Justice @ Rhodes

In today’s class, we touched on Kant’s overall philosophy, and some of the thoughts that he had in his Critiques. One of the points brought up was glossed over- Kant’s direction to “Act only in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your person or another, always as an end in itself and never as merely a mean.” Although seemingly merely a re-wording of the age old adage of the Golden Rule, I find the way Kant words this point both confusing and impossible to follow.

To treat another human as an end and not a means implies that humans have intrinsic value, versus instrumental value, which would be given to humans being used. Yet I find humans as inherently instrumental tools for each other, with no intrinsic value. Man is a pack animal, and although we have evolved incredibly complex and intricate societies, we are still no more than that. We rely on each other, and through our interactions, we have developed a sense of right and wrong that are both genetically and socially engrained. Man on his own is neither good nor bad, but a part of a cycle of life. In order to find intrinsic value in humanity, or other humans, one must be able to find such value within the individual. And as the individual can not exist outside of the confines of society (whether one chooses to stay there or not is individual choice, but we are all born with at least one other person), we can only see individuals within his or her given context.

This context stretches beyond the bonds of public life, and is present in even the most personal corners of our lives, like when a child clings to its mother for survival, a man loves his wife because she evokes the emotion called love, or friends enjoy each others company. Although we attach a higher level of meaning to the relationships we form, they are at their most basic as instrumental as a company developing sweat shops in third world countries and governments exploit the fears of civilians. It is only by attaching emotions to them that we see people as valuable, and seek to treat people like they have intrinsic value. Even kindness for kindness sake is only an extension of instrumental use for the purpose of emotional satisfaction. All judgments of a man’s value are wiped away when she or he is taken out of her or his surroundings. Even the value we put on ourselves is indicative of how successful we are at survival and fulfillment. Man has no more intrinsic value than any other advanced collection of atoms. We are literally dust in the wind.