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Ethics Question of Your Day

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  • Even Rym's anaylsis has a qualitative component - assisting a person is good, but causing or allowing great harm is bad - which is why he said "harm as well as good".
    In any case, while it's nice to know qualitatively what it is that we value, quantitative analysis is essential.
  • The moment you try to argue good, bad, harm, evil, etc..., your argument has reached a basic bottom point which is inherently true and inherently useless.
  • edited April 2012
    You'll always do more good than harm by saving a life. There's almost no way to tell a person's nature in a moment of crisis (not that I believe there are people who are pure-evil or completely good, anyway).

    What if they were an "evil" person who was privy to some important information. After being resuscitated, that person could be interrogated and benefit your side. What if that person's death creates a sense of martyrdom that benefits the enemies? People are unpredictable, mysterious beings, and no one can judge a person's worth in a moment.
    Post edited by Schnevets on
  • It's not always just "a moment", but it is indeed true that as human beings we have to take shortcuts with our thinking - there's no way we can fully evaluate the consequences of our actions. It is also quite clear that choosing to save lives works very well as a rule of thumb.
  • A person in need is not someone who is going to espouse their unsavory beliefs right away, unless they're so deeply entrenched that they would indeed turn down assistance, at the risk of losing their life, from someone they hated. Such a person, in such a case, deserves to die in my eyes for putting their own beliefs before their survival.
  • This is starting to remind me of the old story about a time traveler who goes back in time and, while exploring old Europe, ends up saving a random kid's life. Unfortunately, said kid is little Adolf Hitler...
  • Man, I really want to kill Hitler right now.
  • Be careful.
  • Killing Hitler doesn't actually solve anything. Germany would still be susceptible to a dictator, and there has never been a shortage of hateful idiots. You could stop WWI (any number of ways: assassinate the Kaiser when he first takes the throne, convince Moltke not to change the Schlieffen plan, industrialize Russia...) but WWI brought the birth of dissent, so you might not want to do that. The best way one could stop the Holocaust and WWII is to infiltrate the negotiations in Versailles and convince Clemenceau not to include the blame clause and drastically lessen the German debt.

    On an unrelated note, would it be ethical to let The Great War happen and have millions of people die because our modern morals think that its affect on culture was positive?
  • I assume you mean going back and killing him before the Nazis formed. There were assassination attempts during the war which were more to cause a power vacuum and make the party fall apart from inside.

    In terms of war being the result of pressures and social conflict, not the handiwork of a single person, you are correct. Hitler would just have a different name.
  • I really mean either. If he was killed mid-power Germany would've been even weaker.
  • Killing Hitler doesn't actually solve anything. Germany would still be susceptible to a dictator, and there has never been a shortage of hateful idiots. You could stop WWI (any number of ways: assassinate the Kaiser when he first takes the throne, convince Moltke not to change the Schlieffen plan, industrialize Russia...) but WWI brought the birth of dissent, so you might not want to do that. The best way one could stop the Holocaust and WWII is to infiltrate the negotiations in Versailles and convince Clemenceau not to include the blame clause and drastically lessen the German debt.
    Just don't try to do it by killing the Arch-duke. They already tried that, it didn't really help. Somewhat the opposite, in fact.

  • edited April 2012
    On an unrelated note, would it be ethical to let The Great War happen and have millions of people die because our modern morals think that its affect on culture was positive?
    No, unless those cultural differences averted greater harm.
    Post edited by lackofcheese on
  • Always have to be careful time travelling any time before the cold war.
  • Always have to be careful time travelling
  • edited April 2012
    [You] always have to be careful time travelling.
    I'm the Doctor, and I'm here to help!
    Post edited by Bronzdragon on
  • People who make syntax mistakes while altering colloquialisms under the guise of grammar mistakes..
  • People who make syntax mistakes while altering colloquialisms under the guise of grammar mistakes..
    This must be an oddity of the English language. I'm not familiar with this sort of phrasing, nor what it accomplishes, and I honestly thought you had erred. I apologize if I mistakenly corrected you. Could you explain exactly what I'm missing? Or in the very least, point me in the right direction so I can find out more?
  • Square brackets are used for something the person writing would say themselves, such as replacing He with a name. If you had inserted them and left them black, you would have been correct with your syntax.

    In addition, you can assume that most people know the You was implied, as in, "Look out, it's a bear!" doesn't need the "You should" at the beginning.
  • So, this one came up in a corner of reddit today. While it's a given (I hope) that rape victims are not responsible for having been raped, are they morally responsible to report the crime?

    I say yes. The rapist is very likely to rape again if there's no consequence of his/her rape.

    The person who instigated this line of thinking was arguing that because it's the rapist's fault he/she is a rapist, it's incumbent upon the rapist to stop raping and the victim has no moral or social responsibility to "out" them.
  • It's usually a good idea for a victim of any crime to report it, but it's not mandatory. See Les Miserables chapter 1 silver candlesticks.
  • I think it depends on your definition of mandatory. I think there's a moral imperative, but of course almost nothing is mandatory.
  • I think it depends on your definition of mandatory. I think there's a moral imperative, but of course almost nothing is mandatory.
    What if someone shoplifts from me, and I don't want to press charges? Why am I morally obligated to do so?
  • I'm used to the language being "Obligatory", "Commendable", and "Condemnable".
  • I think the "moral obligation/imperative" thing in general is sort of silly honestly, but that aside, I cant fathom placing any obligation whatsoever on the victim of a crime.
  • I think the "moral obligation/imperative" thing in general is sort of silly honestly, but that aside, I cant fathom placing any obligation whatsoever on the victim of a crime.
    So you think that an impromptu ad hoc "covenant of silence" would be morally acceptable even if it allows a rapist to continue to serially rape without consequence?

  • I think it depends on your definition of mandatory. I think there's a moral imperative, but of course almost nothing is mandatory.
    What if someone shoplifts from me, and I don't want to press charges? Why am I morally obligated to do so?
    I think the potential damage of not reporting the crime is a factor. In the case of rape the potential for the perpetrator to do damage if unchecked far exceeds that of a shoplifter.

  • I think the "moral obligation/imperative" thing in general is sort of silly honestly, but that aside, I cant fathom placing any obligation whatsoever on the victim of a crime.
    So you think that an impromptu ad hoc "covenant of silence" would be morally acceptable even if it allows a rapist to continue to serially rape without consequence?

    The rapist is responsible for his/her own actions. Even if the victim sent a letter that said "Im not going to tell anyone, feel free to keep up the rape!", that person's in no way responsible, as the actual decision to commit a crime is gonna happen in the rapists brain. Its a weird thing we do that we like to play the "enabler" card pretty often, and put the responsibility for some action somewhere other than the direct source. Like the "oh he was just raised to be this way" kind of thing.
  • I'm in no way excusing the rapist. Of COURSE the victim is not responsible for their rape NOR any prior or subsequent rapes. That's a given.

    Still, the victim's report has the potential to prevent all potential subsequent rapes by that offender, and that's where the moral imperative comes from. It's not about assigning blame, it's about living in the real world.
  • I'm in no way excusing the rapist. Of COURSE the victim is not responsible for their rape NOR any prior or subsequent rapes. That's a given.

    Still, the victim's report has the potential to prevent all potential subsequent rapes by that offender, and that's where the moral imperative comes from. It's not about assigning blame, it's about living in the real world.
    Is Superman morally obligated to rescue everyone he can possibly save? Just because you have the ability to do something good does not mean you are obligated to do every good thing you can do. Doing a bad thing is bad. Doing a good thing is good. Doing nothing is neutral. The only moral obligation is to not do bad things. To use Creamsteak's words, doing good things is commendable, not doing bad things is obligatory.
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