I had an interesting conversation with a friend a couple weeks ago about the ethical implications of a multi-billion person humanity. This is where the personal and social moral worlds intersect. It seems like many of the systemic evils in our world (poverty, hunger, consumerism, apathy) are caused partly if not entirely by large numbers of individuals acting, well, as individuals, rather than as members of the network we call humanity. This is a different side to ethics that does not really fall much into our everyday consciousness of our ethical decisions.

Many decisions we make daily do not seem to have much of an ethical component to them. They do not involve interaction with, let alone harm to another person. They do not harm us. They seem to be simply actions. Let us make this a bit more concrete with an example about urban sprawl. Urban sprawl is a growing societal problem in the U.S.. It is a large environmental concern, destroying habitats, fueling erosion by crating ground cover, and leading to water shortages. It is deeply related to the growing class-ification of our society. It destroys community and aesthetics through mindless copying of housing designs. Needless to say it is a problem that the U.S. faces. It is also a problem that has moral consequences and is to some extent a moral issue.

However the factors that lead to urban sprawl do not seem to be ethical at all. Individual families want large homes that are not ‘in the goonies’ but also in a place with open spaces and fresh air. Consequently there is a huge demand for the suburban housing market, which then expands (and along with it, the size of our sprawl). This same effect can be seen in a huge number of societal problems: global warming, globalization, recycling problems, white-flight, immigration. The list goes on. It seems as though awide swath of our society’s most endemic social evils have their origins in relatively minor acts of individuals.

This provides a framework for an additional level of meaning in Kant’s Categorical Imperative, which states that we should Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law. When I encounter a moral dilemma, I must proceed in a way that I could rationally assent to becoming a law for all times, places, and people. However, we can see also now that the categorical imperative also tells us what situations are in fact moral dilemmas. In fact every situation turns out to be a moral dilemma because every situation will look different when we examine how it would be if everyone were to act that way.

This actually can be helpful to us. There are many situations where we have some inkling of an idea that it is a moral situation, but it does not seem to be particularly important. Recycling comes to mind. Keeping in mind the categorical imperative (and the empirical fact that oftentimes everyone else will do the same thing in that situation), we can learn to see the broader context and ethical significance of such acts and hopefully be further motivated to live them out.