• Section One • What is good in itself in an ethical sense? • Gifts of nature, such as intelligence, physical strength, these are not good without qualification because they can be used for evil. • Virtues – these are useful for happiness, even possibly the happiness of many people, but because they are useful (a means), they are not good in themselves. This is the opposite of Aristotle. • Consequences are not good in themselves generally because we do not blame someone who was well intended but failed. • Conclusion: • Goods for which we are not responsible (by nature of good fortune, winning the lottery) are not morally good necessarily. Our natural inclinations towards happiness are not good without qualification. Consequences are not good without qualification. • Only the good will (guided by the categorical imperative) is seen to be good without qualification. • Good Will • What is a good will? • What provides us the criterion to judge whether will is good or not? • Reason in its empirical use aims at what is useful, not what is good in itself, like practical reasoning for happiness. • Only when reason is about the good in a non–empirical or pure way does reason reach what is good in itself. • Reason applied to what is good in itself is determined universally and only conceptually which means apart from any empirical content or consequences. Good Will • A good will wills to act for what is good in itself but only reason in its pure universal and logical use can tell us what is good in itself. So the use of the will in a way that is not limited by any usefulness or consequences is a will in accordance with the universal application of reason to pure concepts of the good. The free will is most free when it is unconditioned by empirical need and circumstances. So, free will is nothing else except the will in conformity with practical reason. Autonomy of the will is the use of reason in application to the good in itself. So good will is will determined by reason or duty. Duty • III. What is duty? • A. • a. To find this out, we exclude acts contrary to duty, obvious things like stealing, murder. • b. We also exclude acts which are in accord with duty but done not out of inclination but out of fear, or fear of consequences. • c. Acts that are in accordance with duty and also our inclinations. • Kant does not say that the last ones are bad, just that we can't know whether they are moral because we don't know if the agent acts out of inclination or good will, duty. • • What Kant wants is a rational principle that makes it completely clear when a will is good. So what is dutiful becomes clear only when it is contrary to our self–interest. • Duty • B • We can't have a duty to be happy, it doesn't make any sense for Kant because then we can't be sure that it is done because it is good in itself. • • C. • What is a duty? When the will chooses to act out of recognition of the moral law which is universal, then the will acts in accordance with duty. • • Conclusion: • Good will is in accordance with the application of a universal rule that applies regardless of one's personal interests or circumstances as such a universal. It applies equally to every single rational will in the same way. There is only one moral law that applies to all moral agents. Duty • So duty means: – acting with the recognition that the highest good is to act in conformity with a universal law. – Making sure the content of my act is always such that what I will could be willed equally by everyone, i.e. it is in fact a universal law without a contradiction. Duty • There are two ways of getting a contradiction; these two different ways of getting a contradiction give rise to two kinds of duties: • Perfect duties: ones that I must always do • imperfect duties: you can imagine them without a contradiction, but when you think about them, you can't really want a world to be this way; ones that I may choose how and when to do. Duty • 1: Could I rationally act on my maxim in the world? • 2: Could I rationally choose the world as one in which I would be a member? • We must be able to answer yes to both questions for the maxim to be acceptable. If we get a no answer to either, we must reject the maxim and try to find another one on which to act. – Borrowing money and promissing to repay – Not being charitable Duty • Duties Perfect Imperfect • • To Others tell truth assist others in need • don't break promises help others achieve goals • don't steal, murder, enslave • • To Self no suicide or • develop talents • other forms of self-destruction •