Kant’s attack on being moral in order to be happy
As we have seen, Aristotle claims that morality is a part of
happiness. His answer to the question ‘Why should I be moral?’
is therefore ‘so you can be happy’. The eighteenth century
German philosopher Immanuel Kant offers a series of
objections to the claim that we should be moral in order to be
happy. Do you agree with his objections? Why (not)?
1
This is the wrong sort of appeal to make to someone.
The answer to the question ‘why should I be moral?’ is
‘because it is the right thing to do’. We should not
seek to justify morality by appealing to self-interest.
Morality is an end in itself and if we are acting morally
in order to be happy then this is not acting morally –
the moral person acts morally because it is right, not
for any other purpose.
2
Kant agrees that all humans aim at happiness, but
claims that happiness is not a clearly defined concept.
It is too broad and varied for us to conclude that
happiness must entail moral virtue. It is possible to be
immoral and happy.
3
Even if it is true that humans are happy only if we are
moral, this creates a further problem. If it is true
that morality makes us happy, this is a ‘contingent’
(accidental) feature of humans. But we also believe
that even if morality did not makes us happy we would
have an obligation to be good. I MUST respect others
even if does not make me happy, so the reason for
acting morally cannot be grounded in happiness.