I have a theory that if we all lived one day as a Kantian we would actually be a lot happier. This is a paradox of course, because Kant sees happiness as a byproduct of obedience to the categorical imperative – the end we pursue is our duty to the moral law and to the ultimate good of the summum bonum, but this is only achieved by obedience, not by following our desire, or pleasure.  And in a random vote I took of students yesterday, only 3 voted for Kant as the most seriously good moral philosophy worth following. Well this is what happened when I tried it for a day (yesterday).

It’s just worth reminding ourselves what the second formulation says, because even Joseph Fletcher in his book Situation Ethics misstates it. Kant doesn’t actually say ‘don’t treat people as means, but ends’ but ‘don’t treat people simply as a means to an end, but always, also as an end in themselves’. We can’t help treating people as a means to something, for example, my getting a coffee in Pret a Manger in Manchester yesterday from Ricardo.

So, instead of just treating Ricardo as a means to my coffee (an agent of a commercial transaction) I thought I might treat him as a human being with his own dignity, choices, desires and feelings (Kant doesn’t say don’t consider feelings, he says, don’t be ruled by feelings, which is a different point altogether). So my opening salvo was a very enthusiastic ‘hello Manchester!’ which went on to a discussion (brief) about how great it was that United beat Liverpool on Sunday, but how I wish the fans hadn’t sung outside my hotel window till 5am, and so on. To which Ricardo replied ‘you’ve made me laugh so I’m going to give you a free coffee”. So far, so summum bonum.

Getting on the train, I found that a gentleman had the same ticket seat reservation as me. Fortunately we negotiated in a sensible way and he moved to the adjoining seat. I made some casual remark about how a world run by computers was not as ideal as we might think, and we got talking about babies (he has just had one), Manchester United (of no interest) and mutual difficulties we’d both faced in business (a lot of overlap). The result of tapping this wisdom, intelligence, and of course, the providing of mutual determinations to strive on…. a bit more summum bonum.

Finally I got in to Bristol. It was late, damp, and the bus was not for another forty minutes. There was a little old lady at the bus stop who gave me a nice smile, and I smiled back. I thought “please don’t engage me in conversation, I’m not in the mood”. A gentleman appeared who was returning from the Battle of Bosworth (or the funeral procession of Richard III, some 430 years late) and the lady talked to him instead. A minor tale of woe: she had no way of getting from Wells to Glastonbury as the later buses don’t go any further and her train had been severely delayed. Now Glastonbury is twenty minutes out of my way, my car is parked in Wells waiting to go in the other direction. I wished Kant had never existed and that I had vowed to be a utilitarian of a slightly selfish sort. Finally I said “why don’t I run you to Glastonbury, it’s not very far”. She was very grateful, as you would expect and actually I felt okay about it even when I rolled in to my village 30 minutes late. A bit more summum bonum.

And I felt quite good, despite the additional energy, effort, and ‘good will’, and I slept well. I can honestly say that, but for my vow to be Kantian for a day, I would have kept my mouth shut in the bus stop and probably not got that free cup of coffee.

But case proven. Be a Kantian for a day and you are actually happier and the world is a better place.