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[jackofallgeeks]

If Ethics is your thing (I'm thinking notably of Daniel and Nifer), I'd be facinated to know what your thoughts on These are.

Comments

[nif.livejournal.com]

Ok, well I'll go through them one by one. I'm not going to go into elaborate reasoning in this comment, I'll just answer the questions relatively concisely.
1. Uh, totally not guilty? I don't care if it legally falls under the technical definition of murder, he's not guilty.
2. In theory, I would do it. Not because I care about the other innocent person. I would want to be the one to kill my son, not some sadistic guard if there was no other option.
3. Yeah, I think I'd choose. The really sucky part would be never knowing if the one survived anyway.
4. Ok, why is the cave going to fill with water if a big fat man is stuck in the opening? I personally believe that he would create a plug. So it's his call-- dynamite or drowning? Either way, I'm getting out of the cave at some point.
5. This one is trickier. Idealistically, I would try to save the worker. Realistically, I don't know if that would be possible. Of course it wasn't a mistake to begin the tunnel.
6. Oh hell no. The vagabond can feel free to pay for my crimes.
7. He shouldn't have a legal obligation, but perhaps he should feel a moral one. Just.. don't be a dick, dude.
8. No way, totally not just. In fact, I would probably have done the same thing.
9. Yeah it's just as bad. The means of killing someone does not change the morality of the end. The second guy had the intent to kill his wife. He's still a killer.
10. Oh yeah, I totally support torture as a valid method of gaining information. Torture for its own sake is wrong, but as long as it has a point (especially saving others) then sure thing. Ok, so his wife is innocent, but shit happens.
11. Um, there IS a law.
12. How badly would it affect his job if his friend screws up? If it won't, then go right ahead and hire him. That's the way the world works.
13. He's the President. He can be hypocritical if he wants. You know why? Because he is the commander in chief and the nation's top politician. He's still supporting sexual harrassment law for everybody else. At least it isn't genocide.

[nif.livejournal.com]

Edit: I skipped one.
The real #13- He's my friend? I'm not telling if he's not. I protect my own.

[dikaiosunh.livejournal.com]

I have to run to get ready, but after reading the first few... bottom line is, they seem to be mongering a distinction between killing and letting die. I don't think there is, in general, such a distinction (cases in which the killing/letting die distinction is apparently important are, I think, really cases where some other attribute is attached to the killing option - greater certainty, lower cost of avoiding the death, etc.).

[bsgnome.livejournal.com]

Ask me for my reasoning if you want it:

1. Not guilty.
2. Pull the chair.
3. She did the right thing to choose.
4. They should try their damned hardest to get the fat man unstuck.
5. Try to save the worker. The tunnel wasn't a mistake.
6. Jean Valjean did the right thing.
7. Moral obligation, yes. Legal, no.
8. Unjust.
9. Joe's as guilty as Tom.
10. Torturing the madman could be justified. His innocent wife is not to be touched.
11. There should not be such a law.
12. Jim was right.
13. I should testify.
14. No one is above the law.

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, go ahead and give me the reasoning.
I would have said:

01. Guilty. He explicitly chose people to die. At the same time, his reasoning is sound, and the circumstances are mitigating, so that should be taken into account. But he's still responsible for those deaths.

02. Don't pull the chair. I can not be responsible for the actions of another, but I can be responsible for my own. That he bases his decision to act on my unwillingness to is irrelevant: there's nothing to say he won't kill an innocent even if I do kill my son.

03. I'm undecided on this one. I think she would have felt guilty regardless of which choice she made (save one, the other, or neither). I think she made the right choice because here was an act of saving, not of killing.

04. Agreed. Using the dynamite would put the fat man's blood on their hands. No pun intended. (Well, maybe a little one...)

05. Try to save the worker: how much worth would you put on a human life? Accidents happen, but an avoidable death should not proceed. The tunnel was not a mistake.

06. Valjean did the right thing, but only because not acting would condemn a minor criminal to serve his life-sentence for breaking parole; his past act is what damns him, and why he shouldn't let an 'innocent' take his place.

07. Agreed; one should have a moral obligation, but not a legal one.

08. Unjust. Though it brings up an interesting question: what is the difference in non-action here and non-action below with Tom and Joe? Malicious intent?

09. I would agree that Joe is as guilty as Tom, but I'm not sure why. His non-action was malicious, but how is that different from the man above who let a boy drown? Are these three examples only removed by degree?

10. Torture is not justified. Once again, one can be responsible for one's own actions, and that he is a vile being is not license for us to be so as well.

11. I don't believe you should inform the authorities, or that there should be a law compelling you to do so; still, I think there *should* be some suitable action; inaction doesn't seem appropriate.

12. Jim should not give the job to his friend over a more-qualified applicant; it is his duty to higher the best man for the job, and Paul is not he. If Jim can not be unbiased, he should defer the decision to someone else who can be, but the other applicant should be chosen.

13. Knowing a crime was committed, the promise should not have been made. To be a true friend would dictate that I break my word, and so my honor is sullied. Still, my honor would be sullied if I let a guilty man go free by my inaction, and so it would be better to testify; the more-honorable of two dishonors. Generally, a promise should be broken when the good of keeping it is out-weighed by the harm of keeping it.

14. I don't like the wording of this last one, because the meaning seems a bit obscured. It *is* hypocritical of them to press the agenda if they mean to exempt themselves; it is not *wrong* for them to press the agenda simple because they are such who would break the laws, so long as they're willing to submit to the consequences of their actions -- in this case, the president being punished appropriately for his crimes of perjury and harassment.

[dikaiosunh.livejournal.com]

I'm not going to go through these one by one, but rather give some general comments.

I stand by my skepticism of the killing/letting-die distinction. Nonetheless, that doesn't mean that you should always save the greatest number or some such utilitarian principle. To get all technical, I think human lives are incommensurable goods. That is, while the morality of your action should be judged in terms of its consequences for human lives (and not whether those consequences are "direct" or not), you can't just add and subtract lives.

This has a couple implications, I think. First, Sophie's choice is a moral dilemma, but not for the reasons most folks tend to say it is. Of *course* she should choose one child rather than letting both die. But the choice between her children is a tragic one - it's a choice between two incomparable goods, and so something irreplaceable is lost either way. Either choice is one for which good reasons could be given, but against which strong reasons could also be given. As a result, I think the mother's regret is perfectly appropriate, though not necessarily *guilt* - she took the only morally apporpriate course, yet also committed a grave moral transgression. Unfortunately, morality is sometimes like that - cf Antigone, though that was an interpersonal clash of values, rather than an intrapersonal one.

At least, if you accept plural incommensurable values (as I do). I think anyone who tries to tell you that there's a neat way of reconciling truth and beauty, or justice and compassion, etc. is selling you a bill of goods.

It also has implications for the impartiality question. Friendship, love, etc. are perfectly respectable values that I can put in the mix with other values. In the case at hand, I think fairness should probably prevail, but that's not always going to be the case. In more serious cases, this might also generate moral tragedies - if I have to choose to save my friend or ten others, I may be able both to morally choose either yet be morally criticizable for choosing either. Taurek's classic "Should the Numbers Count?" is pretty good on some of these issues, though he doesn't feel the force of the tragedy.

On a different note, it pays not to conflate morality and law. If I could save a drowning man at minimal cost to myself, I'm not just a dick for not doing so, I'm evil to almost the same degree as if I'd pushed him in (depends on how minimal the cost of saving him is). But whether there should be a good samaritan *law* is a semi-empirical question: will the law actually encourage good samaritan behavior while not imposing too much of a cost on society at large or people who get accidentally caught by it, can we write the law such that it correctly identifies when such behavior is or is not required, etc... (this rant applies also to debates over parental- and spousal-notification laws for contraception and abortion, but that's a whole 'nother discussion)

[bsgnome.livejournal.com]

So, I've been asked for some reasoning:

1. I said above "not guilty." I'm not sure if I can really hold to that answer. But, I'm not sure if I could hold to the answer of guilty either. On the one hand, were nothing done, everyone would have died, and he would be responsible for those deaths, by his inaction, since something could have been done. The lifeboat was designed for 7 (if I recall correctly), yet they overloaded it. Due to the storm, under such conditions, the lifeboat could not have done anyone good. The solution was to lighten the load (unfortunately, this load consists entirely of people). On the other, he did directly force innocent people into the ocean. Now, I believe that the man was right in deciding that it would be better to save some, than to save none; however, I cannot agree with his decision to force the weak off. It may be true that the only hope for survival was in hard-rowing, but, on the same count, it is also true that the strongest have the best chance for survival sans boat (addmittedly, even for them, such a chance is near non-existent). The best option, I believe, would have been for him to inform everyone of the exact situation, and either have people voluntarily abandon, or draw lots. In this way, the chance for survival, of each, is the same, and none are automatically condemned for being of "less use."

2. I said "pull the chair." On the one hand, I am making myself an instrumental cause of my sons death. On the other hand, by doing so, I am possibly saving another man's life. Now, I don't see myself as weighing lives in this situation, since I know that, regardless, my son will die. If I choose to be my son's executioner, the innocent man may live; otherwise, the innocent man will die. Either way, my son dies. Now, as to whether I'd be as blameless as an executioner, I'm not sure; that falls under the question of authority, and jurisdiction, et cetera and what not. These, I'm not prepared to deal with.

3. She did the right thing to choose. That's that. Now, as to her "guilt" and subsequent suicide. I don't know if suicide can be morally justified, and I don't want to wrestle with that. If she truly felt guilty, what does that mean, did she think it'd've been better had she not chosen at all, and allowed for both of her children to die? If so, she should not have felt guilty, for her choice to choose was correct. Did she think it'd've been better had she chosen her daughter to live? That's entirely "what if" thinking, it never helps anything; besides, there was no "right" choice between son and daughter--you can't weigh lives. If neither of the above, then what she felt was not guilt, or regret, but mere remorse for having been forced to make such a choice.

4. There's no way around it, they can't use the dynamite without directly killing the fat man, so they can't use the dynamite. It's irrelevant that high tide will be coming soon. As said, the fat man got stuck, so he can get unstuck.

5. This is an avoidable death. Whenever possible, death should be avoided. This death should be avoided. The financial/sconomic cost is irrelevant. The tunnel was not a mistake, even though it was known that a number of deaths would be likely in its construction, because of the benefit it serves to the community. Though recognized as likely, the deaths are certainly not intended.

6. Unlike the others, this is not a matter of life, but of truth and justice. It would not only be deceitful of Valjean to let an innocent man pay for his crime, it would be unjust. As to whether or not the punishment is just is irrelevant to this question, it is not Valjean's place to decide, by inaction, that an innocent man will take his place. As to whether or not people working in his factory will suffer due to his imprisonment is also irrelevant. He committed the crime, so he should admit to it, and pay the price.

Continued ...

[bsgnome.livejournal.com]

...

7. The boy clearly can't swim, yet the man on the bridge can, and he know's that it would take little effort on his own part to save the boy. To ignore the boy, and think "not my problem," is to condemn the boy to die. By his inaction, he has killed the boy. The reason that this obligation should not be legal is because there is no practical manner in which such a law could be justly enforced; often, the only one who can be certain of a person's capability to save another is that person themself.

8. Unlike the above, here we have a group of incompotent's. They know they are incapable of helping the assailled, and so, they don't. Though it was in bad taste for them to video-tape the crime and make fun of the victim, it was not criminal.

9. Tom is guilty on account of his action, Joe on account of inaction. Witholding the antidote from his wife is just as bad as poisoning her in the first place. The difference between this and the man above who let the boy drown is that here, Joe was not only capable of saving his wife, but the fact that he was so capable is clear to anyone who examines the evidence. Whether Joe can give his wife the antidote is not so hard to prove as whether passer-by Jim is capable of, not only swimming, but properly keeping another body afloat, so as not to drown them in the attempted rescue.

10. I'm uncertain on this question. My difficulty is in seeing why or why not tortue could or could not be justified. The situation seems extreme enough, so it could be justified. That this is a subjunctive phrase is key, it may be that toruture is never justified, I'm not sure. In either case, it would not be justifiable to torture his innocent wife.

11. The job of a psychiatrist, or therapist, is to be a confidant and advisor, and through sessions, lead the patient to come to reasonable solutions to his problems (at least, such is my understanding). If, by some law, a patient cannot trust that what he says in confidance will not be divulged, then the necessary relationship is undermined, and the intended result cannot be achieved. For this reason, the professional confidentiality should be (almost?) as inviolable as the Seal of Confession which Catholic priests are bound by. Though, inaction, on the part of the psychiatrist, is not the answer, through consultation, he should calm the impulses of the patient, and lead him away from the intention of killing.

12. On the one hand, "the job should go to the most qualified aplicant." On the other hand, Jim knows his friend, and he knows he can trust him, et cetera. It is not a matter of "loyalty to friends," but of knowledge of the applicant. Jim knows things about his friend which were not mentioned in the resume or touched upon in an interview. The stranger may be technically more qualified, but, he remains a stranger, and, more or less, a "wild card." The fact of the matter is, it's an open option, choosing either would be justifiable.

13. On the one hand, an innocent man is in danger of paying for my friends crime. On the other hand, I promised my secrecy. To keep my promise, I cooperate in an injustice. To break my promise, I seem to commit a breach of trust. However, the promise was made outside the circumstances of the trial. Circumstances have changed, and the promise, if kept, will cause more harm than good (though what good this promise could have been for is dubious). It is wrong of my friend to let the innocent man take his place, and it would be cruel of my friend to force me to allow this injustice. He should not have told me in the first place, but now that he has, he must accept that, in these circumstances, I need testify.

14. The person and their rank is irrelevant. The law is irrelevant. The legislator is not exempt, et cetera. No one is above the law. It cannot be expressed any clearer than that.

Just a couple of points.

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

1. The man was responsible for the deaths of the people he forced off the boat; whether he would have been responsible if other choices were made is irrelevant. I even think that having no good choices is irrelevant: he still did what he did. On top of that, the action he made, while well reasoned, was made as an individual against the expressed will of the others; perhaps he would be less accountable if all in the boat had agreed to an action (and perhapse not), but that's not the question posed.

2. One can not predict the future, and ought not made decisions based on such unpredictable measures. Perhapse he kills another man anyways, regardless of you pulling the chair or not; now you've killed your son for no good at all. It is better to act as an individual to the best you can; whether this man kills more people is not under your control.

[bsgnome.livejournal.com]

2. I'm drawing here a connection between the hypothetical "me" and an executioner. The executioner, who acts on the command of a just authority, obtains no responsibility for his action of execution--e.g. a man is condemned to death, the executioner need not worry about whether or not the man is guilty, because the man's blood is not technically on his hands, but those of the one in authority.

In retrospect, though, I'm not exactly sure this connection can be drawn. The question comes to whether or not the authority an opposing force has over POWs is just, and then whether this authority's jurisdiction extends to capital punishment.