Slides for an Introduction to Philosophy course at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, Canada. This is the first set of slides for O'Neill's text, "Kantian Approaches to Some Famine Problems"; there will be more slides added later.

1. O’NEILL ON KANT
AND POVERTY
PHIL 102, UBC
Christina Hendricks
O’Neill, “Kantian Approaches to Some Famine Problems”

2. Second form of Kant’s
C.I,
The form of “humanity as an end in itself”
2

3. ““Act in such a way as to treat
humanity, whether in your own
person or in that of anyone else,
always as an end and never merely
as a means”
(Kant, Early Modern Texts version of Groundwork, p. 9)
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4. 4
Treating people as means to
our own ends
Buying and selling Teaching & learning

5. “We use others as mere means if what we
do reflects some maxim to which they could
not in principle consent” (O’Neill 260).
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Treating others merely as
means to our ends
Lying
promise
Coercion, violenceDeception

6. Not only avoid treating others as mere
means, but also
▷ “sustain and extend one another’s
capacities for autonomous action” (O’Neill
262)
▷ So we should sometimes “support one
another’s ends and activities to some
extent” (262) (can’t do it all the time!)
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Treating people as ends in
themselves

7. Justice & Beneficence
Not treating others as
mere means to ends
“perfect duties”
Treating others as
ends in themselves
“imperfect duties”
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8. 8
Why is this a form of the CI?
Humanity has intrinsic, unconditional value

9. “Things that are preferred have only
conditional value, for if the preferences …
didn’t exist, their object would be
worthless” (Kant 8).
Rational beings “are not merely subjective
ends whose existence … has value for us,
but [their] existence is an end in itself” [and
so has unconditional value] (9).
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Kant on unconditional value of
rational beings
Why?

10. Returning to Kant’s four
examples
Using the second form of C.I. this time
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11. Suicide (9)
Maxim: to avoid pain
using the absolute worth
of oneself as a rational
being as a means to
something of conditional
worth (avoiding pain)
o Perfect duty/Justice
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12. Lying promise
Kant (9): If A makes lying
promise to B,
“B can’t possibly assent
to A’s acting against him
in this way, so he can’t
contain in himself the
end of this action”
o Perfect duty/Justice
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13. Developing
Talents
Kant (10): neglecting our
talents “might perhaps
be consistent with the
preservation of humanity
as an end in itself but not
with the furtherance of
that end”
o Imperfect
duty/Beneficence
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14. Helping others
Kant (10): “For a positive
harmony with humanity
as an end in itself, what is
required is that everyone
positively tries to further
the ends of others as far
as he can”
o Imperfect
duty/Beneficence
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15. http://is.gd/phil102kant
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Questions/comments

16. ▷ 2nd form of C.I. —humanity as an end in
itself
○ Justice/perfect duties: avoid treating others as
mere means to ends
○ Beneficence/imperfect duties: sometimes
support ends of others, promote their capacity
for autonomous action
▷ Unconditional value of humanity
▷ Kant’s 4 examples: duties of justice &
beneficence
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Summary

17. Credits
Special thanks to all the people who made and released
these awesome resources for free:
▷ Presentation template by SlidesCarnival licensed
CC BY
▷ Photos
▷ Grave image licensed CC0 from pixabay.com
▷ Money image licensed CC0 from pixabay.com
▷ Cat image by Kevin Ianeselli on Unsplash (see license)
▷ homeless person image by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash (see
license)
▷ Icons not credited were purchased with a
subscription to The Noun Project
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