Kant rejects utilitarianism. By resting rights on a calculation about what will produce the greatest happiness, he argues, utilitarianism leaves rights vulnerable. There is also a deeper problem : trying to derive moral principles from the desires we happen to have is the wrong way to think about morality. Just because something gives many people pleasure doesn't make it right. The mere fact that the majority, however big, favors a certain law, however intensely, does not make the law just.
Kant argues that morality can't be based on merely empirical considerations, such as the interests, wants, desires, and preferences people have at any given time. These factors are variable and contingent, he points out, so they could hardly serve as the basis for universal moral principles---such as universal human rights. But Kant's more fundamental point is that basing moral principles on preferences and desires---even the desire for happiness---misunderstands what morality is about. The utilitarian's happiness principle "contributes nothing whatever toward establishing morality, since making a man happy is quite different from making him good and making him prudent or astute in seeking his advantage quite different from making him virtuous. " Basing morality on interests and preferences destroys its dignity. It doesn't teach us how to distinguish right from wrong, but "only to become better at calculation."
If our wants and desires can't serve as the basis of morality, what's left ? One possibility is God. But that's not Kant's answer. Although he was a Christian, Kant did not base morality on divine authority. He argues instead that we can arrive at the supreme principle of morality through the exercise of what he calls "pure practical reason." To see how, according to Kant, we can reason our way to the moral law, lets now explore the close connection, as Kant sees it, between our capacity for reason and our capacity for freedom.
Kant argues that every person is worthy of respect, not because we own ourselves but because we are rational beings, capable of reason. We are also autonomous beings, capable of acting and choosing freely.
Kant doesn't mean that we always succeed in acting rationally, or in choosing autonomously. Sometimes we do and sometimes we don't. He means only that we have the capacity for reason, and for freedom, and that this capacity is common to human beings as such.
Kant readily concedes that our capacity for reason is not the only capacity we possess. We also have the capacity to feel pleasure and pain. Kant recognizes that we are sentient creatures as well as rational ones. By "sentient," Kant means that we respond to our senses, our feelings. So, Bentham was right --- but only half right. He was right to observe that we like pleasure and dislike pain. But he was wrong to insist that they are "our sovereign masters." Kant argues that reason can be sovereign, at least some of the time. When reason governs our will, we are not driven by the desire to seek pleasure and avoid pain.
Our capacity for reason is bound up with our capacity for freedom. Taken together, these capacities make us distinctive, and set us apart from mere animal existence. They make us more than mere creatures of appetite.
WHAT IS FREEDOM ?
To make sense of Kant's moral philosophy, we need to understand what he means by freedom. { Kris K says it means : "Just another word for nothing left to lose." } We often think of freedom as the absence of obstacles to doing what we want. Kant disagrees. He has a more He has a more stringent, demanding notion of freedom.
Kant reasons as follows : When we, like animals, seek pleasure or the avoidance of pain, we aren't really acting freely. We are acting as the slaves of our appetites and desires. Why ? Because whenever we are seeking to satisfy our desires, everything we do is for the sake of some end given outside us. I go this way to assuage my hunger, that way to slake my thirst.
Suppose I'm trying to decide what flavor of ice cream to order : Should I go for chocolate, vanilla, or expresso toffee crunch ? I may think of myself as exercising freedom of choice, but what I'm really doing is trying to figure out which flavor will best satisfy my preferences --- preferences I didn't choose in the first place. Kant doesn't say it's wrong to satisfy our preferences. His point is that, when we do so, we are not acting freely, but acting according to a determination given outside us. After all, I didn't choose my desire for expresso toffee crunch rather than vanilla. I just have it.
Some years ago, Sprite had an advertising slogan :"Obey your thirst." Sprite's ad contained (inadvertently, no doubt) a Kantian insight. When I pick up a can of Sprite (or Pepsi or Coke), I act out of obedience, not freedom. I am responding to a desire I havent chosen. I am obeying my thirst.
People often argue over the role of nature and nurture in shaping behavior. Is the desire for Sprite (or other sugary drinks) inscribed in the genes or induced by advertising ? For Kant, this debate is beside the point. Whenever my behavior is biologically determined or socially conditioned, it is not truly free. To act freely, according to Kant, is to act autonomously. And to act autonomously is to act according to a law I give myself --- not according to the dictates of nature or social convention.
One way of understanding what Kant means by acting autonomously is to contrast autonomy with its opposite. Kant invents a word to capture this contrast ---heteronomy.When I act heteronomously, I act according to determinations given outside of me. Here is an illustration : When you drop a billiard ball, it falls to the ground. As it falls, the billiard ball is not acting freely. Its movement is governed by the laws of nature --- in this case, the law of gravity.
Suppose I fall (or am pushed) from the empire State Building. As I hurtle toward the earth, no one would say that I am acting freely ; my movement is governed by the law of gravity, as with the billiard ball.
Now suppose I land on another person and kill that person. I would not be morally responsible for the unfortunate death, any more than the billiard ball would be morally responsible if it fell from a great height and hit someone on the head. In neither case is the falling object --- me or the billiard ball --- acting freely. In both cases, the falling object is governed by the law of gravity. Since there is no autonomy, there can be no moral responsibility.
Here, then, is the link between freedom as autonomy and Kant's idea of morality. To act freely is not to choose the best means to a given end. It is to choose the end itself, for its own sake --- a choice that human beings can make and billiard balls (and most animals) cannot. Hey, dear hearts, we are heading toward INTENT and MOTIVE. Stay tuned.
No comments:
Post a Comment