Blind Spots in the Formula of Humanity : What Does it Mean not to Treat Someone as an End?

Abstract

The aim of our paper is to develop a more differentiated understanding of the ‘negative’ part of the formula of humanity.What does it mean to treat others not as ends in themselves? At first glance, one might think that this would mean treating others as mere means, and indeed, the focus within the literature has mainly been on that kind of wrongdoing (recently Kleingeld 2020; Audi 2016, Part I; Kerstein 2013, Part I). But there are more categories. If you do not help someone in need whom you could easily help, but instead simply ignore them, then you do not treat them as an instrument for your purposes, but also not as an end in themselves. One could say that you treat them like a a mere irrellevant thing (cf. Sticker 2021). Furthermore, if someone is in your way and you simply remove them, you treat them neither as a means nor as an irrelevant thing, nor, for that matter, as an end in themselves, but as a mere obstacle. In the first part of our paper, we will explain the relevance of the distinction between (1) treating or regarding someone as a means, (2) as an irrelevant thing, or (3) as an obstacle. These can all be viewed as subcategories of the ‘thing’ part of the person-thing distinction that plays a central role in Kant’s ethics and which is the topic of the second part of our paper. In the third part we will point out that the distinction between ends in themselves or persons, on the one hand, and things, on the other, still does not cover an important kind of moral wrongdoing: we can treat others as negative ends. This is the case when harming others is the ultimate purpose of our actions.