The Good Will In Kant's Deontological Approach

Kant came out with his theory in answer to the utilitarianist views that were being used at the same time. Those views were focused on the outcome of an action and how much happiness it caused. Kant however, with his moral theory took a more deontological approach. His approach is deontological because it focuses on what should be done regardless of the outcome. For example , if someone tries to do something nice for you, but messes up and causes more problems. According to Kant you cannot blame them for trying to help you because they caused some problems. That is what makes Kant 's view different from those of his time and also makes it deontological.

There is an aspect that gets taken into account when taking Kant 's deontological approach to his moral theory and that is the good will. In Kant 's opinion the good will is doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do, not because you will in some …show more content…
What that means is that if person A wanted to steal from person B they would take into account two things, is this the right thing to do, and if so would it be universally accepted. Obviously, stealing s not the right thing to do, but this depends on person A 's intentions. They could be trying to steal something that was stolen from them or just trying to steal. Let 's suppose person A 's reason to steal was just to steal from person B. Following the first formulation of the categorical imperative this would not be the right thing to do because one cannot simply will stealing to become a universal law. So, to apply this first formulation to an action one must think of an action and then think if it would become a universally accepted