Categorical Imperative#

The idea belongs to Kant, though he arrived at it late and stated it more than once. See Kant for the version that actually gets quoted, and the Groundwork for the argument around it.

Formulations#

1. Act only according to that maxim by which you can also will that it would become a universal law.
2. Act so that you treat humanity always as an end and never as a means only.
3. Act as though a legislating member in the universal kingdom of ends.

The third is usually skipped. Hegel thought the whole thing was empty, and that objection has never fully gone away.

An embedded note#

Kant

Open questions#

• Read the Groundwork
• Work out whether Rawls is doing the same thing in different clothes
• Find where Universalizability first shows up

Nothing here links to Nietzsche On Kant yet, which is exactly the kind of gap a seed page is meant to hold open.