Categorical Imperative: Kant’s Moral Philosophy
The categorical imperative is generally expressed as “must do X” or, prohibitively, as “should not do X.” Examples include “you must be truthful” and “thou shalt not steal.” However, the mere linguistic expression doesn’t determine whether an imperative is hypothetical or categorical. To distinguish them, we must examine the motivation behind our will. If we act in accordance with duty (e.g., not stealing because it’s wrong), our imperative is categorical. If we act to avoid negative consequences (e.g., not stealing for fear of the police), our imperative is hypothetical.
Hypothetical Imperatives
Hypothetical imperatives are generally expressed as “must do X if you want to get Y.” Problematic hypothetical imperatives (rules of skill) involve actions good for a possible purpose, not an end all humans naturally pursue. For example, “must train this afternoon” describes the way to achieve a specific goal, like playing well in tomorrow’s football game. Kant believed ethics couldn’t be based solely on hypothetical imperatives. Hypothetical imperatives, like synthetic a posteriori judgments, are contingent and particular. Rules of skill aren’t universal, as not everyone has the same purpose. Imperatives of prudence, relating to happiness, are more universal but still not strictly necessary. Happiness depends on individual circumstances, and even if happiness were the same for everyone, achieving it depends on empirical factors.
Categorical Imperative Formulations
According to Kant, the categorical imperative has three formulations:
- “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.”
- “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.”
- “Act as if you were through your maxims a law-making member of a kingdom of ends.”
Kingdom of Ends
Kant’s concept of rational beings as ends leads to the Kingdom of Ends, a systematic union of rational beings through common laws. A rational being can belong to this kingdom in two ways: as a member (subject to and maker of laws) and as a sovereign (whose will creates laws). Kant reformulates the categorical imperative as: “Act as if you were through your maxims a law-making member of a kingdom of ends.”
Freedom
Theoretical reason can’t prove freedom’s existence, as it only accesses the phenomenal world governed by causality. Actions lacking freedom are neither good nor bad, and the actor isn’t morally responsible. Freedom is equivalent to autonomy and is essential for morality. Morality, in turn, reveals freedom. Kant suggests humans belong to two realms: the phenomenal and the noumenal. Freedom is the synthesis of virtue and happiness, its realization being the condition for morality.
Supreme Good
. Our moral conduct would be meaningless if there were no possibility of holiness (the absolute perfection of a desire for the perfect fulfillment of virtue), in this world we can no holiness, then there must be another life where the performance gain perfect moral appetite. Postulate of the immortality of the soul seems to serve the highest good access to the immortality of the soul, as virtue requires an infinite time to reach their full potential. Postulate the existence of God in this world does not match the performance of our happiness with the realization of the good (and unhappy beings are good and bad, happy) so we think that God exists (because only an absolute entity can match the laws governing the conduct of happiness with the laws governing the conduct moral).