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John Stuart Mill
An important 18th-century German philosopher and who remains an incredibly influential thinker. Although his thought revolutionized practically every branch of philosophy, in the public eye he is generally best remembered for his notoriously complex ethical thought, and specifically for his argument that morality must be derived from pure (a priori) reason alone. This argument led him to the famous moral law he called the “categorical imperative,” in which people are unconditionally obligated to act morally. Although Kant’s abstract, intention-based philosophy is usually contrasted with utilitarianism, Mill argues that Kant ultimately relies on and validates utilitarian principles.
Immanuel Kant Quotes in Utilitarianism
The Utilitarianism quotes below are all either spoken by Immanuel Kant or refer to Immanuel Kant. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 1
Quotes
It is not my purpose to criticize these thinkers; but I cannot help referring, for illustration, to a systematic treatise by one of the most illustrious of them, the Metaphysics of Ethics by Kant. This remarkable man, whose system of thought will long remain one of the landmarks in the history of philosophical speculation, does, in the treatise in question, lay down a universal first principle as the origin and ground of moral obligation; it is this: “So act that the rule on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law by all rational beings.” But when he begins to deduce from this precept any of the actual duties of morality, he fails, almost grotesquely, to show that there would be any contradiction, any logical (not to say physical) impossibility, in the adoption by all rational beings of the most outrageously immoral rules of conduct. All he shows is that the consequences of their universal adoption would be such as no one would choose to incur.
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Immanuel Kant Quotes in Utilitarianism
The Utilitarianism quotes below are all either spoken by Immanuel Kant or refer to Immanuel Kant. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 1
Quotes
It is not my purpose to criticize these thinkers; but I cannot help referring, for illustration, to a systematic treatise by one of the most illustrious of them, the Metaphysics of Ethics by Kant. This remarkable man, whose system of thought will long remain one of the landmarks in the history of philosophical speculation, does, in the treatise in question, lay down a universal first principle as the origin and ground of moral obligation; it is this: “So act that the rule on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law by all rational beings.” But when he begins to deduce from this precept any of the actual duties of morality, he fails, almost grotesquely, to show that there would be any contradiction, any logical (not to say physical) impossibility, in the adoption by all rational beings of the most outrageously immoral rules of conduct. All he shows is that the consequences of their universal adoption would be such as no one would choose to incur.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
