Kantian Ethics

We begin with the concept of what can be conceived to be good without qualification, a good will. Other good features of human nature and the benefits of a good life, Kant pointed out, have value only under appropriate conditions, since they may be used either for good or for evil. But a good will is intrinsically good; its value is wholly self-contained and completely independent of its external relations. Since our practical reason is …

…order to be free, you need to be rational, and you need to be rational to have morality. If it were not so we would act like animals, living only by our instincts. We as human beings are not able to conduct our lives under the presumption that everything that happens in life is determined, or that we have no free agency. We are forced to think that we are free for our own good.