Immanuel Kant's Moral Theory Analysis

Immanuel Kant is a well know German philosopher who is considered to be the central figure to modern philosophy. In 1785, one of his famous works, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, was first published. This text is split up into three section, and within the second section is Kant’s well known moral theory. This theory states that everything in nature works according to laws and in order for a law to be a moral law, it must be a universal law. These laws apply to all rational beings, there are no exceptions. In this paper I lay out Kant’s moral theory, using the example of illegal downloading of music, and determine whether the theory can adequately respond to the lying objection. I will argue that a Kantian would not download music illegally and that the theory cannot adequately respond to the lying objection. In Kant’s moral theory, moral laws state the obligations, or duties, we have as rational beings. Moral laws are laws that are composed from reasoning alone and apply to all rational beings. In order to live a …show more content…
Korsgaard argues that with the case of Universal Law, lying would be morally permissible. She argues this because when the murderer comes to your door, they lie and try to deceive you. In the case Kant referred to, the murderer does not know that you are aware of the circumstances you are in. Since they think you are unaware of the circumstances you are in, they wouldn’t expect you to lie. This would make the universal law of lying to a murderer at the door effective because the murderer supposes you do not know the circumstances you are in and will not expect you to lie. With this view we can argue that it is morally permissible in situations involving lying to a deceiver because they willingly place themselves on an unprotected