Within Reason

In the first section of the *Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals*, Kant develops the idea that we can call his first proposition:

> In order for an action to have moral worth, it must be done from the motive of duty.

This must be one of the single most misunderstood parts of Kantian ethics, so I want to examine it in this post.

The alternative to acting from duty for Kant is acting from what he calls “inclination”. Inclination can be seen as doing what one likes to do or is inclined to do. But one has to be careful here. Kant is not saying that doing what you like is morally wrong, or even that doing what you like has no moral worth. Rather, he is saying that doing what you like *because it is what you like* has no moral worth. It isn’t necessarily wrong it’s just not an action that is part of the moral realm (though figuring out what Kant thinks is wrong as opposed to amoral is a huge headache). After all, it is certainly possible that one could do something that one enjoys *because* it is one’s duty. What we like and what it is our duty to do may very well coincide.

Kant’s example to show this is preserving one’s own life. Most of us do this without even thinking about it, out of an immediate inclination. I think Kant agrees with common sense in saying that this normal preservation of one’s life isn’t something morally good or bad. It’s just something we do. But there may come a time when our inclinations change. Due to great personal hardship that can come about (such as the death of a partner, child, or other loved one), we can find ourselves without this immediate inclination. Our inclination may switch to letting ourselves whither away. Here, Kant isn’t necessarily saying such a thing would be wrong — it would simply fail to have any moral worth whatsoever unless it was contrary to our duty. But if, even feeling the inclination to slip away, we keep ourselves alive out a motive of duty (perhaps we have other promises to keep), then the action becomes worth something morally.

The same would go for actions that many of us would consider moral because they are altruistic. Some people may be naturally disposed to give of themselves and contribute to the happiness of others. And it is not that Kant doesn’t want to celebrate these people, but in this system they do not get *moral* credit for enjoying being beneficent. In order for a particular action to be in the moral realm and to be truly *morally* praiseworthy, it must be done from duty. Since those who act in such a beneficent way normally are acting from their own inclinations, which are installed and pulled on by only natural law, the best we can do is celebrate that they were born with such magnificent dispositions.

Let me take a stab at defending this.

What is uncomfortable about what Kant is saying to the present-day ear is that one does not own or is not responsible for one’s pleasant disposition, thus one really gets no credit for it. But do these pleasantly disposed people deserve the credit for this, themselves? A Kantian would argue that nature deserves the credit for it. There are two responses available to oppose present-day critics. First, I don’t think we should be worried about people who don’t want credit for their beneficent acts. This, in a way, shows the purity of their dispositions. We may want to reexamine the attitudes of people who celebrate them after their deaths as leading lives of struggle against evil, for they didn’t struggle. We also may want to reexamine our advice to others to be more like these people, for frequently that is not possible. For those who are not so pre-disposed, this would be acting them to act from a motive of duty, which is not what those pre-disposed were doing. Second, those who do want credit for their beneficent acts, even if they feel they come naturally, may actually be acting from the motive of duty more than they realize. One generally wants credit for what one experiences as a struggle. So perhaps these people do deserve credit, and even more than those who are naturally pre-disposed.

Our proper moral ranking of the beneficent people should thus be that the one who acted from duty is the only one who is morally praiseworthy. The other is praiseworthy for being a fine creation of nature, not him or herself. It might sound uncomfortable at first to think of acting from duty as being something one deserves credit for (since the modern concept of duty usually involves following orders), but for Kant duty is actually the purest expression of self, as it is the only thing that frees us from the laws of nature. That theme will come up again and again in the Groundwork and the rest of Kant’s ethical writing.

All this said, a neo-Kantian like myself thinks Kant is a little too restrictive here. I believe that in addition to inclinations we have installed in us from nature and childhood, that one can use a dutiful life to develop additional inclinations. Acting from inclinations which one was motivated from duty to “install” in oneself seems to provide a way in which acting from inclination may have moral worth. They may also be the only desires we can really own. But more on this in a future post.