How Can Moral Character Be Developed: Kant's Moral Dilemma

Introduction

When we consider human beings and what makes us so different from other species on the planet, we see the complexity of our language, our social structures, our high intelligence, and our emotions and ability to have personal relationships unlike any seen within other species. In order to put this into perspective, we can turn to Kant's trolley problem. This is a thought experiment that looks at how people respond differently to variations of the same moral dilemma. A trolley has just lost its brakes and will kill five people if the driver does nothing. The driver has the choice to switch the trolley to a different track where only one person stands; killing one person rather than five. Most people choose to switch tracks, even when the scenario is changed to you being a bystander. Although many claim that Kant's moral philosophy provides a justification for the choice most people make when deciding how to handle the trolley dilemma, a way of investigating this problem is to figure out whether people's general instinct can be justified through philosophical principles or simple psychological factors. One way that people may view this problem is to simply not intervene when given the role of a bystander. The reason behind this conflicts with Kant's ethics on emotions, and personal relationships. Those who choose not to intervene do so due to the conflict of emotion within our reason. We would rather be an innocent bystander and not intervene (meaning five people would die), rather than intervene to save five people`s lives but be a part of a single killing. However, how can moral character be developed in this complex interplay of emotions, reason, and ethical principles?

Moral Character of Immanuel Kant

One of the biggest features of Kant`s ethics is rigorism, which can be see from two different aspects of Kant`s ethics. Firstly, Kant does not want to accord a place to emotions, and therefore doesn’t account for emotions in a moral life. As well as this, Kant also doesn’t allow for any exceptions in moral laws. This rigorism places Kant`s ethics as being too strict, especially for humans. We cannot naturally reason with moral law without having some confliction from our emotions, whether this be due to our virtues in character or whether we act from the emotions we place in personal relationships. These factors can affect our decisions to follow what Kant calls universal laws. An example of this is that if a man with an axe turned up at your door asking for the location of your friend (who is hiding in your house), Kant claims that we have a moral duty to not lie and therefore it is always wrong to lie, even if necessary to prevent a murder to your friend. If Kant`s theory is correct, this seems that we would not only respect the murderer more than the victim, but also would cause us to feel responsible for the consequences.

Nietzsche's Moral Decision-Making

Friedrich Nietzsche criticised all contemporary moral systems, and this reflected in his criticisms against Kant. He argued that Kant`s ethics make a metaphysical claim about the nature of humanity, which then must be accepted for the moral system to have any normative force. Nietzsche follows with the claim that this disallows people to create moral values for themselves that will be useful to them individually. This objective moral law system that Kant emphasises we must feel a duty to abide by, includes universal laws that the majority of rational agents will agree with and abide by without knowing of Kant`s ethical theory.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Kant`s ethics can be discredited when critically examining the aspect of moral decision-making, as well as autonomy to choose own actions based upon your own belief system. I strongly believe this involves your emotions, and even your personal relationships with others. These factors along with wanting to follow what is thought to be morally good, all contribute to the decision-making we make when faced with a moral decision. Although there is strength to Kant`s categorical imperative theory, his beliefs on individual decision-making, such as using emotion with reason is irrational, fails to account for all the factors we consider when making a moral decision. At the time that Kant`s ethics were publicised, it may have been more appropriate or appealing to those to follow this kind of duty/obligation theory in order to live a moral life. However, in the present day, this theory`s view on morality is less appealing as the 21st century focuses itself more around character development and virtues of individual character as a way to live a morally good life. Therefore, in my opinion, theories such as Aristotle`s virtue ethics would be more appealing to today`s universal beliefs.

References

1. Kant, Immanuel. Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals. Translated by Ellington, James W., Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.
2. Nietzsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals. Translated by Kaufmann, Walter, Vintage Books, 1989.