Kant-Bioethics

Historical Background of Kant

-German philosopher who taught metaphsyics and logic. He was raised a strict Orthodox Lutheran (he believed in God but had no interest in prayer or formal church- he had a lifelong appreciation for Christian morality) -He believed it was necessary to convince oneself of the existence of God but you didn't have to demonstrate it. His law has a strong resemblance to the Golden rule of Christianity (never cites Jesus, Scripture or any church authority)

Belief on virtues

-courage, intelligence, happiness, wealth etc. are morally neutral and are only good if they exist in a person with a good will. -if a man with an evil will possesses them, they are evil -if a man with a good will possesses them, they are good

Kant vs Aristotle

-Aristotle: "telos" of the individual is happiness which is the goal of the human life (Kant said that the purpose of our lives as people who can choose should be something other than happiness) -Aristotle: Individuals acquire virtue to achieve happiness (Kant: believed the pursuit of the happy life is distinct from and opposed to the pursuit of the moral life) -Aristotle: the good life is the happy life lived in accord with reason (believed reason and free will are for a purpose other than happiness)

"Categorical Imperatives" vs "counsel of prudence"

-doing your duty and striving for happiness are different -For Kant: to do one's duty is to follow the moral rules, which are always absolute commands -Moral rules=categorical imperatives: commands which must be followed by all in every situation -Human happiness is too uncertain to provide a basis for moral rules -therefore moral rules are totally different than virtues, or counsels of prudence

Happiness cannot be a foundation of morality

-happiness is not always a good thing -happiness can make evil people even more evil if they enjoy their wicked deeds (eg Osama Bin Laden) -according to Aristotle, courage is necessary for happiness, while Kant would consider a courageous act, good in itself, whether it leads to happiness or not.

The life of reason Is not a happy one necessarily

-holds that reason and the ability to make choices cannot bring happiness (eg more unhappiness is brought by human free will than by natural disasters) -Kant suggests that instinct would be a better way to achieve happiness -therefore he concludes that nature must have given humans a reason and free will for another purpose

Good consequences do not make an action good meaning..

-if a person abides by the moral law, then the consequences that follow from his action do not enhance or detract from its worth -Only the action itself if worthy of praise or blame (not the consequences) -A person should be praised for his decision to act, even if he cannot carry out his intentions (reason-because the decision itself is the only thing truly under the control of his will)- not concerned with the actions but rather the inner principles and intentions

The good will is the basis of morality

-"Nothing can possibly be conceived in the world, or even out of it, which can be called good, without qualification, except a good will" -Having a good will is the only thing of intrinsic worth -"good without qualification"= the good will always good in itself, regardless of what follows

A good will is one that follows the "categorical imperative" (formula of universal law) meaning..

-"act only according to the maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law" -can it be conceived as a universal law? Can it be willed as a universal law?

Age of Reason and the Enlightenment

-17th and 18th centuries. The discovery of the sciences revolutionized how people viewed their place in nature and their relationship with religion -Galileo's idea that the earth revolved around the sun (the idea that the earth and human beings were no longer the center of the universe) -People began to question ideas that were only based on authority (reason and understanding seemed more important than faith for understanding science) -Believed that moral questions should be kept separate from matters of faith (grounded in reason alone)

What Kant was good for/helped us to see clearly..

-the admirability of acting from duty: there is something morally admirable about people who do the right thing, even when they do not feel like doing it, just because it is the right thing to do, because it is their duty -The evenhandedness of morality: we are not permitted to make an exception to the laws of morality just to benefit ourselves or those we care about -respecting other person: his insistence that we treat other people as ends in themselves that we respect them as autonomous beings capable of reasoning and making choices based on the results of that reasoning

What makes a will good?

1. Obeying the moral law "for the sake of the moral law itself" 2. Good consequences do not make an action good 3. Kant's 4 imperatives of duty

David Hume

Another philosopher in the same century (proposed that human beings could tell right from wrong by means of a "moral sense")

Kant's law was grounded in what?

reason alone (he lived during the time of the Enlightenment and Age of Reason)- His ethics was thought to be the most influential secular system of moral thought since the birth of Christ

Where Kant missed the mark..

-the neglect of moral integration: he emphasized duty so strongly that he missed the quest for moral integration: for overcoming the split between duty and inclination -the role of emotions in the moral life: for kant, the emotions are not part of the self, but are external to who we are as persons -the place of consequences in the moral life: Kant insulates the moral life from our everyday life. Consequences do count and Kant failed to provide an adequate account of their full role in the moral life.

Obeying the law "for the sake of the moral law itself" means..

-to be good for goodness sake because it is the right thing to do because we have respect for the law. "for the sake of the moral law"=doing one's duty -A person should only be praised or blamed for something that is within the power of his will

The exclusion of emotions has the following consequences..

-working against moral integration -Making the moral life near-sighted (it is through our emotions that we can see suffering that would otherwise be hidden. Emotions help us perceive the world) -sometimes what is most needed in the moral life is an emotional response (when we cannot do anything to help a person in pain, we can care and feel compassion for their sufferings. Kant's ethics has little room for any emotive responses)

Kant's 4 imperatives of duty..

1. to ourselves- so suicide is wrong duty to exist 2. to other- so duty to repay debts, or borrowed money/don't repay to be honest, just 3. to society- so use your gifts/talents/as opposed to wasting them 4. to serve- so be responsible/who cares

Hypothetical and categorical imperatives

Hypothetical: practical necessity, relative to circumstance, the action is good only as a means to something else -Categorical: good without qualification, action is good without reference to another end, action is objectively necessary of itself.

Maxim

the subject rule that a person has in mind when performing an action. (the test for a maxim is whether people could consistently will that everyone adopt this maxim as a guide in their actions) -This is another way of stating "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" (to treat others only as a means of achieving what we want is to disregard his/her humanity, to treat a person as a thing and to fail to show due respect to his/her status as a rational human being)