Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher and rationalist on the 18th century. He was an exponent of an absolutist ethical theory known as Kantian ethics. Kant argues that a person is good or bad depending on the motivation of their actions and not on the goodness of the consequences of those actions. Someone can have moral worth (be a good person) if they are motivated by morality, so if someone's emotions and desires cause them to do something, then it isn't morally right because it wasn't motivated by moral or ethical rules. Kant is not concerned with the consequences of actions, only what motivates them. He says that if two people act for the right reasons, then they are both morally worthy, even if the actions of one of them may lead them to bad consequences. According to Kant a person is only good it they do their duty because it is their duty. It is fine if they enjoy doing it, but they must want to do it even if they do not enjoy it. The overall argument is that to be a good person you must be good for goodness sake. Kantians stress the importance of duty and good intentions: "Act only according to that maxim which you can, at the same time, will to become a universal law."
Any Kantian or absolutist who was given the ticking bomb problem would definitely not torture the terrorist. They do not care about the consequences of not torturing him, they only believe in doing what is morally worthy and the most ethical thing to do. To Kantians they always accent the insignificance of the consequences, therefore they would not regard the fatal loss of tens of millions of people.
Any Kantian or absolutist who was given the ticking bomb problem would definitely not torture the terrorist. They do not care about the consequences of not torturing him, they only believe in doing what is morally worthy and the most ethical thing to do. To Kantians they always accent the insignificance of the consequences, therefore they would not regard the fatal loss of tens of millions of people.