An Analysis Of Immanuel Kant's Categorical Imperative

Immanuel Kant is remembered as the eighteenth century German philosopher who founded critical philosophy. He defined categorical imperative as the absolute or unconditional law that applies to all agents, the claim that does not depend on ulterior motives. The categorical imperative is not a command on people on what they should do or not. Kant formulated it to provide a way in which people would be able to evaluate their actions, measuring their morality and ethics. It is a procedure which any action can be evaluated to deem it morally relevant or not.
Kant was individually interested in self governance among people. He believed that the actions that people take have no meaning unless they are done freely and willingly. His moral laws are centrally based on reason. He believed that with the use of reason during moral dilemma, then they would agree with his formulated categorical imperative. He formulated this decision making procedure of the theory by stating that …show more content…
This is because he sets his view from the belief that everyone has reason and it should be used in identifying whether a certain action is right or wrong. It should be the obligation of all people to ensure that they do not use others as means to their personal ends and that the actions they per take would be well integrated universally without any contradictions.
Kant’s categorical imperative can be associated with some of the literary work that has been written. In the play, Antigone, Antigone is a courageous and moral woman who goes against the king’s orders with the aim of giving his brother a proper burial. She believes that the dead should be laid to rest with honor and she sets her mind to do it, even if it means doing it on her own and losing her life in the end (Fitts and Fitzgerald 1:50). She decides to bury her brother, not for her own reasons but because it was the right thing, unlike her sister who was afraid of the