Essay On Kant's Categorical Imperative

Q.2 How and why does Rachels modify Kants categorical imperative? Are there any problems with this modification?

Immanuel Kant uses the categorical imperative as a means of living. Imperative meaning a command and categorical meaning a necessary in itself with reference to nothing else , defines it as something which is mandatory to do or follow in all situations. An example would be if a thief broke into your house and demanded you to tell him where your most prized jewels are, acoording to kant and the categorical imperative, you must tell the thief the truth, you cannot lie as it breaks the moral rule “thou shalt not lie.” Even though you wish to keep the jewels, it is your moral responsibility to tell the truth at all times due to this rule.

Kant fully believed that it was wrong to lie just because it followed the categorical imperative. He believed in absolute rules. If you followed a rule you had to follow it completely. To never lie even if you could save a life, to never steal, even though you are dying due to starvation, to never kill, even in self defense. These are all universal laws that the world must follow everyday. Another example used is

One of them being that if people follow Rachels suggestion about changing the absolute rules like the example change ‘never lie’ to ‘never lie unless to save an innocent life.’ Then humans could take that approach to all the rules. So in the case of the rule ‘never steal’ and the modification ‘never steal unless absolutely necessary’. Humans could use the approach that when they sole a loaf of bread because they were poor and their wages were not given until the next day so they had to steal the bread to live and it wouldn’t be wrong according to the rule. Which would lead to a lot of problems in the human world if everyone began to steal and not feel morally