Poverty, Exploitation, Mere Things and Mere Means

I argue that, alongside the already well-established prohibition against treating persons as mere means, Kant’s Formula of Humanity requires a prohibition against treating persons as mere things. The former captures ethical violations due to someone’s (perceived) instrumental value, e.g. exploitation, the latter captures cases in which I mistreat others because they have no instrumental value to me. These are cases in which I am indifferent and complacent towards persons in need; forms of mistreatment frequently suffered by the world’s poorest. I explain why we need the category of treating others as mere things and what the prohibition against such treatment entails. Prohibitions against treating as mere means and as mere things are both essential for understanding the specific nature and extent of our duties to the world’s poorest.

Heteronomi som forutsetning for autonomi

In his major works in ethics, Immanuel Kant (1724—1804) does not pay much attention to the question how humans become moral. The main tasks for Kant in these works are to establish the moral law and discuss its application. However, in his minor works in ethics and pedagogy he draws our attention to the question mentioned and claims that humans first become moral when they get 16 years old. Before we reach this age, our will (Willkür) is able to choose, that means prioritize, between rationality (the moral law) and sensitivity (inclinations), but our will (Wille) lacks the capacity to impose the moral law on ourselves. To evolve in this regard so that our will becomes fully moral and autonomous, we need moral restrictions from other people with more moral experience. The relevant Kantian distinction in this regard is the distinction Kant draws between persons and moral actors in the wake of his formula of the categorical imperative called the formula of humanity. According to this distinction, a person needs to be educated heteronomously in order to reach the level of moral actor and become autonomous. Constraint is therefore a necessary condition for self-constraint.

The covenants of the great Abay and their influence on the development of the competences of a public servant

Abai's legacy and moral postulates have not lost their relevance today, although time and society have changed. The idea of the great poet: "Be a man" - becomes in the Universe a formula of humanity and tranquility, tolerance and prudence. In the poet's legacy, you can find many examples that demonstrate the discipline and ethics inherent in a civil servant. The article reflects the views and thoughts of modern employees: examples of the competencies put forward in the writings of the thinker that a civil servant should have are given: integrity, responsibility, stress resistance, strategic thinking, cooperation and interaction. The main outcomes and results of the research were announced in the branch at training workshops dedicated to the development of the language competences of civil servants. Abai's wisdom is an example for each of our compatriots.

Becoming by Returning Home in The Wondrous Woo

In Carrianne K. Y. Leung’s novel The Wondrous Woo, the 1.5 generation – those who were born elsewhere but came to Canada at an early age – represent the challenge of becoming through returning “home.” The uneasy marriage of becoming and homecoming that runs through the novel is decisively realistic. Woo blends elements of magic with realism only to reject romanticized rhetoric and advocate for the urgency of truth-telling and social empowerment. By juxtaposing different stories of becoming with various forms of homeward struggles, the novel gives expression to the transgenerational traumas and challenges that beset the 1.5 generation in the depths of their “homelessness.” In part, this challenge surrounding their becoming is a social one. Through its themes of homelessness, self-parenting, and mental illness, the novel details the struggles of Chinese immigrant families as they are handicapped by a lack of social knowledge. Unfolding around the efforts of the Woo children to transcend their immigrant backgrounds and negotiate empowerment and flourishing away from hostile social forces, the novel ends on a note of hope, suggesting that the hardships that the 1.5 generation endure can lead to a rich and fulfilling life. I will discuss the notions of home and belonging in the novel by bringing Martin Buber’s I and Thou and Kantian ethics in tandem, arguing that wherever an I-Thou bond develops, the formula of humanity is guarded, and home becomes possible.

Universality and Autonomy in Kant’s Moral Philosophy

The paper is devoted to the analysis of Kant’s approach to the ideas of universality and autonomy as the constitutive features of morality. The paper shows that Kant’s findings concerning these ideas were anticipated by the previous history of moral philosophy, mainly by the modern moral philosophers, who focused specifically on the elaboration of the philosophical concept of morality. Kant’s peculiar role was that, firstly, he conceptualized the ideas of universality and autonomy and formulated corresponding principles; secondly, Kant integrated both principles into the concept of moral law (a key concept in his moral philosophy) and revealed the way by which the formula of universality and the formula of autonomy together with formula of humanity constitute the supreme principle of morality and essentially express the sense of morality itself. Kant believed that the reason for the failure of the previous attempts to explicate the supreme principle of morality was inability to understand that the moral agent is subject not only to universal but at the same time his own legislation. Thirdly, Kant, unlike his predecessors, in his examination of universality didn’t appeal to the human nature or nature of things. Fourthly, he underlined that the principle of universality and the principle of autonomy were not only interconnected but also shaped each other: the determination of will may be identified as a universal principle only if it is given through a moral agent’s rational will. And a moral agent may be identified as autonomous only if in his decisions and actions he is guided by principles that are universalizable.

Kantianism, Consequentialism, and Deterrence

Many philosophers argue that it is morally objectionable in principle to punish people in order to deter others from committing crimes. Such punishment is said to treat the offender simply as a means to benefit others. This Kantian argument rests on a certain reading of the Formula of Humanity. However, the central concept in that formula is not “treating a person simply as a means” but rather “treating a person as an end.” This conclusion speaks against the moral principle that Victor Tadros uses to support his nonconsequentialist theory of punishment. Furthermore, a plausible way of interpreting the injunction to treat people as ends—Rawls’s original position—does not rule out seeking deterrence. Therefore, Kantianism and consequentialism do not differ in a fundamental way on the permissibility of deterrence. But Rawls’s Kantianism sets an implausible ceiling on the severity of punishments, and consequentialism does not.

The Categorical Imperative in Defence of Animal Rights. Christine Korsgaard’s Ethical Extensionism

In this paper, I present Christine Korsgaard’s style of building a conception of animal rights protection based on a concept of Kantian provenance, namely “end in itself”. Considering that an end in itself in Immanuel Kant’s philosophy includes only human beings, the American philosopher needed to modify (extend) the meaning of the abovementioned concept. This study aims at showing this change of the meaning in categories derived from Fregean semantics (sense and reference). Moreover, I will attempt to prove that by broadening the extension of “end in itself” Korsgaard uses a strategy called ethical extensionism and situates the revised (naturalized) categorical imperative ipso facto within environmental ethics.I start with elucidating Korsgaard’s views on the meaning of “end in itself” before she took interest in animal rights (set out mainly in Kant’s Formula of Humanity and The Sources of Normativity) and then I synthetically describe her animal rights philosophy with a special regard to the category of “natural good”. The second part of the article explains the methodology used in the paper, while the last part is intended to be an interpretation of Korsgaard’s thought.

Humanity as an End in Itself

This chapter develops an internalist defense of the claim that we all have most reason to be moral, drawing on Kant’s argument for his “formula of humanity,” which states: “so act that you use humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means.” It argues that rational pressure to form maximally coherent, systematically justifiable sets of ends gives us all reason to respect others as ends in themselves—reason that cannot be outweighed by our reasons to promote our own optional ends. It defends the Kantian argument against some prominent objections.

A Kantian Case for Our Obligations to the Other Animals

When we act rationally, we treat things that are good for us as if they were good absolutely. We choose to pursue them, and demand that others respect our choices, thus treating ourselves as ends in ourselves. This argument—Kant’s argument for the Formula of Humanity—establishes that there are two senses in which rationality commits us to the view that we are ends in ourselves. The demands that we make on others commit us to the view that we are ends in ourselves as autonomous lawmakers, and ground our duties to other rational beings. The demands that we make on ourselves when we choose to pursue our good commit us to the view that we are ends in ourselves as creatures who have a good, and ground our duties to other animals. The chapter also examines the difficulties this raises for Kant’s ideal of the Kingdom of Ends.

Procreation and Intellectual Disability

This chapter probes the implications of Kantian ethics concerning procreative decisions that involve offspring with intellectual disability. The chapter argues that selecting against embryos or early fetuses that would develop intellectual disabilities does not typically fail to respect persons’ dignity, according to one partial reconstruction of Kant’s Formula of Humanity. The chapter then disputes Paul Hurley and Rivka Weinberg’s contention that in some “nonidentity” cases involving offspring with disability parents treat their child merely as a means and thereby wrong her. David Wasserman claims inspiration from the Formula of Humanity in developing a necessary condition for morally permissible procreation. The chapter urges rejecting this condition for embracing it sometimes implausibly implies that in producing a child with intellectual disability, parents contravene the spirit of the Formula of Humanity.