Finally, Kant`s examples follow the defense of the position that rationality requires agreement with hypothetical imperatives. Therefore, we should assume that rational actors necessarily have the necessary and available means for whatever ends they want. And if we add this to the assumptions that we must want our own happiness as a goal and that the talents developed are necessary means to achieve that goal, it follows that we do not rationally want a world to arise in which it is a law that no one ever develops any of his natural talents. We cannot do this, because our own happiness is the goal contained in the maxim to surrender to pleasure and not to personal development. Since we have the necessary and available means for our goals, we are rationally obliged to want everyone to develop their talents at some point. Thus, since we do not want as a universal law of nature that no one ever develops talents – since it is incompatible with what we see now that we become rational – we are forbidden to accept the maxim of refusing to develop anything of ourselves. Kant begins his argument with the premise that a moral theory must be based on a representation of what is unconditionally good. If something is only conditionally good, that is, if his goodness depends on something else, then that other thing will only be conditionally good, in which case his goodness depends on another thing, or it will be unconditionally good. So everything that is good must ultimately be due to something that is unconditionally good.

There are many things that we normally think are good, but are not really unconditionally good. Useful resources such as money or power are often good, but since these things can be used for evil purposes, their goodness depends on the use for which they are used. Strength of character is usually a good thing, but if someone uses a strong character to successfully execute evil plans, then strong character is not good. According to Kant, even happiness is not unconditionally good. Although all people universally have the desire to be happy, if someone is happy but does not deserve his happiness (because, for example, his happiness results from the theft of the elderly), then it is not good for the person to be happy. Happiness is only good when happiness is earned. According to Korsgaard, the condition of simultaneity boils down to the requirement that it must be possible to want a maxim as a universal law and to act simultaneously according to this maxim in the world of the universalized maxim. She argues that both in the case of contradiction in the design test and in the case of contradiction in the will test, the agent`s purpose “in the world where the maxims that these tests do not pass are universal law” is thwarted.

[16] In the world of the universalized maxim, an agent cannot act according to the maxim without at the same time enduring the frustration of his own goal. [17] Here`s one way to see how this might work: When I imagine a world where everyone by nature has to try to deceive people whenever he brings them what they want, I imagine a world where no practice of giving one`s word could ever arise, and because it is a law of nature, We can assume that it is common knowledge that such a practice could not exist. So I imagine a world where everyone knows that there is no practice of giving one`s word. My maxim, however, is to make a misleading promise to get the money you need. And this is a necessary way to do it, that there is a practice of speaking out from others so that someone can take my word for it and I take advantage of it. So when I try to understand my maxim in a world where no one in such circumstances ever speaks for someone and knows themselves, I try to understand the following: A world in which there is no practice of giving one`s word, but at the same time a world in which such a practice exists, for me, to use my maxim. It is a world that contains my promise and a world where there can be no promises. Therefore, it is inconceivable that in a world where my maxim is a universal law of nature, I can sincerely act according to my maxim. As it is inconceivable that these two things can exist together, I am forbidden to act according to the maxim of lies to obtain money. What morally compels us to be able to “want at the same time”? I would like to propose the following answer: that the maxim is our own principle of individual action and that it is a universal law. According to Kant`s presentation, a maxim is the principle of action of an actor [principle], that is, the principle according to which an agent acts (GMS, AA 04: 421n.; KpV, AA 05: 19). To act on the basis of a maxim implies the will that it serve as a distinct principle of action.

From a textual point of view, it is therefore possible to read the condition of simultaneity in the FUL in such a way that it refers to the simultaneous composition[32] of the will that a maxim is its own maxim, and of the will that it is a universal law. Or, to put it more simply, the FUL can be read as forcing us to act only according to the maxims we want as our own maxim and at the same time as the universal law. [33] . we would encounter a contradiction in our own will, namely that a certain principle should objectively be necessary as a universal law and that it should nevertheless not subjectively apply universally, but should allow exceptions. [40] (GMS, AA 04: 424) Some actions are such that their maxim cannot even be considered without contradiction as a universal law of nature, much less that one also / always wants it to become one. In other actions, however, this inner impossibility is not found, but it is still impossible to want the maxim [of such actions] to be elevated to the universality of a natural law, because such a will would contradict itself. [52] (GMS, AA 04:424, emphasis in original) According to Korsgaard`s account, the sense in which an immoral maxim implies a contradiction is that to want as universal law means to thwart one`s intention. In her seminal article “Kant`s Formula of Universal Law,” she argues that there is a “specifically practical sense of `contradiction`” to grant a maxim that, if universalized, would thwart the goal stated in the maxim (in the case of a “contradiction in conception”) or frustrate a goal essential to the will (in the case of a “contradiction in the will”). [14] In a world where such a maxim is a universal law, the agent is unable to act accordingly to achieve the goal stated in the maxim (in the case of contradictions in conception), or unable to achieve a goal essential to the will (in the case of contradictions in the will).