Newsletter 4 - Kant's moral formula
Kant's Moral formula
How to test a moral proposition?
I suggest that the morality of progressive tax and GDP growth can be clarified by applying Kant's Universal Law of Nature formula to them.
First, formulate a maxim that enshrines your proposed plan of action.??
A: examples;
Proposed Maxim One
Regarding reducing inequality; I, (a well paid and wealthier than average person), should pay a higher proportion of my income and wealth in tax than a below average wealth and income person should!
Proposed Maxim Two
Regarding using GDP growth as a measure of success; I should produce and sell more goods and services this and every year of my life than the year before!
Second, recast that maxim as a universal law of nature governing all rational agents, so as holding that all must, by natural law, act as you yourself propose to act in these circumstances.?
Proposed Maxim One as a Universal Law of Nature
Regarding inequality; all wealthier than average actors, must pay a higher proportion of their income and wealth in tax!
Proposed Maxim Two as a Universal Law of Nature
Regarding GBP; every person in the world should produce and sell more goods and services this and every year of their lives than the year before!
Third, consider whether your maxim is even conceivable in a world governed by this new law of nature.
Maxim One
A majority of voters could vote for political parties we expect would increase tax on those who are wealthier than average!
Maxim Two
Regarding GBP; it may not be possible that every person in the world could produce and sell more goods and services this and every year of their lives than they did the year before.
Fourth, ask yourself whether you would, or could, rationally?will your maxim upon the world.?
Maxim One:? I would or could vote for a political party that I expected would progressively tax the income and wealth of those who are wealthier than average.
Maxim Two: I could and always have voted for political parties who encourage every person to produce and sell more goods and services this and every year of their lives than they did the year before.
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If you could, then your action is morally permissible.
Maxim One: taxing the wealthy more than the less wealthy to provide public services such as health and education for all would be would satisfy the utilitarian principle; (what is the greatest good for the greatest number?)
Maxim Two: Willing every person to produce and sell more goods and services this and every year of their lives may be morally acceptable according to the moral formular but only because there is no alternative in a first past the post electoral system other than to vote left or right with both options wedded to GDP growth as a measure of success.
Kant's Good will also allows us to test a morality question.
The basic idea, as Kant describes it in the Groundwork, is that; what makes a person "good" is his/her possession of a will that is in a certain way “determined” by, or makes its decisions on the basis of, whatever basic moral principles there may be.
Good will is the state of mind or character of one who is committed only to make decisions he/she holds to be morally worthy and who takes moral decisions in themselves to be conclusive reasons for guiding his/her behaviour.
Kant thought that this sort of disposition or character is something we all highly value. He believed that we value it without limitation or qualification.?
Thus, Kant points out that a good will must then also be good?in itself?and not by virtue of its relationship to other things such as the agent’s own happiness, overall welfare or any other effects it may or may not produce. A good will would still “shine like a jewel” even if it were “completely powerless to carry out its aims” (G 4:394).
He argued that a dutiful action from any of these motives, however praiseworthy it may be, does not express a good will.
Assuming an action has moral worth only if it expresses a good will, such actions caused by duty, have no genuine “moral worth.” The conformity of one’s action to duty in such cases is only related by accident to morality. For instance, if one is motivated by happiness alone, then, had conditions not conspired to align one’s duty with one’s own happiness one would not have done one’s duty.
By contrast, were one to supplant any of these motivations with the motive of duty, the morality of the action would then express one’s determination to act dutifully out of respect for the moral law itself. Only then would the action have moral worth.
According to Kant, what is singular about motivation by duty is that it consists of bare respect for the moral law. What naturally comes to mind is this: Duties are rules or laws of some sort combined with some sort of felt constraint or incentive on our choices, whether from external coercion by others or from our own powers of reason. For instance, the bylaws of a club lay down duties for its officers and enforce them with sanctions. City and state laws establish the duties of citizens and enforce them with coercive legal power. Thus, if we do something because it is our “civic” duty, or our duty “as a boy scout” or “a good American,” our motivation is respect for the code that makes it our duty. Thinking we are duty bound is simply respecting, as such, certain laws pertaining to us.
Looked at in this way, willing annual GDP growth by me, if willed by every person universally, ceases to be a good.
A preliminary formulation of the Categorical Imperative may be written as follows:?
“I ought never to act except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim should become a universal law” (G 4:402).?
This is the principle which motivates a good will, and which Kant holds to be the fundamental principle of all of morality.
6 June, 2013
See also:
Kant’s Moral formula – Blog (michaelreason.com) (more about the Categorical Imperative)