Kant's golden rule.

For all of his ambiguities, Kant sums up his description of duty quite clearly through the use of his catagorical imperative, which can be stated as "I should never act except in such a way that I can also will that my maxim should become a universal law" (Kant, 14). According to Kant, it is by following this law that we act in accordance with duty without any worry of accidentally acting on inclinations or for the purpose of producing an end (which both hold no moral worth).

To be honest, this is the first time I've found Kant really making sense. Throughout his description of duty and all of the ways in which an action can be considered immoral, he maintained that the only actions that are completely morally right are those that are good in and of themselves. To finally make this more clear, he introduced the means by which we can decide what these actions are: a universal law. To restate this law in more simplified terms, an action can be considered morally correct if it can be turned into a law that everyone must abide by. He uses one particular example to illustrate this idea. He asks if it would be morally acceptable to make a promise with no intention of keeping it if he were to be in a state of distress. Since it is fairly obvious that there should be no such law stating "everyone must always make false promises in order to avoid distressful situations," as then there would be no such thing as a honest promise, we can conclude that this action is not good.

Therefore, in order that our will's may be morally good, we must only ask ourselves whether we can also will that our maxims should become universal law, and if we wouldn't will them to be universal law, the answer is clearly no. I've decided to try and live by Kant's law according to this weekend an see how it works out. First action I will to be universal law? "Everyone must always go and see Alice and Wonderland"