Muhammet Mirsat Arslan ETHR 105 Kantian Approach To Nerveson 's Point of Helping The Hungry Starving is one of the critical issues throughout the world. As the developed countries live high off the hog, the others live in poverty. Helping the starving people plays an important role in terms of decreasing this circumstance. In his article "Feeding the Hungry" Jan Nerveson emphasize that people help the starving ones, but he distinguishes charity and justice. He thinks that the demands of justice can be compelled, but the demands of charity cannot be compelled and claims that feeding the hungry is an issue of charity, not an issue of justice. In this essay, I will discuss Nerveson 's argument from Kantian view. Charity is an action that comes …show more content…
Especially, governments can force the people to complete their duty in order to secure the justice. As Nerveson states, being compellable is important features of justice. On the issue of feeding the hungry, Nerveson opposes to the view of justice because he states people should not be compelled to help the hungry whom they did not make it hungry. His argument conforms to Kant 's some points, especially Kant 's classification of duty. First of all, Kant 's second formulation of the categorical imperative specifies that "Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means."(Kant) According to this point, people should help the hungry because of that they are humans. On the other hand, enforcing people to help the hungry make the situation opposition of the formula of Kant because there are always some who do not want to help them because of that they are human, but they help the hungry to not break the law. Thus, enforcing people to help the hungry does not make them treat the hungry as an end themselves. This point also embraces the Kant 's idea that motivation of action is more important than consequences. Kant clarifies that consequences are not important, the primary thing in action is intentional. In this issue, it is not possible that all people help the hungry because of that they have these intentions. There is always one who says that nobody can blame me because of that I did not make them hungry. Moreover, Kant classifies the duty according to its certainty. He defines the perfect duty as a perfect duty such as telling the truth which is not flexible and all people must obey. While the other duty is imperfect duty that is flexible and people are free to obey such as charity. Nerveson treats helping the hungry as charity like Kantian approach. His argument is quite compatible with Kant 's classification of