Deontological (or duty-oriented) theories of ethics (e.g., divine-command theory, Kantian formalism) assume that the first task of ethics is to determine what we are obligated to do.  By doing our duty, we do what is valuable (not the other way around).  Divine-command theory says that something is good for no other reason than that God commands it.  Kant's ethics is called formalism because it focuses on the form or structure of a moral judgment (the fact that all moral directives have the form "you ought to do X").  The fundamental aim of Kant's ethical theory is to determine how a command can be a moral command with a particularly obligating character.

Kant's Ethics

• According to Kant there are several problems with consequentialism

• According to the consequentialist, no act (no matter how evil or cruel) is right or wrong in itself
• If we are already inclined to do an act because we naturally seek to produce good consequences (e.g., pleasure, happiness), then we are not acting freely and therefore not morally responsibly
• Because of differences in their experiences and backgrounds, people differ as to what are good consequences; therefore, we can never achieve agreement on the end of moral behavior or on an ulitmate criterion for making such decisions
• The consequences of our actions are often out of our control, so we cannot be held responsible for those consequences or have our actions judged based on them

• Morality is not based on hypothetical imperatives (if you want X--where X is, for example, happiness--then do Y) but rather on a categorical imperative (you must do X, regardless).  If morality were hypothetical and people differed in their social and personal goals (as they do), then their means for attaining those goals (e.g., morality) would differ as well.  But morality should be the kind of thing which does not vary from individual to individual, because otherwise there would be no point in providing a reason for behavior other than that it is simply what one wants to do.  In other words, it would be to acknowledge that there is no reason for acting one way rather than another.  But because we are rational beings, we can give reasons for what we do, and we can act based on those reasons rather than acting simply because we want to.

• According to Kant, the fundamental rational principle of moral argument or reasoning is the categorical imperative: you should act, regardless of your own aims or purposes, only on maxims (general ways of acting) that you could will that everyone else also adopts.  To test the maxim for universalizability, you have to ask whether the universal adoption of such a way of acting would be (1) consistent (i.e., possible) or (2) acceptable to rational beings.

A maxim such as "lie when you can get away with it" cannot be universalized consistently (i.e., without contradiction) because, if people lied when they thought they could get away with it, you would never know when anyone was telling you the truth; in such a world, there would be no way to tell the truth from a lie, so its universalization would generate a contradiction.  Another example of this same point: the universalization of "steal when you can" would create a world in which no one's property would any longer truly be rightfully his or hers; but if there is no private property any more, there can be no stealing either, since stealing means taking someone's private property.

Kant recognizes that it is necessary to add the second test of universalizability (acceptability) because there are maxims that can be universalized without contradiction (e.g., "Help out people only when you benefit from it") which are not universally acceptable.  That is, it is possible to imagine a selfish world where no one helps out others except for personal gain; however, such a world would not be acceptable to everyone, and the fact that it does not have universal acceptability makes it a maxim on which no moral action can be based.

• Being rational means being able to act based on motives that are universally defensible.  Thus to act as a human being is not to act as a slave to one's instincts or passions or as a result of social causes but as ends-in-themselves.  Human beings can act out of respect for doing something because it is the rational thing to do, and when they do this they are acting for the sake of doing their duty; and this is what being moral means, acting on the basis of a "good will."  In this way, they are authors of their actions (autonomous) and are morally responsible for their intentions, not the consequences of actions.

• Morality presumes the existence of rational persons.  A society of autonomous, rational persons is a kingdom of ends, a society in which each individual has dignity, intrinsic worth, and is considered fully responsible for his or her choices in the making of universal law.  [But if everything is valuable only in terms of moral beings, then what about nature?--Answer: value is meaningful only in terms of freely chosen ends.]  The possibility for rationality makes humans morally significant, but that does not indicate specific morally justifiable ways to act.

Attempts to Undermine the Foundations of Morality

• Existentialism: We are free to choose our moral principles.  If we choose unreason, then there will be no point in asking for reasons for why we act.

• Hume and the Naturalistic Fallacy: No "is" implies an "ought": no factual claims (e.g., about whether actions produce pleasure) can be the basis for statements about what we are obligated to do.  This is called the naturalistic fallacy because it takes something that is part of nature and tries to make a claim that transcends nature.  Even if we are rational (Kant), that does not mean that we ought to be rational.

 
• G. E. Moore: Since the good cannot be defined in terms of any natural quality (it certainly is not tautologically pleasure or duty), then the attempt to define the good in terms of other facts must result in a fallacy.  The alternative: good is a simple quality, like yellow; you either know it or you don't.

• Logical Positivism: moral statements are neither analytic (true by definition) nor synthetic (true by observation); they merely express a feeling or a command.  They are not true or false except insofar as they tell us about the feelings of someone.  [Problem: since the principle of meaningfulness itself is not meaningful based on the criterion, it is a meaningless or nonsensical position.]

• Attack against the whole idea that morality has foundations: even if there are no ultimate foundations of morality, that does not mean that there is no morality.  For morality might be simply the set of values we have selected that gives our lives some order but that is constantly under revision.

Conclusions:  There is no such thing as the good as such.  A good life, however, would be one aimed at the pleasurable and virtuous development of potentialities and acceptance of social responsibilities and personal obligations.  There are no ultimate foundations of morality, but that fact should not prevent us from developing a map of moral strategies by which to guide our lives.