So are yours to my implied questions. You do not have a monopoly on questioning.
Everyone has a monopoly on questioning. Everyone is allowed to ask questions. Everyone has the right to note that his questions are not sufficiently answered. 
thats again, debatlable. if everyone has a right to monopoly only a capacity to attain it will prevent chaos. therefore lack of capacity is a saving grace.
of what do capacity consists of? a masure of strength , mixed with convincing rhetoric gaining popular
support. Minus that hostility is engendered by frustraion, and that stymied can and does at times result in open conflict. that is not the aim of dialogue.
I did not say that the questioner has the right to force an answer. Did you notice that? … Oh, that was a question. 
And where are your “implied questions”? And if there is any: Why do you not ask directly? … Oh, questions.
B.t.w.: Your English is not always clear. Excuse me, please.
Okay, we should not derail this thread.
Will there ever be any tiny institution with an origin in Nietzsche’s philosophy?
Noted your reservation.
Personally I am not claiming to be an expert. I hope I can be an expert but I think that will take some time provided I keep at reading and revising Kant’s philosophy constantly and consistently. One of the problem with trying to master Kant is by the time one move on to concentrate to read the 2nd Critique on Morals, one is likely to loose grip on finer nuance points in the first critique. When one move on to the 3rd critique, one also loose the grasp on the other two. So constant refreshing is very necessary.
What I am comparing with other readers of Kant is based on some degree of objective comparison of actual efforts put into reading Kant assuming we are average learners [not genius].
On that basis, objectively [roughly] there is a difference in one’s understanding of Kant between one who has spent 5000+ hours full-time basis and another who has spent 600 hours.
I personally have spent round 5000 hours full-time on reading Kant.
It is very difficult to gain a comprehensive understanding of Kant’s ideas in its full perspective.
Henry E Alison a supposedly Kant scholar expert with 40 years of experience still missed [he acknowledge that] a critical point as pointed out by one of his student.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zfsKYRIzhg[/youtube]
I mentioned elsewhere the Kantian System of Morals and Ethics is too far ahead of its and our time. Nevertheless the categorical imperative is manifesting partially in principle in fact and reality, subliminally if not consciously.
I dare say you do not understand [not necessary agree] Kant’s Categorical Imperative fully, that is why your views in it fall short and thus are straw-man(s). It is not easy for you to get onto the same boat unless you have put in your fair share of effort to understand Kant’s philosophy systematically. [not independently]
Here are some rough points and hopefully you get some ideas of what the CI is really about;
- There are 5 formulations of the CI. [policies]
- The CIs are not expected to imperative nor enforceable in practice, they are merely guides.
- To put the CI in actual action, one need to formulate Maxims, enforceable Laws and rules that are parallel and in alignment with the CI.
- The Maxims are then translated into strategies to be executed in practice.
- Actual results are compared with the Maxims.
- Gaps and variances are to be closed via corrective steps [or punishment if necessary] on the principle of continuous improvement.
For example note the first formulation of the CI [1],
Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction.
Within Kant’s philosophy, the formulation of the CI [1-5] is referred as the Moral [Pure] aspects.
The practice aspects of the Kantian system is referred to Ethics [Applied]
If one has a maxim, e.g. ‘Killing is permissible.’
If this maxim is made into a universal law that is WILLed and activated by all rational beings at the SAME TIME, then that will result in the extinction of the human species after the last man dies.
Therefore in alignment with CI [I], the general Maxim should be ‘Killing is not permissible.’
But the fact is we must face reality.
Thus we need cater for variations and conditions in real life by codifying Laws and rules that made provision for exceptions where certain killings can be legal.
The point here is CI[1] is universal and will not change, but the Maxims, Laws and Rules can be changed to adapt to changing time and conditions.
In dealing with closing the variances and gaps, one can use and apply the utilitarianism, consequentialism, principles under the umbrella of the CI.
The problem is you did not bother to read and understand Kant’s critically philosophy in totality.
Note the Kantian process;
- Kant start his Moral and Ethic systems from observations and empirical evidence.
- From this empirical sphere he used philosophy to abstract the universal principles.
- Then he put these universal principles through the metaphysical tests.
- Once the universal principles are derived he retested them within the empirical sphere.
The above is exactly how Science and Mathematic deal with their Pure and Applied aspects.
If you are still not convinced, read up Kant thoroughly to confirm what I had stated above!
Btw, I am not claiming there is a total elimination of those practices at present.
I said over the last 100 years, if not try stretching it back to last 1000, 5000, 50,000 years or the time homo-sapiens first emerged.
If you draw a graph of the various traits, there is an increasing and net trend. Btw, I am referring to humanity on a global basis not specific locations or groups.
If you compare China and elsewhere they don’t behead anyone as easily as they do 1,000 years or more ago.
One element for consideration from the neural perspective is the evolution of mirror neurons in primates and human being.
What is ‘good’ is leveraged against the sustaining and preservation of the individual and therefrom the species. This is grounded on the Categorical Imperative [note 1-5] I discussed in the earlier post.
That is the general idea. Note the idea of Good is that which opposed ‘evil’ in the secular sense is a very complicated issue involving the Summum Bonum, i.e. what is the highest unconditional good. Next you may ask what is ‘Evil.’ To understand what is ‘evil’ one need to do extensive research and define what it meant by ‘evil.’ For example, it is obvious ‘genocide’ is evil and cannot be good as a universal law. Genocide as a good universal law would imply the extinction of the human specie. The other aspect is to present a taxonomy of evil to encompass all necessary elements of evil.
It is not that ‘survival’ is good.
What is ‘good’ is that which is aligned and support the preservation of the individual and the species [i.e. humanity] in the optimal sense.
Those trends that I mentioned are not exhaustive, but the relevance is whatever it takes to be ‘good’ that will contribute the survival of the individual and the specie.
What is good need to be aligned with the Categorical Imperative where one of them is as follows;
Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction.
Any trend or actions that do support the above is not considered ‘good’ per se.
According to Kant’s Moral system all rational individuals should strive to act in accordance with the above CI.
However within the Kantian System, it is recognized in reality the individual human can never conform to the above and thus humanity must re-align the CI with Maxims [not mathematical sense], Laws and rules to reconcile the empirical with the rational.
In this case, relative to the current conditions, what is ‘good’ is conditioned upon compliance with the Laws and rules implemented.
Nevertheless there should be an awareness of the gap between what is categorical good and legally & ethically good. Humanity must thus take step to increase the Moral Quotient of the individual to narrow this gap. The question is how to narrow the gap and we should towards Science, philosophy and adoption of other advancing knowledge to expedite the manifestation of the moral impulse within.
I have explained above what is the categorical good, i.e. a near absolute good, the highest good, the Summum Bonum.
Then we have the relative good with applied Ethics which is subject to continuous improvement. A greater understanding of the Kantian system will enable humanity to expedite and narrow the gap between the categorical good [Moral -OUGHT] and the relative empirical practical good [Ethical-IS].
Coherence and cogent??
Frankly I am only interested in discussing Kant for my own selfish interest as a means of a refresher. I am not interested in convincing anyone when the subject is so complicated, complex and difficult to understand.
If you need coherence and cogency, you yourself will need to do the hard work of understanding [not necessary agree] what Kant is about. This is also to ensure I am presenting an accurate representation of Kant’s ideas as I generally one cannot merely to accept the words of the other by faith or even arguments.
I think our line of discussion has somewhat been twisted like an tight bundle of fishing lines.
I have gone into more details of the Kantian system of Moral and Ethics in my last two posts and also explained what I meant by ‘good’.
Perhaps you could pick up again from the later posts and raised your disagreements again anew.
Note again, the Kantian System comprised two aspects, i.e.
- Moral - formulation of the Pure and universal principles [only five, 3 mains and two subs]
- Ethics - the applied empirical aspects of the diversified actual human conditions.
The Kantian system provides sophisticated strategies to reconcile the Moral [OUGHT] and the Ethics [IS], thus resolving Hume’s dilemma.
The Moral aspect is strictly referring to the universal principles of the Categorical Principles only.
Perhaps I may have mixed the two up somewhere and caused confusion. If so, take note of the above strict distinction and dichotomy, i.e. Moral is strictly Moral and Ethics is strictly related to the practices and empirical.
If he can’t speak or at least read German, then he he has a huge problem with the understanding of Kant.
Everyone should know the language of the author he is concerned with.
All of this talk about how one needs to study Kant for thousands of hours and that one needs to know the German language, if one is to truly understand Kant, kind of reminds me of how Christian and Muslim apologists will say similar things, when they feel threatened. For example: An atheist will point out a contradiction or something unflattering about the Quran, and the Islamic apologist will just resort to, say, " You need to read the Quran in Arabic in order to understand that ".
I haven’t read the CPR and I’m sure Kant’s philosophy is nuanced, but I’m confident that I understand the gist of his major themes.
1.) Space/time are parts of our ’ spectacles ', not things that exists independent of the mind.
2.) There is a phenomenal world, i.e., the world we experience — and there is a noumenonal world, that is to say, a world we don’t/can’t experience, as it is beyond our spectacles.
3.) Morality is absolute and imperative.
That is as the Prolegomena, which has been anaylized to be a defense to the Critique. But what of the corpus of my argument, which was implied, and consisted of historicism, vis. the interweaving of philosophical successions between Kant, Hegel, and Nietzche? It has never been answered, and i too, do not wish to continue to beat a dead horse. For those, who missed, skipped over, or ignored the argument, read the above, however, Eric, Your comments are a noteworthy core idea, which has effected the evolution of German Idealism in general.
I am very late to this party, but having read both, N is a far better philosopher.
Kant is boring, pedantic and wrong and books like his critique are some of the worst written
books of all time and that is in English. I have tried reading the German version and got nowhere
mainly because it is worse in German. I read the critique along with Smith’s book “commentary on
Kant critique” at the same time. took me 6 months to get through it. Philosophers like Kaufman dislike
Kant immensely and show why in books like “discovery of the mind” three volumes.
Kropotkin
That is pretty much right, Erik, although i.e. the differences between two Germanic languages are not as large as the differences between i.e one Germanic language and one Romanic language. Very huge are the differences between one Indogermanic language and i.e. one Afroasiatic language.
To know i.e. the language of the Koran is very useful in order to understand the Muslims and their religion, their “spiritual exercise” (Peter Sloterdijk).
To study Kant does not necessarily mean to invest “thousands of hours”, but you need more time for studying Kant, if you do not know the German language, than you need, if you know the German language. So it is a huge adavantage to know the German language when it coems to understand Kant, his country, his culture, and - last but not least - his philosophy. This does not only concern the time you need or other special aspects but also general aspects.
Here, a comment above comes to mind between persciptive and descriptive uses of language. To understand Kant in terms of a perscription, is notany more inferior to a descriptive use, at all, the idea of Kant is borne by his very literally intended connecting the two! This was i believe Suwellos intention of saying that Prismatic was thought to have proposed an argument desriptively.In my min a prescription is proper lacking in Kant, in as much he fails to forsee the consequences , the oughts,of his Humean disconnect between causes and effects. Since we are;talking about the greates merit attributed to Kant,vis, his morally categorical truths, he has crossed, de-ontoligized morality into pure intuition,
That is why questions as to waht ‘good’ is came repeatably about, and that isKant’s big problem. History did not prove him right, and excepting a few adherents, including Polanyi, the thing fails miserably. Nietzche took advantage of this flaw,and if Kant would have been greater, he SHOULD have forseen this as one casual possibility.
Another example:
If a child has to go to a foreign country, then it will soon be adapted to this country - mainly because of the learned language.
That is not debatable at all, my friend.
Learning a language (the first one, the second one, … and so on) has always consequences, and this consequences are nearly always positve consequences.
Do you mean it is obvious that genocide is evil and cannot be good as a universal law, or do you mean it is obvious that genocide is evil because it cannot be good as a universal law?
It is obvious that genocide as a good universal law would imply the extinction of the human species. This, however, suggests that the Categorical Imperative rests on examples like the genocide example. Why would the extinction of the human species be a bad thing? Is it because individuals should (according to Kant) always be treated as ends in themselves? Also, does the fact that an act cannot be good as a universal law necessarily mean that it is evil? Can’t it be, like, neutral?
I think it’s a bit unfortunate to choose the word “optimal” here, considering that it’s from the Latin word for “best”, so using it means using the defined (“good”) in the definition (good < better < best). Also, I don’t understand what you mean by it. If you were just talking about the species, then I could understand how the preservation of all individuals could be said to be more optimal than the preservation of only a single individual (or two, a man and a woman, so that the species can in theory be preserved indefinitely). But as you speak of the individual as well as the species, I’m not sure what you mean. Do you mean that comfortable preservation would be more optimal than uncomfortable preservation? Also, is the preservation of the species good inasmuch as it entails the preservation of individuals, or is the preservation of individuals a means to the preservation of the species? I ask this because the maxim that says individuals should be treated as ends in themselves might itself be a mere means to something else. Please confirm that it is not.
But as for absolute goodness, is what is good good because it is aligned with the Categorical Imperative, or is there a good–the highest good, the Summum Bonum–on which even the Categorical Imperative is based?
In that post, you say:
I’m not interested in what you call Ethics [Applied], only in what you call Morals [Pure]. Now this example again supposes that the extinction of the human species is a bad thing. I’m inquiring into nothing less than the basis (ground, foundation) of the Categorical Imperative. Why should the fact that I do not want to be killed compel me not to kill others?
The thousands of hours is my actual experience. If there is a faster way I would have opted for it.
Btw, many years prior to this current serious effort of a continual studying of Kant, I had already done around 1000 hours studying Kant [doing notes, charts, etc.] but when I meet serious posters in forums specializing in Kant, I could not present the essentials effectively and to the point because I did not understand Kant’s work comprehensively.
It is true knowing the original language does matter, but to read Kant in German, one still have to put in the necessary hours.
The good thing is, Kant’s work has been translated by many translators and in the process the errors in translation has been corrected. Here is one caution on translating certain terms.
Smith for example use the common term ‘object’ to represent the three different terms.
The Islamist apologist may also be right, but fortunately there are also many English translations (> 50 that I know of) of the Quran to put its intended points in perspective. In addition we have so many other fields knowledge, .e.g. philosophy of religions, history, Science, etc. that we can rely upon to ‘triangulate’ what [the illusion, lies, etc.] the Quran and other religious books are driving at.
In the case of Kant, understanding the gist of such major themes can be very misleading. Such major theme [there are many of such] must be understood as part of a whole.
Thus we should edit the above to;
Space/time as pure intuitions a priori are parts of our ’ spectacles ’ [fundamental building black of cognitions], not things that exists independent of the mind.
The additional point, space/time are ‘pure intuitions’ is critical, and there are other critical points relating to space and time that are critical.
Note the nuance in this,
There is a phenomenal world, i.e., the world we experience — and there is a noumenal world to be assumed, that is to say, a world we don’t/can’t experience, as it is beyond our spectacles. If you do not mention ‘to be assumed’ [or postulated] then there is a serious issue towards philosophical realism versus philosophical idealism or transcendental realism versus transcendental idealism.
To avoid more controversy, it would be clearer as,
Morality assumed and taken as principles is absolute and imperative but not imperative at the conditional ethical level.
It is obvious to any normal human being that genocide in general is evil.
It is also obvious those who commit genocide will insist their act of genocide is good, but it also obvious any acts of genocide against their own kind will be regarded as evil.
It follows that genocide-in-general is evil.
What I meant is as follows;
Genocide-in-general is evil of the highest degree within its taxonomy.
Therefore it cannot be good [direct contrast to evil] as a universal moral maxim/law.
The categorical imperative is fundamentally a natural inherent moral impulse within humans.
Philosophically, it is abstracted from all ‘good’ and ‘evil’ empirical human activities. Genocide is merely one example of evil act of the highest degree.
From induction can you demonstrate in general which individual living thing emerges or is born with the immediate intention to kill itself.
From induction it is observed all normal individual living thing emerges or is born with an immediate instinct to live and produce/assist the next generation till the inevitable. From induction of the general, we can infer this is to facilitate the preservation of the species.
Thus anything [e.g. genocide as a universal maxim] that threatened the preservation of the species and elimination all individual are to be avoided, in other words a bad or evil thing.
There is a continuum from extreme good to extreme evil. There are vague and neutral elements that can be considered good or evil depending on the contexts and situations. These ambiguous element can be dealt within the ethical aspects within its context. For example we cannot have a standard maxim with regards to the act of say jealousy, anger, and the likes, thus a need to take into account the context ethically [not Kantian moral].
Note the difference between the ideal perfect maximal and the practical optimal.
‘Optimal’ is achieving the best within given existing constraints.
Thus if we have team-human striving towards the a goal, we do not expect all individual to produce the same results. What is considered ‘good’ would be that each do their optimal [best] within the constraints/limitation they are facing.
I have shown above, how via induction the extinction of a the human specie is a bad thing to each individual as team humanity. Unless one is a Martian or alien from outer space, it is conditioned within the human genome that the potential threat of the extinction of the human specie [a bad, evil thing] is to be avoided at all costs [i.e. to the extent of sacrificing some lives].
For Kant, the grounding of the Categorical Imperative does not directly involve the survival of the individual or preservation of the specie but on the philosophical deliberation of other elements. That is a different topic and a very complicated one.
So, there is much to discuss.
Okay, I find this admirable and worthy of the effort. Thanks for the explanation and taking the time to test the ideas here in the forum so that we might all have a chance to learn.
I don’t see that your logic follows here. You say, if killing is permissible “then that will result in the extinction of the human species after the last man dies.”
But just because killing is permissible does not mean that everyone must kill each other. Imagine as a thought experiment that you and I were together in a room and it was decided between us or by some greater governmental authority that killing each other was permitted. Neither of us would have to, or even want to kill each other unless we had a motive.
If we two were out in a field with a forest nearby and a collection tools and other resources (for example seeds) needed which allow for working the field, cutting trees and building, and it was permissible for us to kill each other, it could very well be in our interest not to kill each other but instead to cooperate to work the field, and use our tools to build domiciles. Say another individual came to where we were with some motivation to kill us, and killing was permissible, we could technically, if that individual did not wish to cooperate with us but pursue the agenda of murder, kill that individual, protecting ourselves, and continue with our work and maintenance, all the while killing being “permissible”.
You then say, “But the fact is we must face reality.
Thus we need cater for variations and conditions in real life by codifying Laws and rules that made provision for exceptions where certain killings can be legal.”
This leads to the conclusions that your use of the categorical imperative is not suitable for generating maxims applicable to reality and that, subsequently, your imperative is not universal and so not categorical. This causes me to call into question the entire value of the ‘categorical project’.
You did not claim that the total elimination of those practices you mentioned (as being immoral) had taken place, that is true, but you did state:
My example with China was to illustrate that humanity’s survival continues despite these trends, and your suggesstion: “try stretching it back to last 1000, 5000, 50,000 years or the time homo-sapiens first emerged.” would lead me further to conclude that the practices you stated, like capital punishment, misogyny, even genocide, have indeed been going on for thousands of years, and yet humanity has continued to survive and our yet our population is at a greater height than its ever been.
What you are saying here leads me to think you would change the structure of your earlier imperative ‘it is permissible to…’ to something like ‘you must…’ so that categorically the imperative to genocide would lead to humanity’s extinction. I think there would still be problems with the categorical imperative project in certain cases, like killing; as you stated realistically there may(?) be times to kill.
But I have another problem with the statement above. You state: “What is ‘good’ is leveraged against the sustaining and preservation of the individual and therefrom the species.”
There are two options to follow this idea through:
-
Imagine that we accept this and ask, if our concern is with the preservation of the species, does it necessarily follow that a genocide would lead to the extinction of the species? If the answer is no, then we still would ask, is a genocide okay then some of the time under some conditions? What if, for example, the earth had become so extremely overpopulated that the shortage of food was pandemic. In such a case, a controlled genocide may in fact aid in the survival of the species whereas to refrain from a genocide could very well result in the extinction of the species entirely.
-
We do not accept the above definition of the good outright (What is ‘good’ is that which is aligned and support the preservation of the individual and the species [i.e. humanity] in the optimal sense.) but instead ask, why is the preservation of the individual and the species good? An individual may think it is good, but thinking something merely does not entail that it is good, because by the same right someone could think the extinction of the species was good — if this person, for example, became convinced that humanity was an immoral viruslike species — in their actions despite their words — for killing animals, poluting the environment, and whatever else. I think a deeper investigation needs to take place to discover ‘what is the quality which makes a thing good?’. And so in this case I am proposing that a deeper investigation take place as to why it is good that “the individual and the species [i.e. humanity]” by preserved “in the optimal sense”.
I will continue in this vein to address the rest of your post:
There is a two problems with this. The first — You yourself contradicted your initial example:
And I have posed a problem for you concerning genocide under the 1) above. I think it needs investigating whether an imperative can even be made categorically (that is, universally) without contradiction.
The second problem — You say: “What is good need to be aligned with the Categorical Imperative”, and I ask, why does what is good need to be aligned with the categorical imperative? Even if a good is aligned with the imperative, why does that make it good?
Without a reason why “all rational individuals should strive to act in accordance with the above CI”, what you are stating is mere dogmatism, one would be obligated to act in accordance with the imperative merely because someone (in this case Kant) says so.
And every time you speak of compliance with the imperative you immediately contradict it by saying “it is recognized in reality the individual human can never conform to the above” and earlier “But the fact is we must face reality.” etc. which breaks your own rule for the categorical imperative: “Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction.”
This does not follow. You say that the CI will not change, yet immediately the categorical nature of the imperative changes because in reality we must adopt contradicting “Maxims, Laws and Rules”, thus the assertion that the imperatives are categorical (universal) is proven of itself false and logically untenable.
I am inclining at present to see this point of view as dogmatic, not only must we accept the imperative for no other reason than that it is good because it is the categorical imperative, but then we must accept it while simultaneously contradicting it to follow “Maxims, Laws and Rules” which we haven’t even yet examined as to their own validity, and surely these “Maxims, Laws and Rules” cannot themselves be categorical if you have already stated that they would contradict other categorical imperatives.
Note Formulation 1 of the Categorical Imperative is this;
Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time WILL that it should become a universal law without contradiction.
Willed as a Universal Law meant it is applicable to all normal rational person.
In principle [note principle] if all [universally] normal rational person applies this [permitted to kill others], then it will lead to the eventual extinction of the human species after the last person is dead.
On this basis, Formulation 1 is rational and acceptable. Note there are 4 other formulations to iron out any kinks in Formulation 1.
Your examples are not applicable as you are conflating ‘Ought’ with “IS.” What is needed is a reconciliation of ‘ought’ with “is” not a conflation of them.
As I mentioned, in principle, if killing is permissible to all people, then, the final result is the extinction of the human specie.
In contrast, if killing is not permissible, then there is no threat to the human specie as a far as ‘killing’ is concerned.
If you test the CI [Formula 1] with all sort of human variables, you will find CI-1 will stand the test.
The categorical imperative is sound within the perspective of pure reason as an ideal. As I mentioned, this ideal is to be merely used as a guide and not to be enforceable.
You need to note [I had mentioned many times] the Kantian Moral/Ethical system comprised the two aspects, i.e. the Pure and Applied.
For example, there is a perfect triangle within Pure Geometry in theory and measurements but there will not be any perfect triangle in empirical reality.
Similarly, we can postulate and assume ideal and perfect absolute moral principles, i.e. the Categorical Imperative, but we do not expect the CI to exist in empirical reality.
To reconcile and align actual practice with the CI we need to introduce Maxims that are aligned as near as possible to the CI.
We may start the maxim with ‘No killing is permissible.’
But we know this is not realistic in practice.
So we add a provision to the Maxim with a Law,
‘Killing is permissible only with the following exceptions’
It is then up to the judiciary to deal with such exceptions.
The positive direction is the setting of the CI establish a fixed goal post to modulate and improve on actual ethical conditions.
When the Maxim is 'No killing is permissible, ’ i.e. Zero,
then there is a benchmark for the executive to manage the variance between zero and the actual number of killings.
Say, the number of actual killings is 100,000 in 2015.
We will analyze the root cause of these killing and find preventive measure to reduce the number to as close as possible to the [quite] impossible ought of zero.
Yes, genocides and the other negatives are still in existent and the human population is increasing.
However if you put the reduction of these negative variables in a graph you will find a positive trend.
Note the ratio to total is more critical than the number in this case.
The ratio of the number of human sacrifice per total population 5,000 years ago would have significantly reduce since then to now.
The number of countries with capital punishment over total countries in the world would have reduced significantly over the last 500 to 100 years.
The ratio of the number of slaves over total population would have reduced significantly over the last 5000 years.
You can do the same estimation for the various evil variables and you will note the increasing positive trend.
This I claim is based on the potential inherent moral impulse within the human DNA.
Note my explanation above.
I started with ‘what ought/must be done’ in principle as abstracted from empirical evidences, e.g. real life situations, moral impulse [mirror neurons, oxytocin,] in the human DNA, etc. This is the pure moral aspects of the Kantian system.
The Kantian system then bridges and reconcile the ‘ought’ with the 'is" via its ethical aspects.
There is no issue here.
Applying the principle of the CI, genocide will lead to eventual human extinction. The CI will stand as a moral principle regardless. Thus the initial maxim is,
No genocide is permissible.
Theoretical: IF [big IF] genocide really necessary, the judiciary will then implement laws to cater for exception where genocide is necessary. In reality I don’t think such a provision for genocide will ever be considered. Within the taxonomy of evil, genocide will be categorized as one of those with the highest degree of evil and obviously no compromise will be allowed.
Re why the preservation of the specie is good, I have explained in my earlier post. It is like asking why breathing is good, i.e. a critical universal necessity.
The test of whether something is good can be done by putting it through Formula 1 of the CI. If it lead to the extinction of the specie, then, it is not good. In other cases, the test is that of general reciprocity.
Btw, the formulation of the CI assume humans are normal rational people and thus exclude people who are mentally sick.
Note the Law of Non-Contradiction imply same time and same sense.
There is no contradiction in my case as it involves two different senses, i.e.
- the transcendental pure reason and
- the empirical
I explained we can strive for perfect ideals [via pure reason] as merely a guide but such ideals are not achievable in empirical reality.
I have explained this in my earlier post.
viewtopic.php?p=2530250#p2530250
When an action/thought is in alignment with the categorical imperative, it is considered good.
If an action/thought is in misalignment with the categorical imperative [it is considered not so good or bad], it impinges on the survival of the individual, the preservation of the human specie and the progress and well-being of humanity. Note there are degrees [1 -99.99%] of ‘good’ and ‘evil.’
Note I gave the reasons above, i.e.
the survival of the individual, the preservation of the human specie and the progress and well-being of humanity.
I would not prefer the term obligated.
In general, when one is a member of a NBA team, being professional one will strive to perform optimally in alignment with the rest of the team member and the team’s mission [team CI and goals], not because the coach said so.
In the case of Kant, it is not because Kant said so. Kant merely highlighted the natural moral impulse within the individual and humanity and presented it very systematically. It is up to the rational and complete individual to understand the principles involved and strive to rewire his/her brain [this is the critical phase we need to consider now into the future] to align with the CI optimally.
This eventually will drive the individual and collective to uplift the average personal moral quotient based on effective approaches.
I hope by now you have understood there is no contradiction as they are in different senses.
Like the lighthouse that will not change, the CI as a principle will not change but merely will be used as guide. I have explained there is no contradiction.
The impulse of the CI is the same as sex is an inherent universal impulse for humans. There are exceptions but they are irrelevant to the universal expectation of humans to produce the next generation. Other than exceptions, the sexual impulse will manifest in humans, there is no question of whether one must accept or reject it.
Thus just like the sex impulse, there is no question of accepting the CI because it is inherent within humans.
As for contradiction, I hope you understood my explanations above why there is no contradiction.
The CI of Morality is similar to the perfect triangle of Pure Geometry. Meanwhile the Maxims, judiciary laws and rules are the real triangles in practice that we attempt to make perfect but can never achieve perfection, nevertheless we benefit from the continuous improvement towards the ideal in the course of striving to be perfect.
Thus striving for the never achievable perfect as a fixed guide is more effective than chasing after movable goal post like those the non-Kantian moral/ethical systems.