The Principle of Universalisability posits that an act is morally acceptable if, and only if, its maxim is universalisable, in which the maxim of an action, the principle underlying such, independent of its consequences, is the means by which morality is determined. xviii), which in turn produces two kinds of contradiction, in conception, such that ‘some actions are of such a character that their maxim cannot without contradiction be even conceived as a universal law of nature’, and in the will, whereby ‘it is still impossible to will that their maxim should be raised to the universality of a law of nature’ (Kant, 1785, p. Kant’s primary formulation of the Categorical Imperative is the Principle of Universalisability, where one shall ‘act only in accordance with that maxim through which you simultaneously will that it become a universal law’ (Kant, 1785, p. Kant’s distinction between the hypothetical imperative, which represents ‘the practical necessity of a possible action as means to something that is willed (or at least which one might possibly will)’, and the categorical imperative, which represents ‘an action as objectively necessary in itself apart from its relation to a furth ended’, demonstrates the necessity of morality’s dependence on the Categorical Imperative, which evokes a sense of intrinsic consistency (Kant, 1785, p.

Therefore, if you act immorally, you are irrational.’ Therefore, if you are rational, you act morally.ĥ. If you obey the principle of universalisability, then you act morally.Ĥ. If you are consistent, then you obey the principle of universalisability.ģ. ‘If you are rational, then you are consistent.Ģ. Russ Shafer-Landau, in The Fundamentals of Ethics, traces Immanuel Kant’s Argument for the Irrationality of Immorality, thus drawing upon explanations of ‘consistency’ and ‘universalisability’, with objections to its Principle of Universalisability, and claiming the incidence of false equivocation regarding ‘consistency’, which are rejected by competing interpretations of Kantian scholars.Īrgument for the Irrationality of Immorality:ġ.

xi), the only thing good without qualification, by which the good person’s actions are determined in accordance with the Categorical Imperative, from which he connects humanity, and therefore, rationality and autonomy, to morality. The Kantian ethic derives from an understanding of the good person whom acts out of the Good Will (Kant, 1785, p. Kant and Friends at Table | Emil Doerstling | 1892–93

Kantian ethics