KANTIAN
CONSTRUCTIVISM
PI 3007 Dr Antti Kauppinen
Constructivism
Constructivists give priority to procedure (or point of view) over the result
For rationalist constructivists, the correct procedure in ethics is practical reasoning
Constructivists can explain why some moral standards are correct – they result from the favoured construction procedure
Christine Korsgaard argues that only rationalist constructivists can explain why we all have
reason to be moral in the sense of answering the first-personal normative question ”why should I do what is morally right, if it is not what I want?”
Reflection and Normativity
The normative question arises because of the reflective nature of human consciousness – we do not just desire things, but can always step back and ask whether the desire is worth having, and thus grant or withhold our reflective endorsement
To answer the normative question, we need an answer that is unconditional in the sense that it
”makes it impossible, unnecessary, or incoherent to ask why again”
The only things with respect to which we cannot further ask ”why should I care?” (ask for a further reason) are those prescribed by norms that we are committed to in virtue of being rational agents in the first place – the answer is implicitly given by the same facts that make it possible to ask the normative question
Constitutivism
Things that have a function are subject to constitutive standards (norms that apply to a thing simply in virtue of being the kind of thing it is)
If an activity has a constitutive standard, then if
you’re not guided by the constitutive standard, you’re not engaging in that activity at all
Meeting the skeptical challenge: no room for a question about why
According to Korsgaard, the only way to establish
authority of a norm is to show that it is constitutive of something the person is doing or has to do
why is following the principle of non-contradiction
authoritative in thinking? Because unless we do, we’re not thinking (our thinking is defective)
“A constitutive principle for an inescapable activity is unconditionally binding.” (32)
Agency
Korsgaard argues that action is a functional category – its function is to constitute us as agents
At the same time, action requires an agent – paradox?
To be a living being is to be engaged in the activity of making oneself into the sort of being one is
To be an agent is to be the cause of some end
What is it for me to be the cause of something, as opposed to something in me causing
something?
Animals and Cities
When does an animal act?
The animal perceives the world in terms of incentives (dinner or danger)
The animal is hard-wired to respond to incentives with certain movements – it has innate ‘principles’
Only when the animal’s movements result from incentives by way of principles that make it the kind of animal it is, the action can be attributed to the animal (otherwise it might be just
something caused by a parasite in the brain or electrical shock or…)
When can we attribute an action to a city-state?
Republic: citizens propose (appetite), rulers decide (reason), auxiliaries carry out (spirit)
What a part does can be attributed to the whole only when the part plays its role in the whole according to the constitution – if a rogue German soldier shoots a Pole, Germany hasn’t attacked, but if he’s under orders deriving from the government, it has
Hypothetical and Categorical Imperatives
Unlike (other) animals, we must decide which
incentives to endorse – reflection splits our natural unity into parts and makes achieving it a task
For this, we need some principle over and above the desires themselves – we’re not passive spectators
Hypothetical imperative: to will the end you must will the means (even if tempted otherwise)
Such a principle must be universal in form (apply to all like situations, regardless of what we’re inclined to do)
The categorical imperative: the law of acting only on maxim you can will to be universal laws
Unlike Kant, Korsgaard distinguishes the Moral Law from CI
The Dentist Example
I decide to go the dentist on Friday
“Now if I am prepared to give up the project of going to the dentist in the face of any consideration whatever that tempts me to do so—that is, if I am prepared to count any desire or temptation as a good reason not to go (and so any circumstance as “relevantly
dissimilar”), then clearly I have not really committed myself to anything. … So in order to avoid being what Frankfurt calls a wanton, who follows every desire that comes along, I have to will my maxim as a universal law. That is, I have to will it as a law that has some universal force—a law that is to be acted on in all relevantly similar circumstances, or unless there is some good reason why not. So I must will a maxim
that is in some sense universal in order to will anything at all.”
Principles and Practical Identity
Our principles express who we are – it constitutes an aspect of your practical identity
To identify as a Muslim, for example, is to adopt certain principles – say of charity for the poor
Being someone’s friend involves seeing it as unthinkable not to contact her in order to
comfort her after losing a spouse
It is only as possessors of a practical identity
that we are authors of our actions
Practical Identity and Obligation
In earlier work, Korsgaard argued that practical identity is the ‘source of normativity’
To have a practical identity is to value oneself under a certain description
If you fail to act in accordance with the norms defining your practical identity, you are no longer yourself – your acting self conflicts with your thinking self, you lose your integrity
You have an obligation to x if failing to x would damage your integrity
No ’ought’ is needed – ”normativity is built right into the role”
Many identities are contingent, up to us; unconditional obligations require there to be an inescapable practical identity
This inescapable practical identity is being a human being, a reflective animals who needs reasons to act
From Need for Reasons to the Moral Law
1. As human beings with reflective consciousness, we need reasons for our actions.
2. In order to have reasons for actions, we need practical identities, descriptions under which we value ourselves.
3. Valuing oneself under a description consists in endorsing the reasons and obligations to which that way of
identifying oneself gives rise.
4. When we choose one or another particular practical
identity, we thereby endorse the reason to choose that arises from our humanity – we treat our need for reasons as reason-giving.
5. Hence, we must value ourselves under the description of being human in order to value anything at all.
6. We must value the same humanity in others – act only in ways that could be justified to others as rational beings.
7. So, categorical moral obligations are imposed by the very nature of human practical agency.
From Action to the Moral Law
1. We must act, cause some ends to be realized.
2. In order to act, we must be agents.
3. In order to be agents, we must conform to the
principles of practical reason, since otherwise we are mere heaps of inclinations.
4. In order to conform to principles of practical
reason, we must only act on principles that would not be self-defeating if universalized.
5. In order to interact with others (including our future selves), we must only act on principles that would not be self-defeating if universalized over all rational agents.
6. Hence, we must only act on principles that would not be self-defeating if not universalized over all rational agents.
Private and Public Reasons
How does Korsgaard move from my humanity being a source of (private) reasons for me and your humanity being a source of reasons for you?
Core idea: interaction is impossible, unless we act on public reasons
“To perform a shared action, each of us has to adopt the other’s reasons as her own”
Interaction with my future self also requires acting on public reasons
“Unless the laws that you make now bind you at other times and in other situations, and unless the laws that you know you would make at other times and in other situations bind you now, they won’t hold you together into a unit after all.”
You could find yourself in anybody’s shoes (but is this really true?)
Hence, unified agency requires acting only on universalizable maxims that can consistently be endorsed by all rational
beings
Meeting At the Office
I say to you “Meet me in my office after class”
You: “I can’t, I have another class” -> you have a reason not to come then
If we are to perform a shared action, I must take your reasons as reasons for me:
“The time I suggested isn’t good for you, and therefore it isn’t good for us, and it follows from that that it isn’t after all good for me, and so I need to suggest another time.”
The alternative: I say “Well, just skip it”
“I can’t see why your reasons should count; all that
counts is that a certain time is good for me. Obviously, we can’t relate at all on those terms. So if that’s how it is, no personal interaction is going to be possible.”
Stealing Example
Can I will the maxim of stealing an object just because I want it as a universal law?
“If practical reasons are public, however, it
must be possible for us to share them—that is, to share in their normative force. Any reasons that I assign to you must also be ones that I can share with you and can take to have normative force for me. In that case, I cannot will to steal an object from you unless I could possibly will that you should in similar circumstances steal the object from me. Assuming that I cannot do that, consistent with my end of possessing the object, I find that I cannot will this maxim as a universal law.”
How Could Realists Respond?
Realists have a number of different strategies of responding to Korsgaard’s normativity
challenge
1. Argue that Korsgaard doesn’t close the normative question either – unless we have a reason to be (or care about being) unified agents, we can rationally ignore the requirements of unified agency (David Enoch)
2. Argue that even if we have reason to be unified
agents, it doesn’t follow that the humanity of others gives reasons to us
3. Argue that there is an alternative conception of moral reasons that shows we have a reason on the realist picture (Russ Shafer-Landau)