Kant distinguishes two ways that reason can command the will, two different kinds of imperative. One kind of imperative, perhaps the most familiar kind, is a hypothetical imperative. Hypothetical imperatives use instrumental reason : If you want X, then do Y. If you want a good business reputation, then treat your customers honestly.
Kant contrasts hypothetical imperatives, which are always conditional, with a kind of imperative that is unconditional : a categorical imperative. "If the actin would be good solely as a means to something else," Kant writes,"the imperative is hypothetical. If the action is represented as good in itself, and therefore as necessary for a will which of itself accords with reason, then the imperative is categorical." The term categorical may seem like jargon, but it's not that distant from our ordinary use of the term. By "categorical," Kant means unconditional. So, for example, when a politician issues a categorical denial of an alleged scandal, the denial is nit merely emphatic ; it's unconditional --- without any loophole or exception. Similarly, a categorical duty or categorical right is one that applies regardless of the circumstances.
For Kant, a categorical imperative commands, well, categorically ---- without reference to or dependence on any further purpose. "It is concerned not with the matter of the action and its presumed results, but with its form, and with the principle from which it follows. And what is essentially good in the action consists in the mental disposition, let the consequences be what they may." Only a categorical imperative, Kant argues, can qualify as an imperative of morality.
The connection among the three parallel contrasts now comes into view. To be free in the sense of autonomous requires that I act not out of a hypothetical imperative but out of a categorical imperative.
WHAT THE HELL IS THE CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE
This leaves one big question : What is the categorical imperative, and what does it command of us ? Kant says we can answer this question from the idea of "a practical law that by itself commands absolutely and without any further motives." We can answer this question from the idea of a law that binds us as rational beings regardless of our particular ends. So what is it ?
Kant offers several versions or formulations of the categorical imperative, which he believes all amount to the same thing.
Categorical imperative I : Universalize your maxim
The first version Kant calls the formula of the universal law : "Act only on that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." By "maxim," Kant means a rule or principle that gives the reason for your action. He is saying, in effect, that we should act only on principles that we could universalize without contradiction. To see what Kant means by this admittedly abstract test, let's consider a concrete moral question : Is it ever right to make a promise you know you won't be able to keep ?
Suppose I am in desperate need of money and so ask you for a loan. I know perfectly well that I won't be able to pat it back anytime soon. Would it be morally permissible to get the loan by making a false promise to repay the money promptly, a promise I know I can't keep ? Would a false promise be consistent with the categorical imperative ? Kant says no, obviously not. The way I can see that the false promise is at odds with the categorical imperative is by trying to universalize the maxim upon which I'm about to act.
What is the maxim in this case ? Something like this : "Whenever someone needs money badly, he should ask for a loan and promise to repay, even though he knows he won't be able to do so." If you tried to universalize this maxim and at the same time to act on it, Kant says, you would discover a contradiction : If everybody made false promises when they needed money, nobody would believe such promises. In fact, there would be no such thing as promises ; universalizing the false promise would undermine the institution of promise - keeping. But then it would be futile, even irrational, for you to try to get money by promising. This shows that making a false promise is morally wrong, at odds with the categorical imperative.
Some people find this version of Kant's categorical imperative unpersuasive. The formula of the universal law bears a certain resemblance to the moral bromide grown-ups use to chastise children who cut in line or speak out of turn : "What if everybody did that ?" If everybody lied, then no one could rely on anybody's word, and we'd all be worse off. If this is what Kant is saying, he is making a consequentialist argument after all --- rejecting the false promise not in principle, but for its possibly harmful effects or consequences.
No less a thinker than John Stuart Mill leveled this criticism against Kant. But Mill misunderstood Kant's point. For Kant, seeing whether I could universalize the maxim of my action and continue acting on it is not a way of speculating about possible consequences. It is a test to see whether my maxim accords with the categorical imperative. A false promise is not morally wrong because, writ large, it would undermine social trust (though it might well do so.) It is wrong because, in making it, I privilege my needs and desires (in this case, for money) over everybody else's. The universalizing test points to a powerful moral claim : it's a way of checking to see if the action I am about to undertake puts my interests and special circumstances ahead of everyone else's.
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