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Is Kant’s Categorical Imperative too rigid?

When obeying those moral laws that we could consistently and rationally will as universal laws, we are following the so-called Categorical Imperative, which might be re-stated as, “Always act such that the maxim of your action can at the same time be upheld as a universal law.”

This is similar to the much older Golden Rule of the Bible and Indian Mahabharata, according to which we should treat others as we would wish to be treated. But whereas the Golden Rule is based on personal desire, which is subjective (I might, for example, be a masochist, or be willing to tolerate some mistreatment), the Categorical Imperative is based on reason, which is objective.

Hypothetical vs Categorical Imperatives

Hypothetical imperatives are practical rules for achieving a desired outcome, for example, “If you want to lose weight, you should watch what you eat.” If you do not desire a particular outcome, you do not need to follow the rules. In this much, hypothetical imperatives are conditional and contingent. In contrast, Categorical Imperatives are universal moral commands that bind everyone regardless of their aims, for example, “Do not lie,” “Do not steal,” “Do not commit suicide.” 

Hypothetical imperatives answer to the lower faculty of desire, which aims at pleasure. Categorical Imperatives answer to the higher faculty of will, which functions rationally and autonomously by following the laws which it legislates for itself, regardless of consequences or personal feelings.

For Kant, true moral actions must be motivated by duty, not some desired outcome. Thus, Kantian ethics are sometimes described as deontological, or duty-based [Greek, deon, “duty”], and contrasted with consequentialism (for example, utilitarianism), which is outcome-based. For Kant, moral systems based on outcomes or desires operate on hypothetical imperatives, not true moral law.

Some Examples of the Categorical Imperative

Kant furnishes some examples to flesh out the bones of the Categorical Imperative. Imagine a person in financial need who borrows money and promises to pay it back, knowing full well that they never will. If this action were universalised, promises of repayment would no longer be believed and the practice of lending would end. 

When we help someone, our action must be motivated by duty if it is to have moral worth. If I help someone from inclination, for example, from sympathy or because it makes me feel good, I am still doing a praiseworthy thing, but my action, being circumstantial rather than principled and reliable, lacks moral worth. Imagine a grocer who always gives the correct change, but only to avoid being caught and losing his reputation. His behaviour, though not blameworthy, is lacking in moral worth. If he knew that he could not possibly get caught, he may start behaving dishonestly. Because his behaviour is prudential and circumstantial rather than born out of duty, it is not categorical. 

For Kant, a paradigm of moral worth is the person who hates life and longs to commit suicide, but stays alive purely out of duty. Because this person has no self-serving inclinations, he is acting purely from duty, rather than mere “conformity to duty.” Similarly, and counterintuitively, a hard-hearted person who has no other motivation than duty has a moral worth “beyond all comparison the highest.”

The Humanity Formulation of the Categorical Imperative

The universalizability formulation is the first formulation the Categorical Imperative. The second formulation is the humanity formulation, or end-in-itself formulation: “Act always treating humanity, in yourself and others, as an end and never merely as a means.”

Like Aristotle, Kant argued that everything that has instrumental value derives this value from the end that it serves. Thus, for anything to have value, there must be some end that has intrinsic worth, that is, some end that is an end-in-itself. For Aristotle, this “supreme good” was happiness, or eudaimonia. For Kant, it was a rational being who could freely determine his or her own ends. In all of nature, man alone is an end-in-itself, and must therefore be treated as such. 

We can only use others (like waiters and cab drivers) as means if we respect their own ends and agency, treating them as rational beings with purposes of their own rather than mere tools for achieving ours. You can employ a servant if you pay and treat them fairly, and the servant wills it because working for you furthers their own ends. Although Kant never applied the humanity formulation to specifically and explicitly condemn the transatlantic slave trade, his moral philosophy provided the framework for later abolitionists.

Benjamin Constant’s Challenge to Kant

In the aftermath of the Reign of Terror (1793-1794), a period during the French Revolution marked by mass executions of perceived enemies, the Swiss writer Benjamin Constant conceived of a thought experiment to undermine Kantian ethics.

Imagine an axe-wielding murderer at your door, asking where your friend, who has taken refuge in your house, is hiding. Although, according to Kant, lying is always wrong, it would be absurd to speak the truth and reveal your friend’s location to the murderer. In this scenario, surely, the duty to protect your friend overrides any duty to tell the truth. What’s more, by intending to commit a grave injustice, the murderer has forfeited any right to the truth.

Kant responded to Constant in his 1797 essay, On a Supposed Right to Tell Lies from Benevolent Motives, and dug in his heels. Even in those circumstances, it would be wrong to lie. The morality of an action is determined by its principles, not its consequences. One could not know whether lying would do more good than harm to one’s friend in hiding. Whereas one would be responsible for the consequences of telling a lie, the consequences of telling the truth would be on the murderer. Moreover, to lie to the murderer would be to treat him as a mere means to an end, denying him the status of a rational being capable of free, reasoned action.

The One Problem with Kantian Ethics—and a Solution

Kant’s rigid application of the Categorical Imperative led him to condemn many actions and behaviours that are no longer generally condemned, such as masturbation and suicide out of world-weariness. He referred to masturbation as an “unnatural vice” on the basis that the natural purpose of sex is procreation. 

The Categorical Imperative is, no doubt, a good rule of thumb, but must admit of exceptions. Exceptions, too, are a matter of judgement and reason—more so even than the rules themselves.

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An introduction to Kant’s Categorical Imperative.

In 1755, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) became a Privatdozent, or non-stipendiary lecturer, making a living by charging students for his lectures and giving private tuition. His students joked that he could cover for the entire philosophy faculty—which at the time included everything except the three “higher” faculties of theology, law, and medicine. He became a star lecturer, reputed for his wit, dry humour, and poker face.

When he lectured, Kant was, according to a contemporary account, “all things to all men.” He stood at a diminutive five foot two (1.57m), with blond hair, blue eyes, and rosy cheeks. Despite his slender build, flat and narrow chest, and “slight corkscrew twist”, he was described as attractive. According to his own account, his flat and narrow chest left “little room for the movement of the heart and lungs”, contributing to his delicate constitution, predisposition to hypochondria, and sedentary, regimented lifestyle.

Kant compensated for his physical frailties by being a sharp dresser. He took inspiration from nature for matching colours. Thus, in middle age, he often wore a yellow waistcoat with a brown tailcoat trimmed with gold braid. In public and in company, he sported a powdered wig, even after it had fallen out of fashion. As late as 1791, his friend and follower Joachim Christian Friedrich Schulz described him as having “the look of a good, honest watchmaker who has gone into retirement”.

From 1766, Kant derived a modest but regular income as sub-librarian of the university. From 1768 to 1777, he rented two rooms in the house of the publisher and bookseller Johann Jakob Kanter. In this period, his student Johann Gottfried Herder described him as “the most urbane fellow in the world”. He moved in the city’s most refined circles and often stayed out into the small hours.

Kant never considered himself quite rich enough to take a wife. He twice considered marriage, first to a “beautiful widow” and, much later, to a “pretty Westphalian girl”, but in each case prevaricated for so long that the ladies ended up marrying otherwise. Although he never married, Kant defended the institution of marriage, which he prosaically defined as “the union of two persons of different sexes for lifelong possession of each other’s sexual attributes”.

Kant’s Categorical Imperative

Kant is famous, among other things, for trying to put morality onto a rational basis, that is, for trying to make morality objective and “categorical” rather than subjective and arbitrary. His core ethical principle is the Categorical Imperative, according to which we should only obey those moral laws that we could consistently and rationally will as universal laws. This might be restated as, “Always act such that the maxim of your action can at the same time be upheld as a universal law.”

The Categorical Imperative is similar to the much older Golden Rule of the Bible and Indian Mahabharata, according to which we should treat others as we would ourselves wish to be treated. But whereas the Golden Rule is based on personal desire, which is subjective (I might, for example, be a masochist, or be willing to tolerate some mistreatment), the Categorical Imperative is based on reason, which is objective.

Hypothetical imperatives are practical rules for achieving a desired outcome, for example, “If you want to lose weight, you should watch what you eat.’ If you do not desire a particular outcome, you do not need to follow the rules. In this much, hypothetical imperatives are conditional and contingent. In contrast, Categorical Imperatives are universal moral commands that bind everyone regardless of their aims, for example, “Do not lie”, “Do not steal”, “Do not commit suicide”.

Hypothetical imperatives answer to the lower faculty of desire, which aims at pleasure. Categorical Imperatives answer to the higher faculty of will, which functions rationally and autonomously by following the laws which it legislates for itself, regardless of consequences or personal feelings. For Kant, true moral actions must be motivated by duty, not some desired outcome. Thus, Kantian ethics are sometimes described as deontological, or duty-based (Greek, deon, “duty”), and contrasted with consequentialism (for example, utilitarianism), which is outcome-based. For Kant, moral systems based on outcomes or desires operate on hypothetical imperatives, not true moral law.

Kant furnishes some examples to flesh out the bones of the Categorical Imperative. Imagine a person in financial need who borrows money and promises to pay it back, knowing full well that they never will. If this action were universalised, promises of repayment would no longer be believed and the practice of lending would end. Kant also points out that abusing the lender in this way reduces a dignified being with ends of his own to a mere means-to-an-end.

The universalizability formulation is only the first formulation the Categorical Imperative. The second formulation is the humanity formulation, or end-in-itself formulation: “Act always treating humanity, in yourself and others, as an end and never merely as a means.” 

When Is It Moral to Have Sex?

Kant’s rigid application of the Categorical Imperative led him to condemn many actions and behaviours that are no longer generally condemned, such as suicide out of world-weariness, homosexuality, and masturbation. He referred to homosexual acts and masturbation as “unnatural vices” on the basis that the natural purpose of sex and the reproductive organs is procreation. Marriage, he argued, is the only morally permissible context for sexual relations. But for those unable or unwilling to wait, sex is preferable to masturbation. Masturbation transgresses the natural order, sex, only the civil order.

What has aged a lot better is Kant’s insight that, during sex, one turns the other into an object of gratification, a means to an end rather than an end-in-himself or end-in-herself. This is only permissible if, in return, one makes oneself into an object of gratification for the benefit of the other. Marriage, on the other hand, is a unique union in which two people mutually surrender their bodies and selves to create a united whole.

For us, the take-home message is: Kant never had sex or even masturbated. 

Jokes aside, Kant grew into, and arguably remains, the supreme moral authority in the Western World. For better or worse, what he thought and how he thought remains part of our mental makeup.