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Boris Godunov
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Portland, OR
Aug 2001
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Theben
Lesser of two evils. I'd say the same thing if it was one man and a community of women, and the man didn't want to breed.
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Why is it an "evil" to allow the woman to choose? What is "evil" in a moral sense about the human race ending in this instance?
Forcing the woman to die to save the baby isn't alleviating any suffering, it's causing more. The Utilitarian argument fails utterly at addressing this issue, because such a creed doesn't apply to non-existent people. If it were to do so, it would have to be seriously revamped in consideration of all other scenarios. First and foremost, it would preclude abortion in any and all circumstances, which is something I don't think most utilitarians would agree with. Second, it would easily pave the way for genocide on a mass scale, because if it's permissable to commit an act of evil for the sake of yet-to-exist people, it's permissable to commit great acts of evil for the good of such hypothetical folks. If it could be shown that slaughtering 6 million Jews would ultimately better the state of the world and a billion people, then it would be the right thing to do, wouldn't it?
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Az
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MACEDONIA - It's the name of the sovereign country to the north of Greece
Apr 2000
time: 07:33
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quote:
Why is it an "evil" to allow the woman to choose? What is "evil" in a moral sense about the human race ending in this instance?
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I've told you already.
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Forcing the woman to die to save the baby isn't alleviating any suffering, it's causing more. The Utilitarian argument fails utterly at addressing this issue, because such a creed doesn't apply to non-existent people. If it were to do so, it would have to be seriously revamped in consideration of all other scenarios. |
Yes it does. I've explained to you how it adresses this.
It's the same reason why putting a time bomb that would explode in a hundred years is wrong. Even though the people who are hurt by it aren't born yet, it's still wrong, since they'll be born some day, and will be hurt.
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First and foremost, it would preclude abortion in any and all circumstances, which is something I don't think most utilitarians would agree with. |
Preclude? No. Limit? yes.
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Second, it would easily pave the way for genocide on a mass scale, because if it's permissable to commit an act of evil for the sake of yet-to-exist people, it's permissable to commit great acts of evil for the good of such hypothetical folks. If it could be shown that slaughtering 6 million Jews would ultimately better the state of the world and a billion people, then it would be the right thing to do, wouldn't it? |
That's quite the big IF there, Boris. Regular utilitarianism doesn't calculate the ethical value of an action without considering the full picture.
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Jaguar
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Montgomery County, MD
Apr 2000
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by curtsibling
OK, today I'm back with a new question! 
And before we progress any further, I want to straighten a few things out.
1. I am not trolling. I have respect for my fellow posters here.
Just because I ask a question concerning faith does not mean I am
a heretic ogre trying to deprive innocent people of their precious views.
2. I am seriously interested in your answers, and do not appreciate spammers filling up my thread with silliness.
If you have a problem with the question, tell me.
If you cannot maintain a sensible attitude, then get mommy to sit you in your high chair to play, OK?
And if you want to go off topic and discuss the finer points, please start your own thread.
Now if you are up for it, here is a question!
If you are religious, and adhere to the ideas that suicide and murder is bad, how would you tackle this moral problem:
Scenario:
While on holiday, you and your loved ones (partner/family/etc) are taken kidnapped and captive by terrorists/criminals.
They give you the choice of either shooting your loved ones or yourself – What do you do?
You could be heroic, and try and shoot them, resulting in you and your loved ones being killed anyway.
But would that be murder?
And if forced to shoot yourself, is that still suicide?
How would you handle this situation?
Please answer as you see fit.
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I would try to shoot them. Taking a stand against evil is that important to me.
I don't really see why this is a religious question though.
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MichaeltheGreat
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Apolyton Grand Executioner
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mooning the house that Ruth built.
Oct 1999
time: 21:33
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quote:
Originally posted by GePap
Well, on the rape woman scenerio- if you begin using violence, how does anyone stop her from committing suicide? She can certainly act to sabotage any pregnacy without the ability to stop her, unless she is strapped down, sedated and fed intravenously. |
Let's take this pleasant scenario even further. Let's say she has a female child and then dies. So you have one female, 12-13 years from puberty. You can raise that female, do everything possible to "protect" her since she's your only means of perpetuating the species, then systematically force breed her as often as she can physically take it.
To assure the greatest possible genetic variation in your limited remaining gene pool (and we know this is critical to long term survival from studies of Kilimanjaro crater lions and great apes in isolated gene pools), you have to breed her around with the healthiest men with the best genetic profile. Some of her kids will be male, thus useless. Some may be female, depending on the odds, how long she survives as breeding stock, etc. With each female, you have another 12-13 year wait before they can be bred. So for two generations, you're looking at 25-30 years, assuming you don't get a run of boys. Many of your original surviving males will have died off by then, maybe most or all, depending on the conditions on earth and their age and health.
Assuming everything goes your way, and all females born are fertile and survive until breeding age, you are attempting to reestablish a viable population based on essentially enslaving any females as breeding stock, raping them (by forced breeding with a variety of partners to gain the largest possible genetic diversity), and excluding some or many of the survinving males from any breeding opportunities. You've gone back to the cave days in terms of rights of females, you've destroyed any concept of familial relationships, and you have a limited population that is still critically inbred for many generations would be susceptible to many possible factors wiping out the "breeding stock."
Is this combination of murder, rape, slavery, and the fundamental destruction of familiar relationships and moral concepts of rights and behavior worth it, in the vague hope of maintaining the species survival? Count me out. 
BTW, thanks for the condolences and good wishes, everyone.
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Theben
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Dance Dance for the Revolution!
Jan 1970
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Why is it an "evil" to allow the woman to choose? What is "evil" in a moral sense about the human race ending in this instance? |
What would it matter if you kept your morals since in the end no one will be left to care?
quote:
If it could be shown that slaughtering 6 million Jews would ultimately better the state of the world and a billion people, then it would be the right thing to do, wouldn't it? |
There's context, and levels of benefit. I wouldn't allow 6 million jews to die if everyone else gets a free lottery ticket out of the deal, but if no one else ever had to suffer ever again, all the remaining 'evils' in the world were forever cured, and people lived to a ripe old age and etc. etc.- who knows?
How about you? What if you knew that if the woman was raped/child born, that 500 years from now, after struggling to get by and rebuild civilization, the human race flourished, and was more moralistic and "good" than before? Would you deny those thousands the right to exist, b/c of the welfare of one person?
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Theben
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Dance Dance for the Revolution!
Jan 1970
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat
Assuming everything goes your way, and all females born are fertile and survive until breeding age, you are attempting to reestablish a viable population based on essentially enslaving any females as breeding stock, raping them (by forced breeding with a variety of partners to gain the largest possible genetic diversity), and excluding some or many of the survinving males from any breeding opportunities. You've gone back to the cave days in terms of rights of females, you've destroyed any concept of familial relationships, and you have a limited population that is still critically inbred for many generations would be susceptible to many possible factors wiping out the "breeding stock." |
Enslaving? Raping? Destruction of family? You're taking a leap of faith here. The women I highly doubt would be enslaved, any more so than any other person in the community, just trying to survive. Most probable that they will be conferred with an exceptionally high status in the community, if not made the leaders. The breeding need not be forced (except the 1st woman) and it is just as likely if not more likely that the women will accept the responsibility and status given to them. And the familial concept would only change from nuclear/extended to communal, which already exists and isn't a bad one. It's found in many 'primitive' societies and that's what this would be. As for the males who've lost "breeding opportunities", well, in your scenario they lost them anyway, right?
quote:
BTW, thanks for the condolences and good wishes, everyone. |
You're welcome.
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Boris Godunov
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Portland, OR
Aug 2001
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Theben
What would it matter if you kept your morals since in the end no one will be left to care? |
WHo said my reasoning was for the sake of my morals? It's not, it's so that the woman doesn't suffer and die if she doesn't want to. It's about alleviating the suffering of and preventing the death of a person who is alive and here as opposed to fictitious people who aren't even conceived yet.
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There's context, and levels of benefit. I wouldn't allow 6 million jews to die if everyone else gets a free lottery ticket out of the deal, but if no one else ever had to suffer ever again, all the remaining 'evils' in the world were forever cured, and people lived to a ripe old age and etc. etc.- who knows? |
I may be out on a limb, but one of the things I've seen used to justify genocide is that it will ultimately make the world a better place for more people. Certainly the Nazis thought so, and the people who advocate killing all Muslims as a means of ending terrorism do. Since nobody has the powers of prescience, who's to say they are wrong in thinking such?
quote:
How about you? What if you knew that if the woman was raped/child born, that 500 years from now, after struggling to get by and rebuild civilization, the human race flourished, and was more moralistic and "good" than before? Would you deny those thousands the right to exist, b/c of the welfare of one person? |
It's a no-brainer for me. There is no "right to exist" for people who don't yet exist. If you believed such, I'd imagine you'd oppose birth control, condoms and abortion in all cases, wouldn't you? I do think, however, the woman has a right to do as she wishes to save her own life. She's not causing suffering to the men who are currently alive, and saying she's somehow causing future suffering would, of course, be absurd.
The potential for the human race to flourish and do moralistic good, while compeling in philosophy, simply doesn't matter two whits when it comes to dealing with people in the here-and-now and their suffering. And before accusations of short-sightedness start, it's one thing to make plans for a reasonable assumption of descendants who will most likely come along, but quite another to forcibly engineer their existence through detestable means that force pain and death on unwilling participants.
Whose to say, if we're going to conjecture as far as 500 years, that in 1 billion years a new intelligent species won't arise on Earth that will be moralistically superior to humans and surpass all we do, but only if we're out of the way so they can arise? Or should the value of "moralistic good" be confined solely to the human race?
In the scheme of a 15-billion year old universe with 200 billion galaxies, and probably uncountable forms of life, is the continuation of our species in this context so vital a thing to a person that it necessitates rape/murder? If so, at what point does one draw the line of commiting atrocities that may ultimately be good for the sake of mankind?
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Az
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MACEDONIA - It's the name of the sovereign country to the north of Greece
Apr 2000
time: 07:33
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Space reserved for penile enhancement commercials.
Last edited by Az on 07-02-2004 at 03:07
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Az
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MACEDONIA - It's the name of the sovereign country to the north of Greece
Apr 2000
time: 07:33
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Boris:
quote:
I may be out on a limb, but one of the things I've seen used to justify genocide is that it will ultimately make the world a better place for more people. Certainly the Nazis thought so, and the people who advocate killing all Muslims as a means of ending terrorism do. Since nobody has the powers of prescience, who's to say they are wrong in thinking such?
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They were thinking they were building a better place ACCORDING TO THEIR JUDGEMENT OF A BETTER PLACE.
their target society was authoritarian and despotic, so that's a ****ing no brainer. Killing a billion people to stop terrorism is completely uncomparable, ethically.
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It's a no-brainer for me. There is no "right to exist" for people who don't yet exist. If you believed such, I'd imagine you'd oppose birth control, condoms and abortion in all cases, wouldn't you?
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No, as I explained above to Agathon.
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I do think, however, the woman has a right to do as she wishes to save her own life. She's not causing suffering to the men who are currently alive, and saying she's somehow causing future suffering would, of course, be absurd.
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once again, we return to that philosophical exersize: Is it morally ok to place a bomb with a time trigger set to 100 years, so that all the people that would be hurt aren't alive yet, just because they aren't alive yet?
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The potential for the human race to flourish and do moralistic good, while compeling in philosophy, simply doesn't matter two whits when it comes to dealing with people in the here-and-now and their suffering.
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I'd say that it's quite the opposite. The suffering caused by the death of that woman is irrelevant in the context of the lost human lives of the future.
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And before accusations of short-sightedness start, it's one thing to make plans for a reasonable assumption of descendants who will most likely come along, but quite another to forcibly engineer their existence through detestable means that force pain and death on unwilling participants.
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How is it so? Is it different just because it includes coersion? and if so, why?
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Whose to say, if we're going to conjecture as far as 500 years, that in 1 billion years a new intelligent species won't arise on Earth that will be moralistically superior to humans and surpass all we do, but only if we're out of the way so they can arise? Or should the value of "moralistic good" be confined solely to the human race?
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Now THAT'S pure conjecture, and there is no way you can know it.
quote:
In the scheme of a 15-billion year old universe with 200 billion galaxies, and probably uncountable forms of life, is the continuation of our species in this context so vital a thing to a person that it necessitates rape/murder?
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In the scheme of a 15-bill universe, the continuation of our species may not be important what soever, but this is more true billions and billions of times for the life of that woman.
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If so, at what point does one draw the line of commiting atrocities that may ultimately be good for the sake of mankind?
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Nowhere. There is no such line. Either it's good, and then it must be done, or it's bad, then it shouldn't be done, with various degrees of goodness, and badness, and thus the urgency to prevent or help an event.
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Boris Godunov
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Portland, OR
Aug 2001
time: 00:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Azazel
They were thinking they were building a better place ACCORDING TO THEIR JUDGEMENT OF A BETTER PLACE.
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And this is different from you making your judgment of a better place how, exactly? Your "better place" is a world in which it's perfectly permissable to rape/kill people in the here-and-now for the sake of non-existent future people. The Nazis just made such things official government policy.
quote:
their target society was authoritarian and despotic, so that's a ****ing no brainer. Killing a billion people to stop terrorism is completely uncomparable, ethically. |
So you think it's acceptable to kill a billion people right now to end terrorism, which may not, in the future, be responsible for killing close to that many people, or might be ended in the future by some different means that doesn't require such wholesale slaughter of innocents?
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No, as I explained above to Agathon. |
That explanation didn't relate to what I said, as I was refering to Theben's statement of a supposed "right to exist" for yet-to-exist people. If you believe in family planning as such, then you don't believe in this "right to exist" for the non-existant.
quote:
once again, we return to that philosophical exersize: Is it morally ok to place a bomb with a time trigger set to 100 years, so that all the people that would be hurt aren't alive yet, just because they aren't alive yet? |
How is this relevant? Is there any need in the here-and-now to set a bomb with a time trigger for 100 years later? Will it somehow alleviate suffering today to plant a bomb like that? What a ludicrous scenario.
Regardless, it's answered by Agathon, in that there is a difference between regard for those you reasonably expect to be there and one's you do not. See below.
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The potential for the human race to flourish and do moralistic good, while compeling in philosophy, simply doesn't matter two whits when it comes to dealing with people in the here-and-now and their suffering.
[/q]I'd say that it's quite the opposite. The suffering caused by the death of that woman is irrelevant in the context of the lost human lives of the future. |
THERE ARE NO LOST HUMAN LIVES OF THE FUTURE. How can you make an argument based on people who don't exist yet and whom you have NO WAY OF KNOWING will exist? This is simply stupid. The suffering of the woman IS MOST relevant in this context, because there are no rights of people who don't exist! You're arguing a fundamentally rights-based philosophy now without even realizing it, as your core argument is that there is some "right" for these potential people to exist!
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How is it so? Is it different just because it includes coersion? and if so, why? |
It's different because in the latter you're forcing an outcome that wouldn't ordinarily apply for the sake of people who don't exist yet (and probably won't), while the former situation involved taking a position that the future life is going to be there regardless of your actions, so it's morally better to take that into consideration.
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Now THAT'S pure conjecture, and there is no way you can know it. |
You don't know it, and since it's happened once, there's no reason to assume it won't happen again, is there? Especially since animal life won't have to start from scratch again. We're only talking about the extinction of humans, not everything. Hell, considering there are chimps, bonobos and gorillas out there, I'd say it'd be more likely than not within the next few hundred million years--won't even need a billion.
But even if not--so what?
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In the scheme of a 15-bill universe, the continuation of our species may not be important what soever, but this is more true billions and billions of times for the life of that woman. |
Which has no bearing on my argument, as it is based on the suffering of people in the hear-and-now, not in the distant future for non-existant beings. It's you who've decided to play the "future generations" game, so I'm just taking your argument to its (absurd) limits.
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Nowhere. There is no such line. Either it's good, and then it must be done, or it's bad, then it shouldn't be done, with various degrees of goodness, and badness, and thus the urgency to prevent or help an event. |
Except you've made no case as to why the continued propagation of the human species in this case is a "good" that warrants the woman's murder/rape in contrast to potential "good" that could result if it doesn't happen. Her ending humanity, as it were, might just as well prevent the suffering of untold millions. After all, let's say her death gives rise to the birth fo 10 billion humans, and of those 6 billion lead horrible, nasty lives filled with suffering and they die in agony, cursing the day they were born. Wouldn't it be in the best interests of the majority, then, that the woman shouldn't give birth to their terrible suffering? So then 4 billion happy innocent non-existing potential people will be "eliminated," but it will be for the ultimate good of the 6 billion miserable non-existing potential people who then don't have to suffer. Wouldn't this be perfectly logical for you?
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Az
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MACEDONIA - It's the name of the sovereign country to the north of Greece
Apr 2000
time: 07:33
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quote:
And this is different from you making your judgment of a better place how, exactly? Your "better place" is a world in which it's perfectly permissable to rape/kill people in the here-and-now for the sake of non-existent future people. The Nazis just made such things official government policy.
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A)It's permissable to rape/kill people, under VERY VERY special consequences. These are those VERY VERY rare, VERY dire consequences. Just like it's legal for the president to order to shoot down a plane full of civilians, if he knows it's about to crash into a skyscraper, for example.
B) This will actually be the case only if they'll accept utilitarian ethics. They might as well accept some other ethics, or develope a moral theory based on a deity, or whatever.
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So you think it's acceptable to kill a billion people right now to end terrorism, which may not, in the future, be responsible for killing close to that many people, or might be ended in the future by some different means that doesn't require such wholesale slaughter of innocents?
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No I am not, why would I be? Where's the utility in killing a billion people to mitigate a threat ( muslim extremist terrorism), that has killed only a very small number of people. And I am skipping the other "small" consequences: the depreciation of the value of human life by the public, the trauma, and the destruction of the soul for all of those people who will be executing this monstrosity, etc. etc.
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THERE ARE NO LOST HUMAN LIVES OF THE FUTURE. How can you make an argument based on people who don't exist yet and whom you have NO WAY OF KNOWING will exist? This is simply stupid. The suffering of the woman IS MOST relevant in this context, because there are no rights of people who don't exist!
You're arguing a fundamentally rights-based philosophy now without even realizing it, as your core argument is that there is some "right" for these potential people to exist!
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I've never claimed there is a right for those people to exist. I've said that their welfare and their happiness should be taken into consideration as well, just as the value of the people that exist today is taken into consideration. That's why we shouldn't destroy the enviroment ( a good example by agathon).
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It's different because in the latter you're forcing an outcome that wouldn't ordinarily apply for the sake of people who don't exist yet (and probably won't), while the former situation involved taking a position that the future life is going to be there regardless of your actions, so it's morally better to take that into consideration.
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How does that change the value of the non-existing people. In both cases they don't exist YET. in one of the cases, there certainty they'll exist is much lower than in the other, still there exists such possibility. You might as well say that there is a chance that the future's people will be wiped out by a meteor, so we don't have to nothing to accomodate them. The only difference between those two cases is a difference in percentages, and no matter how small the chance for the humanity to survive, it will still be by far larger than the welfare of that person that has to die to save humanity.
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You don't know it, and since it's happened once, there's no reason to assume it won't happen again, is there? Especially since animal life won't have to start from scratch again. We're only talking about the extinction of humans, not everything. Hell, considering there are chimps, bonobos and gorillas out there, I'd say it'd be more likely than not within the next few hundred million years--won't even need a billion.
But even if not--so what?
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Then the amount of utility will decrease. btw, I still claim that utility only applies to human beings, not to sentient beings, generally, since only human beings have a concept of ethics.
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Which has no bearing on my argument, as it is based on the suffering of people in the hear-and-now, not in the distant future for non-existant beings. It's you who've decided to play the "future generations" game, so I'm just taking your argument to its (absurd) limits |
The limits aren't absurd. If you prefer the here-and-now, you're short-sighted, and are wrong. If you base your arguement on the uncertainty that these people will be born, then, as I've explained, nothing is certain.
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Except you've made no case as to why the continued propagation of the human species in this case is a "good" that warrants the woman's murder/rape in contrast to potential "good" that could result if it doesn't happen.
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Because Utility will encrease: more humans that are more happy for more time is good.
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Her ending humanity, as it were, might just as well prevent the suffering of untold millions. After all, let's say her death gives rise to the birth fo 10 billion humans, and of those 6 billion lead horrible, nasty lives filled with suffering and they die in agony, cursing the day they were born. Wouldn't it be in the best interests of the majority, then, that the woman shouldn't give birth to their terrible suffering? So then 4 billion happy innocent non-existing potential people will be "eliminated," but it will be for the ultimate good of the 6 billion miserable non-existing potential people who then don't have to suffer. Wouldn't this be perfectly logical for you?
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Only the problem is for most people, utility is still positive. The number of people who are better off dead is very small: the extremely sick individuals who want euthanasia come to mind. This is true even for the poorest countries. Did you know that 30% of all Indians consider themselves COMPLETELY satisfied with their lives?
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07-02-2004 00:57
That's not ludicrous. That's the point. It's a BAD thing to do. but is it immoral to this now to people who aren't born yet?
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