”
First Maxim
Based on the main final action of the movie “Gone Baby Gone” it can be asserted that Patrick Kenzie acted in agreement with the moral aspect. This assertion rests on the fact that he acted in the right manner without any condition. This statement is true since he opted to report the matter about the kidnapping of the four years child to the police rather than remaining silence. Even though he was persuaded by Angie Gennaro and Jack Doyle not to report the matter to the police, he was bold to overcome their persuasion and opted to do the right thing by reporting the issue to the police.
This action by Patrick Kenzie corresponds to the first premise of Kant’s moral philosophy which holds that an individual act morally if his or her conduct without condition would be opted by another person in a similar circumstance. This declaration rests on the fact that if it were another person in the same
…show more content…
Based on the main final action of the movie it can be declared that Patrick Kenzie’s conduct is right as entailed by Kant’s moral philosophy. The moral philosophy of Kant holds that conduct is right when a person treats other parties and him or herself in a valuable manner (Reath 230). This aspect of the right conduct undertaken by Patrick Kenzie is evident when he opted to report the identification of the missing four-year-old child. Through reporting the matter to the authority, he ensured that he treated other persons in a valuable way. For example, he made sure that the child reunited with her biological mother. Moreover, he also treated both Angie Gennaro and Jack Doyle in the right way by reporting the matter to the police hence ensuring that justice was upheld. Besides, Patrick Kenzie also treated himself well when he reported the identification of the missing four-year-old to the police to avoid the possibility of psychological torture by failing to rescue the child from the person who had kidnapped her at the age of four

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Therefore, from a utilitarian perspective, Officer Jenkins' intervention could be seen as justified if it led to a net increase in happiness or well-being. In Kant's deontological ethics, actions are assessed based on their alignment with moral principles and duties rather than focusing solely on their…

    • 717 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Away By Michael Gow Essay

    • 566 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Topic sentence - Harry and Vic live with an existential view on life. Their son Tom is dying and they live positively and strong for him.…

    • 566 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Say your family and you are struggling to meet your basic needs such as food during a harsh famine. Your basic instinct is to acquire food by any means necessary. One way you could get food is by stealing it from your neighbor. In this essay I will examine whether this issue is morally right. I will argue that by using Kant’s End in itself theory, stealing food from your neighbor in time of famine is morally wrong.…

    • 727 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Kevin Carter Famine

    • 1045 Words
    • 5 Pages

    In 1994 Kevin Carter won the Pulitzer Prize for Photography thanks to a photograph that he took in the village of Ayod in Sudan of a child crawling towards a feeding center. Whether it was morally right for him to have captured that moment instead of helping the child is a debate with many people. Some people believe that it was right because it helped stop the famine in Africa, others believe it was wrong because he did not aid the child after taking the picture. It is understood that there was thousands of refugees walking and crawling towards the food center, so was he suppose to help everyone or just that child? In philosophy class we have been talking about Morality in Kant’s point of view which is the Categorical Imperative and also about…

    • 1045 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Good And Evil Casablanca

    • 1184 Words
    • 5 Pages

    He believed that our actions must come from a sense of Duty, not because we care for or love one another but because it is our Duty to “respect the Moral Law” (p. 246). Judging the importance of a decision based on whether or not it was following a rule or set of rules is called deontological ethics. He believed that it was not the consequences of the action which were important but the person’s motive carrying out the said action. Many disagree with Kant saying that we must have a foundation to start from, a reason such as love or concern to do what is morally…

    • 1184 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    A Bronx Tale

    • 627 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Kohlberg’s theory includes three levels, pre-conventional, conventional, and post-conventional. The pre-conventional level is about the beginning stages of one’s moral development . The first stage of the pre-conventional period is about blind-obedience where that which is right is rewarded and that which is wrong is punished. When Colagero was little he went to the bar Sonny owned and watched the people interact through the back door that was cracked open. After he told his parents about this, he was disciplined and punished, thus, Colagero didn’t return until adulthood. Stage two of the pre-conventional level explains how one’s actions are still self-serving but their interest is broadened to include close family and friends. Colagero witnesses Sonny murder a man over a parking space in front of his home, to protect himself and his family from the mafia, Colagero fails to tell the police.…

    • 627 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Immanuel Kant would never condone Scott’s behavior to use Bailey in the way he did. He would have called Scott’s actions immoral and unethical. Kant’s theory indicated that, “we should never use people” and “everyone, no matter who they are, should be both the legislator and the follower of moral laws” (Ciulla 95). He similarly stated, “For all rational beings stand under the law that each of them should treat himself and all others never merely as a means but always at the same time as an end in himself” (Ciulla 107). Kant would feel that it was Scott’s duty to make decisions without using another person as simply a means to an end, and that people should be treated as ends in themselves. By Scott attempting to make Bailey do these unethical…

    • 197 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Emmanuel Kant (hereinafter “Kant”) believes that Ethics is categorical and states that our moral duties are not dependent on feelings but on reason. He further states that our moral duties are unconditional, universally valid, and necessary, regardless of the possible consequences or opposition to our inclinations (Pojman and Vaughn 239).…

    • 273 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nazi Prisoner Doctors

    • 467 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Kant, I. (1990). “Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals.” Exploring philosophy: an introductory anthology (4th ed., pp. 415-420). New York: Oxford University Press.…

    • 467 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    What if the one thing you wanted out of life, was about to be taken away from you without a moment's notice? Mary Maloney was a loving and devoted housewife, until the day her perfect image was at risk. Patrick and Mary Maloney were a loving, dull, and repetitious couple. Throughout their relationship, Mary has been the doting housewife with the obvious impression that she will have children and do house chores. She not only murders her husband with brutality, but has an amazing well thought out plan to divert the authorities from suspecting her. Mary’s crimes can be perceived as purely selfless, that she only wants to protect her child, is that the case? Mary wants nothing more than to be the “perfect housewife,” if she doesn't have the child,…

    • 160 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Since Mrs. Maloney is clearly the murder of Patrick Maloney when she bashes him in the head with the the leg of lamb, and feed it to the police playing innocent at the time the irony of the story is a sweet face might completely get away with the murder of her husband.…

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    First of all Kantian ethics respet to person, and we never ever should not forget that our…

    • 366 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Reason, declared Kant, is the source and ultimate basis for morality. Morality wholly rests in pure, innate reason and not in intuition, conscience, law, or utility. The standard of morality, therefore, is inherent in the human mind; it is definable only in terms of the mind; and it is derived from one’s innerself by direct perception (Cavico & Mujtaba, 2013). According to Kant, in order to be moral, one has to be rational. “The right use of reason is directed to moral ends” (Cavico & Mujtaba, 2009). A person has to think rationally, he or she does not have think only about self-interest. As a result of that, there is no place for such thing as Ethical Egoism. People should be treated with dignity…

    • 1483 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Deontology is the ethical view that some actions are morally forbidden or permitted regardless of consequences. One of the most influential deontological philosophers in history is Immanuel Kant who developed the idea of the Categorical Imperative. Kant believed that the only thing of intrinsic moral worth is a good will. Kant says in his work Morality and Rationality "The good will is not good because of what it effects or accomplishes or because of it's adequacy to achieve some proposed end; it is good only because of it's willing, i.e., it is good of itself". A maxim is the generalized rule that characterizes the motives for a person's actions. For Kant, a will that is good is one that is acting by the maxim of doing the right thing because it is right thing to do. The moral worth of an action is determined by whether or not it was acted upon out of respect for the moral law, or the Categorical Imperative. Imperatives in general imply something we ought to do however there is a distinction between categorical imperatives and hypothetical imperatives. Hypothetical imperatives are obligatory so long as we desire X. If we desire X we ought to do Y. However, categorical imperatives are not subject to conditions. The Categorical Imperative is universally binding to all rational creatures because they are rational. Kant proposes three formulations the Categorical Imperative in his Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Moral, the Universal Law formulation, Humanity or End in Itself formulation, and Kingdom of Ends formulation. In this essay, the viablity of the Universal Law formulation is tested by discussing two objections to it, mainly the idea that the moral laws are too absolute and the existence of false positives and false negatives.…

    • 1561 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The Sanctity of Life

    • 4148 Words
    • 10 Pages

    However, perhaps someone’s quality of life is not as important as may initially appear. Perhaps what is more important is that they have the right to be autonomous. Kant would argue that everyone should be able to make their own autonomous decisions; doing something because society wants them to is not autonomous, and neither is doing…

    • 4148 Words
    • 10 Pages
    Powerful Essays