The Ethical Continuum

The Ethical Continuum

An April 2002 ethics survey conducted by Zogby International included the question, “which of the following statements about ethics was most often transmitted by … your professors,” but it provided only two answer choices: a general definition of absolutism and a specific definition of relativism.1 The pollsters, along with many who contemplate the issue, commit a false dichotomy and blind themselves by seeing relativism and absolutism as black and white. Contrary to the beliefs of moral nihilists and Kantians, ethics need not be ruled by extreme definitions of relativism or absolutism. If, instead, the two theories are juxtaposed as opposite ends of a continuum, then a more moderate approach to ethics becomes visible which represents a true compromise between relativism and absolutism. For purposes of this essay, the ‘most “enlightened” approach to ethics’ must be intellectually sound and promise positive moral progress.

Deontological theories, “which take right and wrong as primary,” stand at the extreme end of the absolutist side of the moral continuum, and the most well known of the ultimate principles embraced by moral objectivism is Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative.2 In his Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals, Kant undertakes the absolutist’s quest for a “supreme principle of morality,” and after meticulous consideration of human will and rational decision making, he declares that people should only commit acts “that [they] could also will that [their] maxim should become a universal law”.3 The categorical imperative is one of philosophy’s best attempts to provide an absolute principle, but when scrutinized, this famous dictum is not universal or logical. As one of the Enlightenment’s greatest proponents, Kant heralds the presence of equivalent rational thought in all men and develops his theories with an optimistic assessment of “the moral knowledge of common human reason”.4 This proposed parity creates problems with the categorical imperative because Kant believes that common reason produces common decision making, void of emotional considerations. However, the categorical imperative requires people to will certain actions, and what people will is unquestionably determined by desire, a purely emotional thought. Although Kant attempts to ensure the universality of his principle by removing “all subjective motives,” such as emotion, he incorrectly associates the human will with rational thought instead of desire.