kant and truth

`Always tell the truth and Always keep your promises':
Kant's Categorical Imperative

Paul Grosch and William Large


‘Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the oftener and the more steadily we reflect on them: the starry heavens above and the moral law within’ (Kant, The Critique of Practical Reason, p. 260). For Kant there are scientific laws which govern the natural world, and moral laws which govern the social world. Or, more specifically, there is one moral law which governs the social world: the categorical imperative. As we shall see, there are three main formulations of it: And what particularly concerns us in this paper is the relationship between the moral law, or the categorical imperative, and the two maxims which may be derived from it, namely: Always tell the truth and always keep a promise.

Kant's Moral Theory

Kant’s moral philosophy is basically deontological. That is to say it rests on the notion of duty or obligat...