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If I Enjoy Doing Good, am I Less Good?
Manage episode 298728268 series 2813927
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A very famous philosopher named Immanuel Kant flipped traditional ethics
on its head when he suggested that the commitment to moral goodness is only
truly noble and “pure” when it is fully detached from any reward, from any
happiness, from any other purpose whatsoever.
Kant was worried about the problem of ulterior motives that, he thought,
could water down the noble purpose of the truly good choice. His separation of goodness from human
happiness has led to what is now the most widespread ethical theory in the
West, namely the opposition of egoism vs. altruism. Egoism is thought to be acting for the ego,
the self, the “I,” while altruism is thought to be acting for the other. Kant’s philosophy pits these two motivations
for action against one another fundamentally, so that on Kant’s account, one
could not act both for the other and for the self. Hence, any action done for one’s own sake
immediately becomes morally problematic, becomes selfish, because it seems to
deprive the other of your duty.
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