Kant: Obviously I don’t expect individuals to follow these ethical rules to a tee. In fact, it is very difficult for us humans to follow these. However, in an ideal world, we’d only act such that we’d hope others act towards us, and this theory would produce moral laws that we can use all the time. Lynch: That sounds nice, but is it realistic? Mill: Kant, do you not believe it is okay to kill a cruel dictator or a mass murderer then? In my eyes, this is sometimes okay and ethical, since it may maximize the overall happiness of the inhabitants of the area. Yet your theory contradicts this, since I’m certain you wouldn’t want to be killed, or would you? Kant: I would not. Mill: Then how can you promote this flawed theory? Kant: My categorical …show more content…
Lynch: Exactly, it’s important that you say something in this case, and lying may very well protect your whole family. How could you justify doing otherwise Kant? Kant: Not saying anything is a perfectly acceptable thing to do. My silence may just confuse the serial killer long enough to allow my family to escape. Or my lying may provoke the killer and make him even angrier and more likely to slaughter us than before. You don’t know the consequences, thus you really cannot take them into account. Lynch: I think if we were to look into case studies of homicides we would see pretty clearly that not speaking to the murderer is not going to save your life or the lives of your family. Kant: I’m not trying to find anecdotal evidence to ethics. That’s simply an absurd idea. My moral theory is completely a priori, you don’t need any life experience or to research others’ life experiences to know that individuals should act in accordance with the way they want the people around them to treat them. All Mill does is look at circumstances, but we as a society need to be striving for an intrinsic moral law that applies no matter what those …show more content…
Animals look only to survive, but humans think beyond that. We know that sometimes it is right to do an action, and sometimes it is wrong, and sometimes it is morally gray. The world is not as black and white as Kant seems to believe it is. Kant: I disagree, I think that if we follow my moral theory, the rights are right and the wrongs are wrong. Utilitarianism utilizes this “morally gray zone” that you mention, but we would not have that with a different system of ethics. Lynch: Morally questionable situations are simply a part of nature. There is no way to avoid them, a strong moral theory like you propose would potentially even cause more of these, as people would be trying much harder to fit their actions into right or wrong, when not everything fits entirely in one category or the other. Mill: Precisely, that’s why you must work through the situation before acting, trying to achieve the best possible outcome for everyone. Happiness is the only intrinsically good thing in life, thus the best possible outcome for everyone is to increase general