Definition of Formal Ethics

We denominate in our language as ethics to everything proper or related to this branch of the philosophy what about the morality of human actions and that according to your circumstance will allow us to qualify them as good or bad.

Also, the concept of ethics designates everything that adheres to the moral and to the good traditions and to the series of norms that regulate a relationship or conduct within a specific context such as medicine, law, journalism, among other professional activities.

Within the vast universe of ethics we can find various aspects and currents that were elaborated and proposed along the way. throughout history by various philosophers, below we will refer to the Formal Ethics proposed by the great German philosopher Immanuel Kant.

Formal ethics or Kantian ethics promote freedom, dignity and goodwill above all

The Formal Ethics, is what is known as Kantian Ethics, in homage to his propellant, the German philosopher Immanuel Kant.

Regarding the history of ethics and the theory of knowledge,

in the XVIII century, there will be a schism with the appearance on the scene of the German philosopher Emmanuel Kant, on the one hand, due to his criticism of reason pure and on the other hand because his proposition of a formal ethics certainly came to contrast with the material ethics current.

Your ethical proposal promotes the freedom and dignity of all men above all things. Kant argued that the objectively good is a goodwill, the rest of the things that we usually consider as valuable, such as the intelligence, value, wealth, among others, are not, and can even become dangerous for man when what he prevails is a crooked will.

Essential features

According to Kant, man has both reason and instinct, meanwhile, reason not only has a theoretical but also a practical function whose objective is to seek the moral good.

Now, according to Kant, reason can hardly make someone happy, because the wise man, starting from his intellect, will quickly discover death, illness, poverty, among other unpleasant situations, while good acts that come from practical reason do not lead to happiness, although it is possible for the simplest man to find happiness without the need for reason and with his mere instinct. Therefore, Kant argues that if the end of man was precisely happiness, nature would not have endowed us with a practical reason that make judgments that do not lead to happiness, then it is a fact that man was endowed with that reason for a much higher end than happiness.

From the above it is discovered that moral acts are not evaluable based on their results because they are not chosen to achieve something but by themselves, because the result of a Act considered as good can be harmful, but in any case, the act will continue to be good, because for Kant the most important thing in a moral act passes through what moves.

Another relevant concept within the Kantian proposal is the categorical imperative, which are those acts commanded by duty; This imperative will always rule but without any end, only out of respect for duty, therefore, the man who follows it, who is capable of commanding himself, will be a free being.

Just as it is conceived that law Morality cannot have anything empirical, the categorical imperative cannot contain it either, only the form of the moral.

Kant liked to say about it that one had to act according to the maxim in such a way that you can at the same time want it to become a universal law; He also recommended acting as if the maximum action would become by one's own will a universal law of nature; and finally he said that it was necessary to act in such a way that humanity is used both in the person of one and in that of the other, always as an end and never as a means.

None of the proposals expressed by Kant had anything linked to experience, but only concerned the form of the moral. He never told the other how he should behave in a concrete and express way, nor did he advocate as the only one rule, nor did it promote a self-serving purpose of any kind.

He emphasized the universality of our actions and always privileging what our own will determines, thereby making the freedom and autonomy of the people who decide.

For him, the will could not be subject to any element of experience, much less, it must be free and the imperative that is the one who has the The mission of regulating it does not promote any conduct, being thus that the will must be given per se a norm of conduct, giving it an absolute character autonomous.

What he has highlighted Kantian ethics from the rest of the ethics is the focus placed on the forms of ethical decisions.

Topics in Formal Ethics