If you missed class on Thursday, April 7, complete the make-up assignment below.
The Humanity Formula of the Categorical Imperative is pretty abstract (briefly paraphrased, "always act so as to treat humanity as an end-in-itself, never merely as a means."). It takes work to figure out how that should actually "play out" in real life. For this assignment, we're going to start thinking about what specific obligations we have, to uphold the humanity formula.
Step 1:
Spend 10 minutes brainstorming about a real life situation that you think is meaningful and important.
Start by briefly describing the situation.
Then say what's required in that situation in order to treat everyone (yourself included) as an end-in-itself.
Step 2:
Post your brainstorm in the comments below.
Step 3:
Over the weekend, keep checking back in and reading your classmates' stories and thoughts (there were 8 of you who missed class).
Based on the collection of stories, generate a list of general rules about how you should act in life in order to be treating all people as ends-in-themselves. Discuss back and forth with one another in the comments. As a group, the 8 of you will decide on your list of general rules for treating people as ends-in-themselves. You'll put your final list in the comments here.
new years , 2011 I was woke up by my mother tellin me we had to get up because my sister husband had got shot in the head ! I got up had to get my mind right and also had to hear my sister voice , she was screaming and shocked. Later at the hospital we was faced with so much drama , baby mamas arguing, police lying and a man in critical condition on his death bad. My sister was 5months pregnet with his little girl which was his fourth child and did everything for him she loved him, and the night he got shot, I believe that karma was out to get him.. HE LIVED AND I PRAYED FOR HIM, but us not knowing what was going to happen next almost destroyed our family, and it changed my sisters life, his families and everybody who loved him. Months started passing and drama got worse, so bad to the point I questioned god why did I pray for someone as evil as him?? I guess god wanted him hear for a reason, I couldn't understand any reason besides all if his children, but yet he survived and was worried about his looks.
ReplyDeleteOne of my friendshipa have ended due to people being unloyal to me. I feel like theres nothing wrong with disowning people when you find out they're not there for good reasons in your life. To get to the point, what i tell them they would tell others and thats a NO NO just out of respect like they dont deserve recognition or to be in my presents not even a second chance to make things better between us. I mean its wrong in my book to do bad things to your friends behind there back, why not disown and have nothing to do with them?for that person. So weve argued, ive belittled them, talked bad about them and disowned them. Even at the site of them i feel they dont deserve recognition or a chance to make things better, in my book its wrong to be unloyal even as a friend so why not have nothing to do with them?
ReplyDeleteThis situation doesn't involve myself entirely, so I hope it fits the assignment.
ReplyDeleteLast year my best friend told me she was pregnant. It was an accident, and her husband wasn't supportive of a new addition to their family. His reasons were legitimate; they weren't financially ready for a child and he wasn't psychologically prepared to be a father. He suggested she have an abortion, and she agreed. Unfortunately, my dear best friend already had a sonogram and thought her baby was the most adorable little shape she'd ever seen. She named it according to the shape it resembled, a peanut. Peanut became the subject of many of our conversations, and while I warned her to not attach sentiments to a sack of tissues she did just that. (Mind you, she’s strongly Pro-Choice. She just spent too much time reading ‘motherhood’ blogs online. And babies are cute.)
As the date for the abortion approached, my best friend spent her days plotting schemes to convince her husband to keep the baby. She finally decided to tell him quite simply, “I’m keeping the baby.”
To which I’m told he responded something to the extent of, “If you do, know that I won’t love the baby. You want to bring an unwanted child into the world? You can’t, I still have a say in this. I’m not ready to be a father. This will be the end of us. What do you want more, us or a baby?”
Here’s what I think was needed to treat everyone as an end-in-itself, and so this is the advice I gave her.
I feel my best friend needed to have an abortion. She can’t use her husband as a means to satisfy her maternal cravings, not unless she wanted to end her relationship, which she didn’t. If she wanted to treat her husband as an end-in-itself, she would get the abortion because she would value him for the position he is willing to take. Fatherhood is a daunting task, and it shouldn’t be forced upon someone.
Great start, everyone! I’m pleased that at least 3 of you had posted; more people may join us over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteCaneisha and Gernisha raise a good point for further discussion: namely, what precisely is owed to people who have treated us as less than ends-in-ourselves. You can all discuss this, but C & G especially, be sure to come back in comments and say what you think would be necessary in the circumstances you described in order to treat people as ends-in-themselves. You’re probably right that social recognition isn’t necessary, but what would be?
Mahak, what a difficult situation! I’ll have to think about that one for a while. There are lots of duties and cross-duties at play, here. For one thing, we’d want to consider what the husband’s obligations are in terms of treating everyone as an end-in-themselves. The possibility that your friend will continue the pregnancy also raises the issue of whether we have duties to possible future people, at least insofar as we intend to try to bring them into the world. Really tough one – life really has a way of inventing terribly difficult ethical dilemmas.
Okay, so keep working at this and thinking about what the C.I. requires. I look forward to seeing what else you come up with – great discussion!
focusing on me and Gernisha's situations and relating it to the C.I. the outcomes or even the sitautions wouldve ben different. In gernisha's situation she shouldve respected him as a person and in that case to put her hate to the side and not wish death on him for her sister and their family sake. Everyone makes mistakes which connects to my situation because i shouldve treated that person with respect and recognize they are human and make unworthy mistakes and decisions and have to learn from them. You have to let people grow from what might not be a beneficial decision but then again never put them down due to the C.I because they are human just like ourselves.
ReplyDelete-Caneisha F.
I agree with you Nina, I should have put my hate aside and focused on him still being a human and thankful that he is here and will be able to see all of his children and play his role as a father. & I think in your situation you couldve connected to the C.I just by saying it was a mistake and know that you guys could never be friends again even though she disrespected you friendship you could of just respected her as a friend. In Mahak situation I don't feel abortion should play any part, I feel if he didnt want the child he should of used protection and she should of kept her baby, her mom didnt abort her.. basically I feel the C.I would of wanted her to keep the baby death is never an option.
ReplyDeleteHi everyone, I’m really sorry for the late post!
ReplyDeleteGernisha, I agree with Caneisha in that wishing death on someone can't be regarding them as an end-in-its self. Still, I understand your dislike towards him and I feel similarly towards Caneisha's feelings for her disloyal friends. I don’t feel Gernisha’s brother in law, or Caneisha’s friend treated others as ends-in-themselves.
So what do I feel is owed to people who treat us as less than ends-in-themselves? Well, I don’t feel its necessarily forgiving/overlooking their past transgressions.
Caneisha, I think you're right when you say your friend will learn from her mistake, and so that might justify forgiving her. But haven't you also learned from your friend’s mistake? Maybe you've learned not to trust her as much, and so perhaps your friendship is not as close? I feel distance and caution is owed to those who treat us as less than ends-in-themselves, so that we can maintain being treated as ends in the future. Does that make sense?
In regards to the situation I presented....
Gernisha, would you feel differently if I revealed that the pregnancy was caused due my friend’s improper use of her birth control? She wasn’t correctly educated on proper usage and often skipped dosages, she’d done this for some time and so assumed she’d be okay. She also didn’t discuss her misuse with her boyfriend, and claims if she had he’d probably have used proper protection.
As in nature and our societies, parenthood is unfortunately demonstrated as an option. Unwanted children end up in orphanages; fathers leave mothers with children and vice versa. And so, if my friend’s husband so pleases he can disassociate himself from his wife and their child and pay child support for the rest of his life.
In my opinion, her husband’s obligations extend only so far as him being her husband. Can we force him to develop duties and affections for the future life that he’s helped conceive? We can’t.
As far as my friend’s obligations for future life are concerned, if she so wished to produce that life she could have held true to those obligations. And then in doing so, she would have given her obligations to future life precedence over the value she held in her marriage.
Professor, I hope this situation fits the assignment and isn’t too broad. After considering the questions you raised I realized the further complexities. My opinion of what the C.I requires here is starting to blur.
Mahak,
ReplyDeleteIt's exactly in trying to work out the C.I. that it starts to get confusing. The principle is great, of course, but figuring out how to actually follow it get incredibly complicated - full of competing obligations and questions. Feeling like the lines are starting to blur is normal when you're thinking about it carefully.
Last year i had bought another car. a Buick Regal which i really liked and all my friends liked. One day i find out that one of my best friends was talking bad about me and basically stated that the only reason he hangs around me is to get rides to places. Once i found that out i stopped talking to that person because i feel that is not a real friend. How can you act nice around someone just because of the things they have? Thats not frinedship, and that's not treating people as end in themselves.
ReplyDeletei agree with what caneisha said becasue i feel the same way about freindships. if someone is not loyal to you as a friend then why even bother being their frined in the first place. a friend is supposed to look out for you and not do things to harm you.
ReplyDeleteA couple months ago my sister got pregnant on accident by someone she knew wouldnt be a father figure.On top of that she was a full-time student, working a full-time job, with 3 extra kids she had to provide for. She dont believe in aborations but there was no way she could have another child and be able to survive. She is a single mother , raising 3 kids by herself.
ReplyDeleteI honestly feel for her but my advice i gave to her was to get an aboration as soon as possible. The reason i say this is because theres no need to put a child through that. Shes having a hard time with the kids she have now and the person shes pregnant by is just a guy she see every now and then. I really dont think its worth it. I believe she should do him a favor and more importantly her a favor because they both made the mistake.
Eddie and Shanyla, good start with the situations. So for the next step, think about the situation specifically in terms of what would be required to fulfill your basic moral commitment to treating all people as ends-in-themselves. You can think about what other people might have done to treat you as an end-in-yourself, but don't make that the only part of your discussion, and be sure to focus on the Kantian question.
ReplyDeleteOnce you've both answered that question, you can move on to the last part, which is trying to spell out some general rules about how to treat others as ends-in-themselves - work on the second question now, though.