Grounding For The Metaphysics Of Morals Summary

Zach Wakeland () Using Kant’s Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, I will analyze this story through the lens of Kantian philosophy with his universality law, the second formulation of the Categorical Imperative, from duty and in accordance with duty, and perfect and imperfect duties. In this story, a mother of a malnourished child uses deceit as a means of stealing from a business and then asking for a loan from a rich woman. Although the Kantian position states that the principles set forth shall be used to determine the moral law, the inconsistencies in the practical situations lead to a logical collapse of the Kantian position. The mother in this story steals from a grocery store to feed her child. A Kantian would argue that this action

As Kant analyzes in his book, the universalization of a lying promise to where everyone lies when making a promise, the institution of promises collapses as every pledge can no longer be trusted. With the collapse of promises, the ability to trust also collapses as there becomes no purpose for telling the truth if no one believes one’s word. As a further Kantian position, the mother, when making the transaction, stated that she would use the money to feed her malnourished son but then proceeded to use it to develop her talents, meaning she broke the initial promise. When this maxim of promise-breaking is universalized, the institution of promise-making collapses as trust has eroded from the institution of promise-making. This story also comes with a meta-ethical concept of cultural relativism, which means that morality varies from culture to culture—shown in the first paragraph, the mother claims that letting a child become malnourished is more immoral than theft in her culture. This cultural barrier indicates the moral differences between individual communities and nations as ethics and morality are subjective to raising the individual rather than an absolute moral

As a further examination of this story, the Kantian position would define the actions of the rich woman’s reasoning for giving the mother money as her “Christian duty” was by duty rather than of duty. This action is in accordance with duty as it is only done because of her Christian set of morals rather than for the sake of being a moral action. While the Kantian position defines that a maxim cannot have moral worth unless it is from duty rather than in accordance with duty, this stance on the maxim leads to moral actions being declared to be of no moral worth. To examine, in this story, the rich woman loaned the mother money on the basis that it was her “Christian duty,” a Kantian would argue this has no moral worth and not take into account that the woman did the moral action to help others. If this action has no moral value, people have no incentive to act morally. Not only does Kant’s position on duty and from duty lead to logical inconsistencies, but the position of the universal principle and the conflict between imperfect duties also