What Makes a Fairy “Good”?
Investigating Kant’s moral thought to assess how intent, act, and effort contribute to making a person good
The influence of the work and thought of Immanuel Kant — the famed 18th century German idealist philosopher — has very few rivals in modernity. Kant’s theories on ethics, reason, politics, and more have drastically guided the direction that Western philosophy (and thus, Western culture and politics) developed in the proceeding centuries, and it would not be an understatement to say that we are living in a largely Kantian world. Given this, it’s all but hopeless for those interested in philosophy, ethics, and morality to avoid engaging with his work at some point.
The problem is that Kant’s work, though brilliant, is often dry and boring — page turners, these books are not. Here, I have tried to alleviate that issue somewhat by glazing this essay on the Kantian view of What is a good person? with some lovely, magical (and real, I believe) creatures of legend.
A Tale of Four Fairies
Close your eyes and imagine a tooth fairy — not the tooth fairy, but a tooth fairy. That is, not the silly caricature of some ballerina appeal-clad tiny human, but a mystical-yet-real nature pixie, gathering teeth for all sorts of ritual or eccentric purposes; not the joke that modernity has turned the myth into, but the possible beings that spawned the myth to begin with. Do you see it? Now, imagine four of these fairies squeezing through worn-out door jambs and darting through windows and crawl space vents, scurrying and fluttering about people’s homes, and then sneaking under pillows to take the gift bestowed to them, and — if they’re feeling generous — leaving a token of gratitude in their wakes (hopefully, cash).
Our four subjects are all tooth fairies, yes; but like humans, no two (let alone four) fairies are exactly alike. Our first fairy is a good-natured soul, and one night she decides that in addition to taking a lost tooth and leaving a reward, she will also be so kind as to fix the on-lost teeth of the boy. Summoning all her stealth, she pries open his mouth and sprinkles in a remedial potion. The boy’s teeth are instantly strong, healthy, and pearly; those teeth that were chipped or pitted are good as new.
The second fairy is also incredibly good-natured, but he is also quite… clumsy. He visits a child, takes the lost tooth, leaves a monetary token of gratitude, and also decides to bestow some fairy healing upon this boy’s teeth. Unfortunately, this inept fairy has brought along the wrong potion — rather than healing and cleaning the teeth, the potion renders them all brittle and yellow. In horror and embarrassment, the fairy flees speedily from the home, awakening the dog and the newborn along the way.
Like humans, not all fairies are good-natured, as is the case with the last two I’ll introduce. Fairy number three, rather than being inclined to fix the teeth of the girl he’s attending to, is dead-set on breaking them, for no other reason than that he thinks it would be amusing. This vile wretch of a fairy opens the child’s mouth — after taking the lost tooth and leaving a token behind (for karmic reasons only), of course — and is about to hammer away at the poor girl’s teeth with his pebble-headed club, when he suddenly has a sever Charlie horse. He spasms, accidently knocking healing potion (which he only had brought along for himself) into the open mouth, restoring the child’s teeth to pristine conditions rather than shattering. In pain, and aware that he’s made a ruckus, this fairy flees.
The fourth and final fairy is also a truculent and horrible person. This fairy — disregarding the old ways and divine bargains long-established — doesn’t even take the lost tooth, but rather she goes straight to attacking the poor child’s teeth; she doesn’t just want the lost one, she wants them all. She pulls out her twine, ties loops around each boney stump, swallows a portion of flight-enchaining potion, and lifts-off with all her might, removing all the boy’s teeth with her.
Mixing Intent & Act
At this point, I’ll summarize these four scenarios in terms of intent and action:
- The first fairy has good intentions and does a good deed.
- The second fairy has good intentions but does a bad deed.
- The third fairy has bad intentions but does a good deed.
- The fourth fairy has bad intentions and does a bad deed.
Which of these fairies is good? To answer that, we have to first ask whether their goodness in contingent on their intentions, on their actions, or on both to some proportion or another.
It doesn’t take much intellectual daring to suggest that the first fairy is good and the fourth one is bad. With the first, both her intentions and actions were good; with the final, both her intentions and actions were bad. With these two — whose intentions and actions are on the same moral level — we could distinguish between will and act, but there doesn’t seem to be any practical need to. However, with the middle two fairies, with whom intention and action diverge on the good/bad spectrum, this division between will and act is necessary in order to determine if fairies two and three are good or bad moral agents. Thus, these are the two fairies I’ll be focused on the most from here-on-out, because addressing this duality will allow us to address the more ambiguous facets of our own existence as moral agents.
Fairy two had the good intention of wishing to fix the child’s damaged teeth, but those intentions only existed in her mind and never matured into good actions; the poor child won’t even know that his teeth were meant to be made perfect, not horrible. If we asked the boy whether this was a good or bad fairy based on his actions, I imagine that he’d declare the fairy to be bad because all he is experiencing is the bad result. At the same time, if we asked the third child whether the fairy that visited her was good or bad, she might very well say that it was a very good fairy indeed; the fact that the third fairy intended to break all her teeth is irrelevant to her, because all she experiences is the good result.
However, if these two children were telepathic and able to peer into the hearts of minds of their respective fairies, their evaluations might change. If the children could see into the second fairy’s mind and see that he meant well, or into the third fairy’s mind and see that he meant ill, their once-easy judgments based on their experiences would change, because they have acquired a new experience — that of gaining knowledge.
But still, we are faced with the question of whether a good person is the person with good intentions, whether or not their will bears fruit or not, or is the good person the one who does good, regardless even of if they intended the opposite? Or, does being a good person require an alignment of good action and deed?
Enter, Kant
Your intentions descend from your thoughts; your thoughts are the base for your habits; your habits form your character… which results in more thoughts still. This means that your intentions are inseparably linked to your character, so it seems as though a good person is one whose habitual good intentions form their character. Furthermore, the very nature of intention is different from that of action, and all actions are a result of thought. Thoughts lead to action, of course, but the two are quite different, from which we can claim that actions are an outcome, rather than a facet, of character. It is true, though, that actions also have the ability to sway our thoughts, resulting in new intentions, and changing the path of our character’s development. Even still, intention is grounded in character and action is a separate subject. If this is all true, then intention alone is sufficient for evaluating a person’s moral character.
The philosopher Immanuel Kant was a deontologist, and thus found the notion of favoring intentions over actions top be wholly agreeable. Deontologists like Kant believe that moral acts are always derived from duty — that is to say, your internal motive to fulfill duty counts significantly more than the external consequences of your acts. In his revolutionary 1785 work, Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant says that a “good will”, the intent to do good, is distinct from other character traits because it is unconditionally good. Kant believed that some traits — courage and wit, for instance — could easily be put into use for bad actions; good will, though, could definitionally never be bad. Kant saw good will as the trait through which all other traits were filtered through in order to become good themselves. A good will has “absolute worth” precisely because its value is dependent from the outcomes it causes.
At first glance, the line-of-thought I previously expressed, stating that good intentions are more pivotal to moral evaluation than results, seems to fit snuggly with Kant’s deontological theory. However, there’s an additional angle to Kantian ethics in that they explicitly rely on acting from a sense of duty — specially, duty to respect the “supreme principle of morality”, which he labels “the Categorical Imperative”. Imperatives (powerful commands as to how you should act) are categorical only when they are constant, regardless of particular circumstances, your desires, or anything else.
Kant expresses his Categorical Imperative in various ways in the Groundwork. One expression is a principle of universalism, when Kant writes: “I ought never to proceed except in such a way that I could also will that my maxim become a universal law.” If one abides by this, you should only act in ways that would logically be good for everyone to act as well. A different expression is a humane formula; as Kant says, “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or anyone else’s, never merely as a means, but also always as an end.” We should treat people as if they have inherent value, rather than merely seeking to extract what we can from them.
It seems as though I largely agree with Kant’s ethical prioritization of intent over act. That being said, I can’t help but see intention as a part of character, while Kant uncompromisingly states that character traits are not goods themselves, and are wholly reliant on passing through good will in order to be used for good. Kant rejects the possibility of desires or inclinations being a source of moral worth; moral intentions spring forth from duty alone, regardless of how our desires feel about it. This is a significant distinction between us, as it means that our ethics have quite different sources. For Kant, moral worth requires good will seeking “the supreme principle of morality” (the Categorical Imperative). On the other hand, I understand moral worth to be drawn heavily from good intentions, rather than dogmatically pursuing certain rules and duties.
Adding Effort to the Mix
I’ll be the first to say that judging moral worth exclusively by intention is not a practice without lack (and it’s absolutely not a practice I’d recommend). For example — one I can all to easily relate to — what if I intend to help someone, but then something distracts me and I forget? I certainly intended to do good, but what value does my intent have when it’s not bearing the fruit of action?
To explore this thought, let’s return to the enchanted world of fairies. Imagine a tooth fairy is prowling a neighborhood, seeking out lost teeth to collect for an especially arcane ritual later that night. As she zips around hedges and does her best to avoid cauldrons of bats, a gang of far-more sinister sprites spots her. The malevolent fairies immediately start to chase her, and she desperately dives through a dog-door and flies as fast as she can up the home’s stairs. She’s tired from a long evening of tooth-gathering, though, and the ruthless sprites have just left their den a short while ago — as she reaches the top stair, they catch up with her.
At the top of the stairs is a bathroom, and out of it steps out of the father of the home, shocked to find a horde of squealing fairies so near his head. At first, the fairies all look somewhat like horrifyingly large insects to him, and he prepares to swing at them like Babe Ruth, when at the last second our beleaguered tooth fairy cries out, clear and close enough for him to understand, “Please help me!”
Now, this is a sensible man, not clipped by the banal scientism of the modern age, so once he takes another look he has the wherewithal to recognize the fairies as the mystical beings that they are. He also as the moral sense and wisdom to judge the aggressors from the victim. Reacting quickly, he reaches back into the bathroom to grab a can of air freshener; intending to help the benevolent tooth fairy, he aims the lemongrass aerosol at the nasty sprites. However, at that moment, the man’s wife calls to him from the bedroom, asking him to bring her a glass of water. From this precise moment in time, we’ll follow three scenarios:
- The man goes to the kitchen, prepares a glass of water (no ice, two slices of cucumber), and takes it to his wife, intending to return to help the tooth fairy once he has attended to his spouse. Tragically, when he returns the tooth fairy has already been killed and the teeth she collected have been stolen.
- The man attempts to wage chemical warfare against the sprites. He aims the air freshener at them and sprays away, but they are able to hold their breath long enough to reach the tooth fairy. Again, the result is tragic.
- The man sprays the sprites, but they hold their breath and evade his assault. He thinks quickly and grabs the tooth fairy, retreating into the bathroom where the sprites follow. Still holding onto the tooth fairy, the man turns the ceiling vent on, which sucks the sprites out of the room. Safe at last, the too the fairy blesses the man with dose of all-purpose pixie dust and leaves in peace.
In any of these three scenarios (I spared you a fourth that involved the sudden appearance of a vampire), is the man good?
This new round of scenarios is distinct from the previous round. Critically, we are no longer only weighing the goodness or badness of intention and the success or failure of actions to decide moral value; these scenarios are giving specific weight to another aspect of action — the effort put forth. I would like to propose that effort is the sinew that connects intention-heavy ethical thinking with the practical concerns of action. Without considering effort, determining whether good intention that doesn’t result in action is moral is fool’s errand. After all, if our will doesn’t bear fruit, then how substantial were our allegedly good intentions to begin with? I might have good intentions when I offer to clean the kitchen, but without longevity — without preserving through distractions — then I think it’s dubious to claim that I truly valued the intentions I claimed to have.
In the first scenario, the man meant well but he is absolutely unburdened by any sense of follow-through. His almost immediate reversal of care about the tooth fairy’s plight reveals that (consciously or not) he didn’t think she was worth his immediate attention. The man’s spineless intention is not, I suggest, grounds for claiming he was moral, and his flimsiness cost the fairy her life. In truth, his “intention” is more like a mere whim than anything else.
Blessedly different, the second scenario shows the man clearly trying to save the tooth fairy; his intention is so clear because he tried to back it up with action. The tragedy of the fairy still dying due to the failure of his action doesn’t reverse the truth that he tried to save her. I think it’s safe to say that in this scenario he is a good person, as his intention-spawned efforts validate the truthfulness of his intentions. With this in mind, the third scenario where the man successfully saves the tooth fairy, are we presented with a better person? I’m inclined to say yes and no. Morality isn’t dependent upon effectiveness of intention-inspired effort, but more so upon the earnestness of intention (as proven by effort), so in this sense, no this is not a better person. On the other hand, wouldn’t someone truly concerned with being good be able to quickly, naturally, and elegantly span the gulf between intent and effectiveness? So perhaps it’s more accurate to say that this third-scenario man is not necessarily more moral, but simply better at being moral — better at being a person, not a better person per se.
Now, let’s throw a wrench in this thought experiment and say that the man had no good intentions at all. He recognized the tooth fairy and thought that by protecting her, his children would be extra rewarded when their teeth fell out, and for that reason alone protected her — is he still a good person? Here, I’m inclined to say that he’s probably not, given that he’s acting from selfishness rather than good will.
In this modified-Kantian framework, goodness is a combination of intention and effort, but the success of that combination is (at best) a tertiary concern. Using your energies to help others through a sense of good will is what produces moral value. Mere whims of inclination don’t have the sturdiness to be moral, but following true intention with meaningful effort proves that you have enough care to invest in your instincts towards goodness by committing to enact your good will. Without effort, good will is just a useless, though benign, wish; something so vaporous is hardly anything that we can measure character by. At the same time, effort not grounded in good will is selfish, and thus is of no more moral worth than consequences alone.
Does being a good person require more from me than putting effort into my good intentions? I don’t think that one, two, or even several dozen combinations of good will and good effort make one a good person — that comes back to character which is formed by habituation. Being a good person necessitates a consistent cultivation of good intentions proven by a steady outpouring of attempted good action, and this constancy is what results in good moral formation. But, here’s I am, veering away from Kant’s deontological ethics and towards Aristotelian virtue ethics (which, admittedly, is where and with whom my deeper appreciate lies).
While I agree with Kant that intention is absolutely critical to the goodness of a person, he seems to think that good will is an unconditional good, and I would posit that good will requires good effort to have true moral worth. (Again, effort is the evidence of the sincerity of our intentions, and is therefore reflective of our moral station; or, as the Apostle James wrote: “Faith without works is dead”.) And perhaps Kant is more in agreement with this than I am giving him credit for, as he did (one time, in passing) refer to good will as “the mustering of all means that are within our power”.
This effort-inclusive variation of Kant’s ethics isn’t nearly as rigid as pure Kantian thought, and both deontologists, utilitarians, and virtue theorists can apply it without much struggle (in stark contrast to Kant’s dogmatically deontological system). As an example, in a pure-Kant framework, if a band of goblins conquered the fairies, the fairies would still be ethically obliged to respect the goblin king’s intrinsic value (and, therefore, not rebel and kill him). However, by adding effort into the calculus alongside intention, one could find justification for overthrowing the goblins — depending on the motives of the fairy rebels. Say that a fairy used a spell to annihilate the goblin king in order to save an entire species of fairy, and she did so because she earnestly believed that to be the best outcome to achieve (a utilitarian motive). In this case, she is good. At the same time, if another fairy refused to kill the king due to his having intrinsic value (a deontological motive), then she could also be condoned. Or maybe a third fairy had the intention of making peace, so he decided to work out a serious compromise between the goblins and fairies, thus cultivating virtues of compassion, prudence, etc. (a virtue theory motive). The ethicality of these three fairies is derived from the alignment of their intentions and efforts rather than their worldviews.
Adjusting Judgment
Is this quasi-Kantian ethical roadmap one that everybody could follow? Not necessarily — think of those without the mental or physical capacities to put forth effort? Or what about the severely mentally-incapacitated, or those who are too young to think rationally? I would make the case that these particular instances of capacity-lack should not be judged moral or immoral, and that a lack of capacity corresponds to a lack of culpability. People who are literally incapable of conscious intentionality act, at worst, on the level of amorality; those who can comprehend morality but are unable to act may be moral or immoral, depending on their specific capacities and particular intentions. All that being said, this discussion has been written focused on the vast majority of people who are capable of both moral intentionality and earnest effort.
However, knowing what being a good person requires is merely the start. What should we do with this information? I find that it’s incredibly common for people (myself certainly included) to judge others based on what they succeed or fail in doing, whereas we hold ourselves account only for our intentions. I think that adjusting the Kantian framework to prize effort, and then applying that to our thinking could be a way of changing this hypocritical dichotomy.
Rather than casting judgments solely based on what others achieve (or don’t), maybe we can focus more on trying to comprehend if they’re sincere and, if so, what they are sincerely trying to accomplish. As for ourselves, if we were no longer proclaiming ourselves as “good” based almost entirely on our internal thoughts, maybe this way of thinking would encourage us to strive harder for external moral pursuits as well.
And, of course, keep an eye out for the more hooliganish and belligerent of the fairies.