Deontology Ethics

The word deontology comes from the Greek word deon, which means duty or obligation.

For deontologists, what makes a choice right is its conformity to a moral norm. One’s action is
right if and only if it conforms to the moral norms set forth by the particular theory. It is wrong
if it does not.

What matters is whether or not one follows the rules.

For many deontological theorists, some actions are forbidden, no matter how good the
consequences. I cannot kill one even if could save a hundred in doing so. I cannot steal a loaf of
bread even in doing so saves my family from starvation. Your actions are moral if they conform
to moral norms which are strongly held as binding.

“Deontologists act on an inflexible set of beliefs about right and wrong, doing what they
personally believe is right no matter what the consequences are.

A deontologist acts on a set of personal beliefs about the world and is unwilling to compromise
those beliefs.

Thus, a deontologist will usually ignore situational factors when making decisions, and does not
let the consequences of decisions get in the way of their actions no matter how risky the
outcome. Actions in deontology are always judged independently of their outcome.

This can be contrasted with consequentialist/teleological theories of ethics where actions are
judged based on their consequences.

One popular deontological ethics is Immanuel Kant’s.

He is responsible for the most prominent and well-known form of deontological ethics.

Kant’s moral theory is based on his view of the human being as having the unique capacity for
rationality. With reason, man is able to guide one’s acts; man can formulate rules or laws or
principles which can determine one’s actions. No other being in the world possesses such
propensity for reasoned thought and action, and it is exactly this ability that requires human
beings to act in accordance to and for the sake of the moral law.

Kant believes that human inclinations, emotions and consequences should play no role in moral
action; therefore, the motivation behind an action must be based on a well thought out norms
before the action takes place. Kant’s deontological theory provides humanity with a framework
of rational rules that guide and prevent certain actions, and are independent of personal
intentions and desires. The only motivation or intention one must have in obeying these rules is
duty.
Let us have this formula as our guide what has been so far said about Kant’s deontology.

Will  Duty  Moral Law

Duty is the only motivation in the pursuance of the moral law.

Moral Law must be categorical imperative.

A Good Will
People with bad will are popularly known as bad people. And no one, whether at the
level of rational impartiality or common sense, likes bad people even if such people are
physically attractive or prosperous in life. Maybe we envy their endowments or prosperity but
never their bad character. But all of us like a good person or that there seems to be a universal
belief that what the world needs for it to be a better place to live are good people. For Kant,
good people are people with good will, and only acts coming from a ‘good will’ have moral
worth.1 The ultimate ground then for the moral worthiness of an act is the ‘good will.’ This
means that an act is good only when it originates from a will that is good.

But what constitute a ‘good will?’ The following statement of Kant enlightens this question. “A
good will is not good because of what it effects or accomplishes, because of its fitness to attain
some proposed end, but only because of its volition, that is, it is good in itself and, regarded for
itself, is to be valued incomparably higher than all that could merely be brought about by it in
favor of some inclination and indeed, if you will, of the sum of all inclinations.” 2 Not the effect
or not the end that it can achieve but the mere volition or willing that makes the will good. This
brings to mind moral theories that propose that the goodness of an act is to be determined by
its effects.

Here is another statement of Kant about good will: “The law then determines the will directly,
the action conforming to it is in itself good, and a will whose maxim always conforms to this law
is good absolutely, in every respect, and is the supreme condition of all good.”3

Kant believes that “when moral worth is at issue, what counts is [sic] not actions which
one sees, but those inner principles of actions that one does not see.” 4 With this, Kant suggests
that we should not base our approval of an act based merely on how it benefits others but on
the principles on which actions are grounded.

1
Graham Bird, Ed., A Companion to Kant (Australia: Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2006), 325.

2
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 8.
3
Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, Trans. Werner S. Pluhar (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing.
Inc., 2002), 84.

4
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 19-20.
 A ‘good will’ then is not random when it comes to choosing what it plans to do. It is
guided by moral principles. So, what constitutes the goodness of a will is its being law abiding.
No matter what, whether in convenience or in inconvenience and even if it means sacrificing
one’s own happiness and life in general, it always follows the dictates of the moral principles it
adopts for itself.

Doing something good like giving alms for the reason that the doer feels fulfilment in
the performance of the act is a failure from the point of view of this command. This is for the
reason that the principle behind the alms giving is marred with another incentive, which is the
feeling of fulfilment. This includes the thought of salvation. But Kant is not explicitly proposing
to totally shun from doing it but only to judge that such act is lacking the true moral worth. For
Kant, only to acts done for duty’s sake can the true moral worth be rightly conferred on. 5

So now we know that what makes a will good is its mere volition or willing. Willing
what? It is to will a moral principle that qualifies as a categorical imperative.

a. Hypothetical and Categorical Imperatives

Imperatives can be hypothetical or categorical. It is hypothetical when the causality of a

rational being is determined purely by the desired object or end of an act and by its adequacy
to accomplish it.6

Hypothetical imperatives are basically grounded on ends that satisfy subjective

inclinations which are relative ends and for this matter no practical principles can be drawn out
as valid universally.7

Hypothetical imperatives, being aimed at objects or purposes that satisfy subjective

inclinations, “determine the will not absolutely as will but only in regard to a desired effect.”8
The imperative, “Do pay your debt always,” for example, if it is done for a desired object which
could be to avoid criminal charges or to gain the trust of the lender then, the imperative is
hypothetical and is only a mere practical precept. As mere practical precept, the imperative is
to be done as a kind of instrument to achieve a desired object, which is to avoid criminal
charges or to gain the trust of the lender. The imperative then is conditioned by the desired
object. And for this reason if the debtor gives up the desired objects in paying debt then the
debtor may now also give up the good act of paying the debt. Thus the imperative in this sense
is called a hypothetical one because it does not command absolutely.

5
Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals, 241.

6
Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 31.

7
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 36.

8
Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 31.
 On the other hand, categorical means that it is binding to everyone, who acknowledges
it with their own reason, at all times and in all situations or circumstances. It morally commands
absolutely.9 This means that what it commands is acknowledged as the only course of action
that is moral. Thus, one may still disobey it but not without guilt. Categorical imperative has an
absolute moral authority that we have no other option but to obey it to be moral. The authority
of the categorical imperative comes neither from external authority like that of the church or
religion nor from the authority of experience wherein one feels obliged to obey the rule, “When
driving always keep your eye on the road.” 10 The authority of this rule comes from experience
because experience tells us that if you do not put your eyes on the road, accidents happen. But
the authority of the Categorical imperative rests on the fact that it is legislated by pure practical
reason a priori, not coming from experience.

Let us take for example the maxim: Always give to people in need. Can this be
considered a categorical imperative? Yes, if it complies with Kant’s formula of the categorical
imperative, which states: “act only in accordance with that maxim through which you can at the
same time will that it become a universal law.”

The interest here is to elevate the maxim from a mere subjective maxim to the status of
the moral law, which is an objective or a universal law that is acceptable to all. Can the maxim
be proposed as a universal law?

To illustrate the process of universalization, Kant takes the maxim of self-love. The
examples are envisioned to show the process of universalization test wherein shown why the
maxim of self-love and the rules that are derived from it cannot be proposed as a universal law.

Our interest in this explication is the universalization process of a maxim using the one
formula of the categorical imperative.

…his maxim of action would go as follows: when I believe myself to be in need of

money I shall borrow money and promise to repay it, even though I know that
this will never happen. Now this principle of self-love or personal advantage is
perhaps quite consistent with my whole future welfare, but the question now is
whether it is right. I therefore turn the demand of self-love into a universal law
and put the question as follows: how would it be if my maxim became a
universal law? I then see at once that it could never hold as a universal law of
nature and be consistent with itself, but must necessarily contradict itself. For,
the universality of a law that everyone, when he believes himself to be in need,
could promise whatever he pleases with the intention of not keeping it would
make the promise and the end one might have in it itself impossible, since no

9
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 31.

10
Brendan e. Liddell, Trans. Kant on the Foundation of Morality: A Modern Version of the
Grundlegung. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1970Kant on the Foundation of Morality, 15.
 one would believe what was promised him but would laugh at all such
expressions as vain pretenses.11

Can borrowing money without the intention of paying back be proposed as a law for all
thinking beings? To answer this let us universalize the plan of borrowing money without the
intention of paying back by proposing it to be the maxim for all human beings. To do this is to
mentally project that we make it known to all thinking beings and that they should act
according to the same rule. Now if it is known to all that all who borrows money do not have
the intention of paying back, would anyone still lend money to anyone who borrows? I don’t
think so. Can one lend money to a debtor who one knows does not have the intention of paying
back? This plan then is not practical for the moment it is universalized it is instantly rendered
implausible. In his own analysis of the act, Kant sees that it ‘necessarily contradict itself’ and
therefore cannot be made universal. We observe here that Kant’s disapproval of the act here is
not moral but logical. So, one thing to be observed in the universalization test is the principle of
contradiction wherein “no cognition can be opposed to it without annihilating itself.” 12 So this
maxim cannot be willed to become a universal law for it contradicts its very goal, which is,
financial assistance. It self-contradicts by self-negating its very goal.

Kant believes that if there is one quality that a law must possess then, it must be its
being logical. But a moral law must be universal and being logical is not enough for a law to
qualify as a universal law. More than being logical, a moral law must have ‘humanity’ as its
ultimate end.

Reason through the laws provides the will an end as the ground for the will’s self-
determination. Understand end as an object of interest of a will in its pursuance of an act as
dictated by a law. When I buy something (cellphone), the act of buying as a practical law is
motivated by my interest on the cellphone. Now for the act of buying to be universally
compelling, that is, appealing to all; the interest on the cellphone has to be universal as well: all
must have the same interest on cellphones. But it is not the case that all has the same interest
on cellphones. Thus the act, to buy cellphone, does not qualify as a moral law because it does
not command universally or absolutely on all rational beings. Since Kant claims that the
categorical imperative absolutely commands then, it must have an end that is universally
appealing.
And so we ask: what object a maxim should have for it to have the character of a
categorical imperative? Kant identifies it as the nature of human beings as ends and never as
means,13 which is an instrument used to achieve another end. Kant calls this as the principle of

11
Kant, Groundwork of Metaphysics of Morals, 32.

12
Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, 280.

13
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 37.
humanity.14 A maxim has to serve nothing but humans as ends and only then it can be proposed
as a universal law.
The idea of this end is not a whimsical proposal but actually a deduction from the
"subjective principle of human actions" wherein the self is treated as the end itself. 15 Surely, a
particular act, which is aimed for an end is precisely pursued for the reason that the end aimed
for is subjectively considered good. Here the value of the end is always in relation to how the
self is served with its personal desires or needs. Ends at the subjective level, in all rational
beings, are conditioned by still another higher end. This higher condition, and actually the
ultimate possible end that we can think of, is one’s humanity. Humanity, as an end, is where all
our subjective ends converge; In other words, each of us actually treats our humanity as end in
itself. So if there is one thing that all rational beings can agree upon as the final end of human
endeavors, it must be humanity. This is the foundation of the variant expression of the
categorical imperative that 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, never merely as a means. ”16
The role then, of this formulation of the categorical imperative is not to teach us a purely new
lesson about humanity but a reminder that as we respect the humanity within us individually,
which is usually the case, we should not forget that the same humanity is present in all other
thinking beings and for this reason, all the others deserve the same respect we afford to
ourselves.

Whereas some ends can be used to attain another ends this end, humanity, is the final.
As a final end it should not be used to attain another end. Humanity, which is present in others
and in me, is to be considered holy17 at all times and in all places and in all circumstances. This
dignity so highly portrayed by Kant, that not even God violates, has its provenance from the
fact the humans are the ‘subject of the moral law.’ As such, humanity is the author of the moral
law, the one expected to obey it and whose durable or absolute obedience to it constitute its
holiness. As the author of the laws in the moral world, “humanity” is the ‘alpha and omega’ or
‘god’ in the same way God is the “alpha and omega” or ‘God’ of the world of nature.
Understanding humanity in this way magnifies the inviolability of humanity in others and in me
for it is highly unlikely that one, without any qualm, desecrates a ‘God.’

The categorical imperative is founded on the principle of humanity and it is on this

principle that it can be willed to be a universal law. To attain one’s holiness then amounts one
to have this universal law (moral law) as one’s duty. With the principle of humanity we can tell
that the primary aim of Kant’s moral system is not happy people but good people, who deserve
to be happy.
14
Ibid., 39.

15
Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morlas, 37.

16
Ibid., 38.

17
“A will whose maxims necessarily harmonize with the laws of autonomy is a holy, absolutely
good will.” (Kant, The Groundwork of Metaphysics of Morals, 46.)
 So, what constitute a good will is its being determined solely by the moral law which has the
character of the categorical imperative, that is, logical and has humanity as its ultimate end.