Deontological Ethics
• Deontological theory—Asserts that
the rightness of actions is determined
partly or entirely by their intrinsic
value
• Consequentialist theory—Asserts that
the rightness of actions depends
solely on their consequences
Deontological Ethics
The Moral Law —Immanuel Kant
 Nothing can be called good without
qualification except a good will.
 If an action is to have moral worth, it must
be done from a sense of duty.
 Kant’s categorical imperatives are absolutist.
Kant’s Categorical
Imperative
First Formulation: “Act only on
that maxim through which you
can at the same time will that it
should become a universal law.”
Kant’s Categorical
Imperative
First Formulation
Kant thinks that making a lying promise
would be wrong because you could not
consistently will that everyone should
make lying promises.
Kant’s Categorical
Imperative
Second Formulation: “Act in such a way
that you always treat humanity, whether in
your own person or in the person of any
other, never simply as a means, but
always at the same time as an end.”
Kant’s Categorical Imperative
Second Formulation
• People must never be treated as if they were mere
instruments for achieving some further end, for people
are ends in themselves.
• Kant does not prohibit treating a person as a means
but forbids treating a person simply, or merely, as a
means.
• We treat people merely as a means instead of an end
in themselves if we disregard their characteristics of
personhood (e.g., if we thwart their freely chosen
actions, undermine their rational decision-making, or
discount their equality by discriminating against them).
Deontological Ethics
Intuitionism —W.D. Ross
 Moral principles have prima facie, or
conditional, bindingness.
 We can discover true moral principles
by consulting our intuitions.
Deontological Ethics
The Deep Beauty of the Golden Rule —R.M. MacIver
A Critique of the Golden Rule —Richard Whately
• MacIver argues that the best formula for
discovering our moral duty is the Golden
Rule.
• Whately contends that using the Golden
Rule as your sole guide to right and wrong
actions would leave you perplexed.
Deontological Ethics
Does Morality Depend on Religion? —Plato
• The doctrine that morality depends on religion
is called the divine command theory (DCT).
• The doctrine forces a dilemma: Are actions
right because God commands them, or does
God command them because they are right?
• The first option implies that morality is
completely arbitrary.
James Rachels:
The Divine Command Theory (DCT)
The Big Question
Is an action right (or wrong) because God
commands that it be so—or is it right (or
wrong) independent of God’s commands
(so that God himself must answer to the
moral law)?
Rachels argues that the DCT is false and that
neither the theist nor the nontheist should accept
it.
Thomas Nagel: Moral Luck
• Nagel says the Kantian view is simplistic and
fails to take into account the way external factors
impinge upon us. These factors introduce the
idea of moral luck.
• “Where a significant aspect of what someone
does depends on factors beyond his control, yet
we continue to treat him in that respect as an
object of moral judgment, it can be called moral
luck.”
Carl Dennis: “New Year’s Eve”
The good and bad angels
of moral luck.
• Is it your character that keeps you
faultless—or is it luck?
• Is it the other person’s bad
character that brings him to
grief—or is it mere misfortune?