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    Carmelics

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
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    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Kantian dignity admits of degrees grounded in rational nature, but Christine Korsgaard argues that subjective valuation of one's own life suffices for direct moral standing.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
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    • 1.Subjective valuation alone cannot ground obligations toward non-valuers (e.g., infants, severely cognitively impaired persons who cannot self-value).
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    • 2.Mere valuing of one's life seems too thin to ground the stringent, universal duties Korsgaard attributes to dignity; preference could be arbitrary or changeable.
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    • 3.Grounding dignity in subjective valuation risks making moral status contingent on psychological states rather than objective features, undermining dignity's normative force.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Korsgaard's view avoids implausible hierarchies: it grants equal moral standing to all agents who value their own existence, regardless of cognitive capacity.
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    • 2.Subjective valuation is more empirically accessible than degrees of rationality, making moral status determinable without contested metaphysical claims about reason.
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    • 3.If dignity grounds duties to others, those duties must stem from something the duty-bearer recognizes as mattering—which subjective valuation directly captures.
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