Kant’s Categorical Imperative essay
One of the most widespread ethical dilemmas is the admissibility of white lies. Pious deception is obviously a form of intentional deception, as soon as it expresses person’s interest. However, unlike non-virtuous deceit, as a rule, used to implement selfish interests, a virtuous deceit expresses interests that are compatible with other universal values, principles of morality and justice. In such cases, an object of deception and an object of a good deed do not coincide, and moreover, one subject typically lies to another subject for the benefit of either the third party, where the third party may be represented by anything – from an individual to an abstract idea, or their own purposes seen as socially fair. For instance, in cases where it is necessary to neutralize terrorists during negotiations, anti-terrorist forces may be allowed to undertake all possible forms of pressure and distortion of reality in order to weaken the attention of law violators, force them to succumb to provocation, and further disarm, which is, in particular, shown in Steven Spielberg’s “Munich” (2005) referring to the historical event of Munich Olympics terrorist act. A more elegant example of white lies is fund in another Spielberg’s film “Schindler’s List” (1993), when a boy is cheating the Nazis, pointing to a man who had already been killed and calling him the man they were looking for. Here, lies turn into a necessary social tool able to achieve much more favorable results than in case only the truth is spoken. People lying in the context of a particular situation do not pursue their own interests or desires to benefit from it. It is also likely that outside the context the same people are not able to deceive others, while cheating may still be perceived as a tool the use of which is justified in strictly defined situations.
Similar case is discussed by Kant in his “On a Supposed Right to Lie Because of Philanthropic Concerns”, where he examines the example of a householder who has granted asylum to a friend, who was haunted by the lawbreakers. Later, as they knock on the man’s door and ask if the person of their interest was hiding in the house. According to Kant, the categorical moral duty commands to tell the whole truth to attackers without any concealment. The philosopher’s general thesis says that if for some reason, some kind person supposes that one’s lies can help someone or even save someone, this person is deeply mistaken, because saving some concrete individual, this person virtually “makes the very source of further unusable”, since the result of this humane act is the total distrust to any testimony at all, termination of social contracts and cancellation of all relationships. Moreover, the lie should be considered as an offense, as soon as a liar should further bear responsibility for all the unintended consequences of one’s own actions. Indeed, the anti-terrorist operation in Munich was far from successful on many stages, and eventually led to the death of hostages, however, the moral reasoning applied by Kant provokes serious doubts on different grounds.
First, from the standpoint of metaphysics, the question is whether the householder (law enforcement agencies) is really in any relationship responsibilities with house intruders (Palestine terrorists) to be asked for the dereliction of duty in front of them. Second, from the standpoint of situational ethics, shouldn’t the analysis of correct behavior take into account the relationship of the householder with his friend (responsibility for the safety of the nation)? Third, wouldn’t the truth told to possible assassinators be the betrayal to the one the asylum is granted to (Israel Olympics team)? And at last, is not the moral principle of “do no harm” more powerful in this context than the “do not lie” requirement?
In his turn, Kant argues that no good intentions can serve as an excuse to lie (in relation to the attackers), thus transposing the logic of reasoning he used when considering the situation of knowingly false promises on this case of improper compulsion to confess. In our opinion, the validity of such extrapolation is not obvious, as soon as testifying at a fair trial is not the same as providing evidences in court subordinate to the arbitrariness of rulers, and certainly not the same as informing intruders under pressure, and moreover, informing them while breaking responsibilities in front of third persons. Nonetheless, Kant claims that there is no difference between these different situations of forced response, saying that the duty to tell the truth, above all, makes no distinction between those persons in relation to which it should be observed; on the contrary, it is an unconditional obligation which is valid in all sorts of relationships.
Following Kant, it turns out that any relationship between human beings, including the relationships with terrorists, are fundamental to the society and humanity in general. But how can we assume some law-related connections between, metaphorically saying, the householder and the malefactors, if they arise spontaneously and are also against the will of one of the parties? From the perspective of personal duties, the householder is not in any relationships with the attackers simply because these relationships would be malicious. Here, the householder is found is in his natural state in which he is allowed to rely on his own interests only and which is potentially regarded as a state of war of all against all. In the end, according to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, basic human needs -physiological needs and the need for security – are of much greater value for any of the majority of people than the needs of a higher level of development, including morality and humanity. As a result, it can be concluded that in its natural state, public opinion generally recognizes or is prepared to recognize the right to the existence of situations of pious deception, when they are designed to meet the society’s basic needs for survival and security.
On the other hand, Kant is rightly assuming that people are not fully responsible for the consequences of their actions, especially in sub-standard conditions of revolutionary, totalitarian, or criminal arbitrariness, and therefore cannot make decisions on which information is more harmful. However, this does not mean that people are not responsible for their actions. If grasping this idea of moral philosophy, anyone tries to absolve oneself of responsibility following the truth telling, he or she can easily be put in front of other severe moral claims, similarly belonging to Kant’s fundamental principles of metaphysics of morals. Thus, we reckon that in many aspects, Kant is considering the abovementioned moral dilemma in some absurd world: saying that when one tells the truth and law violators grab people one is responsible for to possibly kill them, the person do not bear any blame, while when one lies, and there are still victims caught, the person is morally guilty. This interpretation of the situation cannot be fully reliable, especially believing that an accident can occur at all times and the subjects of action still have no control over it.
To sum up, life laws are constructed in the way that in specific situations one moral norm may face other moral norm directly, and a person will have to weigh them to choose one of them. Moreover, as Kant’s case analysis shows, one and the same rule fulfilled in respect of one person turns to be broken with respect to another person, thus violating the promise of mutual assistance and mutual support. In fact, life really provides with black-and-white situations where absolutely virtuous solutions are possible: in the end, any decision violates someone’s interests, will bring trouble or suffering to someone. As a result, in most cases, we have to choose the lesser evil. Indeed, an individual should not blindly follow one isolated norm, but rather should not forget about other rules applicable to a given situation. For example, the single-eyed adherence to the “do not lie” norm while ignoring other equally important norms may turn into absolute faux pas, callousness, and even cruelty. Thus, the task of the morally responsible subject is to assess ethical dilemmas from the standpoint of complexity and multidimensionality of moral set of rules.
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