What does it mean to treat someone as an end not as a means?

What does it mean to treat someone as an end not as a means?

Kant said that rational human beings should be treated as an end in themselves and not as a means to something else. The fact that we are human has value in itself. 3. This idea applies to us too. We shouldn’t treat ourselves as a means to our own ends; instead we should respect our inherent worth/value.

What does it mean to treat someone as an end example?

To treat someone as an end in him or herself requires in the first place that one not use him or her as mere means, that one respect each as a rational person with his or her own maxims. But beyond that, one may also seek to foster others’ plans and maxims by sharing some of their ends.

What does Kant mean by treating someone as a means?

In the idiom of the article, to say that someone is treating another as a means or, equivalently, using him, implies in itself no moral disapproval. According to Kant, to treat another merely as a means is to do something morally impermissible; it is to act wrongly.

What a means to an end?

: something done only to produce a desired result For her, marrying a rich man was just a means to an end. All she really cared about was money.

Why is treating someone as a person not the same as just being nice to them?

Treated someone as a person entails more than just ‘being nice’ because it means that you bring about a unique connection, a deeper understanding. Treating someone as a person means that you take care of the basic needs and legitimate expectations of others as well as yourself.

What is kantianism in simple terms?

Kantianism is defined as a branch of philosophy that follows the works of Immanuel Kant who believed that rational beings have dignity and should be respected. A philosophy of rational morality including God and freedom, based on the works of Kant, is an example of Kantianism.

Is it permissible to treat people as ends in themselves?

A third related point is that, according to Kant, it is both a necessary and a sufficient condition for one’s treating persons in a morally permissible way that one treat them as ends in themselves (Hill 1992: 41–42).

What does it mean to treat someone as an end?

Treating someone as end, he says, “entails treating the person in a way that is governed, and to some extent motivated, by caring about the good of the person (1) for its own sake (hence non-instrumentally) and (2) under some objectively satisfactory description of that good.”

How are human beings treated as ends and not as means?

Human beings should be treated as ‘ends’ and not as ‘means’ ‘ Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end, but always at the same time as an end.

What makes a person an end in itself?

The fact that we are human has value in itself. If a person is an end-in-themself it means their inherent value doesn’t depend on anything else – it doesn’t depend on whether the person is enjoying their life, or making other people’s lives better. We exist, so we have value.