Whether or not to give money to a homeless man depends on one’s values. Especially if you have the money and would hardly notice it’s absence. This paper will argue whether to give money to a homeless person based on the theories of utilitarianism, Kantian ethics and virtue ethics. Utilitarianism promotes maximizing the most happiness or pleasure. Therefore, this view would give the homeless person the money.
In Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant does not presume to establish moral laws; he posits the basis for moral law itself. Through this process, Kant introduces the opposing concepts of heteronomy, laws provided externally for the individual, and autonomy, laws established via the application of reason. The implication arises that autonomy under Kant's definition is freedom, and that autonomy is a requisite for moral actions. To fully develop an understanding of this relationship it is crucial to deconstruct and integrate his notions of: will, duty, maxim, and imperative. Humans have the unique ability to perceive natural law, and imagine or will those forces to be different.
For centuries, philosophers have provided us with a greater understanding of the world around us, providing suggestions as to how we might reflect upon, criticise, or improve the societies in which we live. This has allowed us to speculate on many topics, such as politics, ethics, and morality. Among many others, two of the most influential thinkers to this day are Nicolo Machiavelli and Immanuel Kant. Their writings, The Prince and An Answer to the Question “What is Enlightenment?” provide insight as to how societies should be ruled and set up in order for all people within them to be content.
Before Kant, moral philosophy was dominated by Crusius’s sense of divine morality which stipulates that the will of a person has to be in accordance with the will of God. Wolff’s notion of moral perfection adds that we should strive to procedurally achieve our sense of moral obligation to the degree that the ends or effects of a particular action are based on our ability to calculate perfection. Kant concludes that Wolff’s postulates are virtually impossible in attempting perfection in 1764 in his Prize Essay ,‘‘now I can with little effort show how I became convinced, after much thought, that the rule ‘do the most perfect action which for you is possible’. ’’ (Prize Essay.2:229) Crusius and Wolff’s arguments essentially appeal to the un-provable
Moral Dilemmas Caused by Artificial Intelligence “Morality is primarily concerned with questions of right and wrong, the ability to distinguish between the two, and the justification of the distinction.” Scott B. Rae once said that morality is focused on the differentiation of right and wrong in a certain scenario. This concept can be applied to many situations in life. Specifically, this ideology can be applied to the novel, “A Separate Peace”, by John Knowles.
In Imanuel Kant’s, “What is Enlightenment” he opens his essay with the phrase, “man’s release from his self-incurred tutelage.” This phrase is referring to man’s dependency on others to make decisions for him. Mankind is not courageous enough to take their own responsibility for their own actions or decisions, so they rely on other people to do it for them. Failure is what makes people scared of making their own decisions, and when they do make a mistake it is easier to have someone to blame it on. Having others do and think for you requires no effort, and more times than not these “guardians” of one’s life do not want to let go of their control.
In Groundwork of the Metaphysics of morals, provides some example of where man a wants to waste his talents. On page 35, Kant explains in his third example that to find “himself a talent that by means of some cultivation could make him a useful human being in all sorts of respect”. Kant explains that talent should be wasted if it will bring a joyful situation. But one should not waste their talent if it will be pain to one self. Kant also questions his own talent and wonders if he is wasting his talent for not making it a reality.
Although, one person's morals could be very different from another. Even so, what would happen if a person with no morals had the ability to harm others? That might be the case with A.I. exceptionally soon. Kaj Sotala, a common figure in A.I. discussion had much to say about the risk of robots not having morals. He wrote, “As simple examples, any AI with a desire to achieve any kinds of goals will have a motivation to resist being turned off, as that would prevent it from achieving the goal; and because of this, it will have a motivation to acquire resources it can use to protect itself.
Immanuel Kant made a large impact in the world of Philosophy. His goal was to introduce the principle of morality and have it become an important area in the history of Philosophy. He explains the idea of an objective principle and the initial concept of it. It is a command of reason and the direction of this command would be named an imperative. All imperatives mandate either categorically or hypothetically.
In closing, Kant makes for a wide range on what can be termed as an absolute moral duty, with his argument of the principle of universalizability and the principle of humanity. Kant argument shows that I should do things whether I want to do so or not. “With the results [being] that if [I] ignore or disobey them, [I] [am] acting contrary to reason (i.e. irrationally),” (FE, 168). Being a rational being is something that human beings are able to achieve. With Kant argument, we can only determine if an action is right or wrong once we know its maxim.
Through research, famous philosophers like Socrates and Kant believed that morality was highly associated with rationality and selfishness. For example, Socrates believed that to make a moralistic decision, a person must not take his or her emotions into account. To elaborate, while making a decision or a choice, the person must be in his or her clear state of mind, meaning they cannot allow their anger or sadness to be the drive behind their decisions. The decisions have to be made based on facts, reasons and consequences that not only affect themselves but the surrounding people as well. Similarly, for Kant who originated the instrument: Categorical Imperative (CI) had comparable ideas.
The minds of humans and conscious manmade artificial intelligence (as I defined in the first paragraph) are simultaneously very similar and also worlds apart. In my speculative form of AI, they would function on the basis of both logic and emotion, as humans do, but they may have very different ideas of what is moral and what is not. It could depend on the human who creates it. A real-world example of this are the ethics systems coded into self-driving cars. The person coding the protocols for what passengers to save in a crash have to make decisions about the ethics.
There are people that believe, there are absolute moral rule that everyone should follow, no matter what the situation is. Immanuel Kant a philosopher pushed this concept and believed that no one should break moral rules, even if it is to save people. He believed that we will never know the true outcome of anything, so we should always follow moral rules and late fate play its role. But most people don’t believe in this because it seems obvious that breaking some moral rules can have some real benefits from it. Furthermore, it would be impossible to follow every single rule because some rules can contradict to themselves.
Hyejin Jang Professor Writing DED 8 April 2016. 4. 7. Kant’s ethics differs from utilitarian ethics both in its scope and in the precision with which it guides action. In The Categorical Imperative, Kant emphasizes that human autonomy is the essence of morality.
Immanuel Kant’s moral theory differs greatly from the other theories we have learned about, especially Mill’s view of utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is based on the consequences of actions, while Kantian Ethics focuses on the intentions a person has before they act, and if they are fulfilling their duty as a person when acting. Kant explains his theory by providing examples of different people who are all doing the same action, but for different reasons. He discusses a store owner who charges everyone equal prices and explains that this only has moral worth if he is acting from duty, meaning he does this because it is what is right. The act is not moral if he acts in accordance with duty, or because he is worried about his reputation or business.
