1 Actually there is one kind of exception, namely that moral imperatives do not apply to a "holy will." More on this soon.
2 Some may think Jesus of Nazareth always did the morally right thing, but that since he was human enough to be tempted, there was not a necessity of his doing right. Others claim that, even though he was a human being, he necessarily did the right thing. If the latter are right, then he is an exception to the unqualified claim that no human beings have holy wills.
3 See "Consequentialist Ethical Theories."
4 John Stuart Mill, in chapter 1 of Utilitarianism, suggests that Kant's arguments are at bottom really consequentialist, but I believe this is a misunderstanding on Mill's part.
5 Kant does not suggest that we build up moral merits and demerits that are tallied at the end of our lives. He certainly does not think any of us is in a position to do the tallying.
6 The Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals, section II, p.421 by the standard page numbering.
7 Foundations, section II p.429.
8 Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals section II, p.430.
9 Of course some sales people prefer such quick, efficient translations. If you know this to be true of the seller of subway tokens in Times Square, it would not be treating him as an end if you were to make small talk. It might instead be treating him as a means to satisfy your own inclination to chatter.
10 These distinctions did not originate with Kant, but he made use of them.
11 In the Foundations Kant also calls perfect duties "necessary" duties and "strict" duties. He calls imperfect duties also "contingent" duties and "meritorious" duties. In his later writings he distinguishes "juridical duties" from "duties of virtue."
12 This is not Kant's way of explaining it.
13 This is not to say that once you tell a single lie, it makes no difference how many more you tell. You still have a (perfect) duty not to lie, and further lying violates that duty.
14 Foundations II p.429.
15 Foundations II p.423.
16 Foundations II p.430.
17 Foundations II p.429.
18 However, Kant would admit, I think, that we also have a duty to others to make sure we can be useful to others, and so indirectly have a duty (an imperfect one, of course) to others to develop our useful talents. So if you might, with a little study, be able to find a cure for cancer, you may have an indirect imperfect duty to others to devote yourself to that study.
19 Foundations II p.430.
20 It is this, by the way, that allows Kant to avoid Mill's complaint that Kant's arguments are consequentialist. Kant is not looking at whether the consequences of the maxim, when universalized, would be awful (which is what Mill thinks he is doing). He is asking whether the maxim when universalized can possibly be willed at all, i.e., whether there is no contradiction in so willing.
21 For those who do not immediately see this: Suppose there are just three students and one question. Alfred copies from Betty and Betty copies from Conrad. But where does Conrad's answer come from? By the way, this is my example, not Kant's.
22 One reason for my passing over these examples here is that I do not find many of Kant's arguments on this point convincing.
23 See "Consequentialist Ethical Theories."
24 Although Alasdair MacIntyre has made this charge.
25 The philosopher R. M. Hare, who borrows much from Kant (but ends up with conclusions closer to utilitarianism), argues in effect that such maxims cannot genuinely be universalized, because one must imagine it applying to oneself even if one were not a talented counterfeiter. See chapter 6 of his Freedom and Reason.
26 I would like to thank a former student of mine, Karen Mason, for bringing up this example.
27 This argument may not convince you that the maxim is not able to willed as a universal law of nature--and I'm not sure it should--but I submit that argument is as good as those Kant offers for his cases of actions contrary to duty.
28 Okay, so I am being unfair. The priest would be choosing not to procreate, but surely wouldn't be choosing on the basis of this maxim.
29 Kant thought that these formulations of the categorical imperative worked together and expressed different aspects of the same fundamental law of morality, but we can explore them in isolation from each other.
30 See Christopher Gowans, editor, Moral Dilemmas for a collection of some of the early important papers on this topic.