Moral theories of Mill & Kant

This study will examine the moral theories of John Stuart Mill in Utilitarianism and Immanuel Kant in Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals. The study will specifically argue that, although there are similarities in the two philosophers' approaches to morality, Kant's is the superior moral theory in part because it places greater responsibility on the freedom of the individual's will as an expression of God's will, discerned through reason, and in part because Mill ignores God's will and puts all power for defining morality in terms of man's slippery definition of "pleasure" or "happiness."

Both Mill and Kant rightly advocate the freedom of the individual in determining moral behavior, but both also rightly connect the behavior of the individual with the good of other human beings.

To Kant, for freedom to mean anything requires the active and conscious involvement of the reason and the freedom of the will of the individual. Similarly, the basic idea of the connection between freedom and morality extends from the individual to the entire human race. Kant's moral imperative requires that the individual act as if his behavior were going to be emulated by all other human beings: "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law" (Kant 30). This gives a sense of tremendous worth to the actions of the individual and requires that he or she engage his or her reason and freedom of the will to the utmost in deciding ho

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e greatest happiness or pleasure, and, therefore, he is free to determine the definition of that greatest happiness or pleasure in any specific set of circumstances. Without God in the equation, the utilitarian can say that his action promotes the greatest pleasure, and all that can be set against such a stand is the counter-stand of other individuals who have an opposing idea of what produces the greatest happiness. However, in confronting this reasonable argument, Mill does not directly address it, but merely says, in effect, that the same can be said in argument against any moral theory or philosophy: Is utility the only creed which is able to furnish us with excuses for evil-doing and means of cheating our own conscience? They are afforded in all doctrines which recognize as a fact in morals the existence of conflicting considerations. . . . It is not the fault of any creed, but of the complicated nature of human affairs, that rules of conduct cannot be so framed as to require no exceptions (Mill 32). All Mill is saying is that every moral philosophy is subject to "conflicting considerations." He is not properly, directly, or effectively addressing the principal argument against utilitarianism. This is not to say that si

Category: Philosophy - M