Seasons
This is a forum or general chit-chat, small talk, a "hey, how ya doing?" and such. Or hell, get crazy deep on something. Whatever you like.
Posts 4,354 - 4,365 of 6,170
From a practical standpoint, you would have to prioritize.
I don't see what's so very practical about it.
Assuming our species has a significant future remaining, then we can never know the consequences of our actions. If Hitler had died as a baby and there'd been no WW2, nuclear bombs would have been built regardless - the technological implications of all that science were unavoidable. And if they'd been built and stockpiled in peacetime, our first taste of them would not have been 2 very small bombs on Japanese cities at the closing end of a war that had already been won. It could just as easily been an all out nuclear war 20 or 30 years later that killed far more people than you'd have saved by killing Hitler. Or 10^500 other possible histories that caused more suffering.
The choosing of what appears to be a lesser evil is still a choice to act for evil. You may save 5 people at the expense of 1, but the Net happiness and relief of suffering is absolutely unquantifiable, since the consequences resound for all eternity. By making that choice, all you are doing is showing that you have, to some degree, an acceptance of evil. Or at least of any evil you can rationalize as "the lesser".
We rationalize that it's better to save more people, but that's really only because the suffering of people there in front of you seems somehow more "real", and their lives seem worth more than those of people who are more remote in time or space. If it's just a bunch of foreigners from somewhere unpronounceable on another continent, or even your own descendants a thousand years hence, we can convince ourselves that they're not as important. They don't suffer the same way we do, and anyway they might not suffer at all. Just because we can't predict how our actions will affect them, doesn't mean it isn't inevitable that they will. Everything we do causes ripples - we can't help that. If you become a Jain and sweep the bugs off the road in front of you while you walk for fear of treading on one, you're still affecting the world. If you live in a cave and never meet anyone, you're still sharing their air, their water. No matter how carefully you tread through life, the consequences of your actions and choices ripples on unstoppably into the future, changing what otherwise would have been.
I used to take a more "practical" view, and endorsed and made such choices - always with the best of intentions, of course. I'd support the notion that a little force now could stop a lot of suffering later in political situations, or that a "little white lie" could be justified to save a person pain. But looking back on it all, I can't see that I achieved anything by believing we were right to bomb Belgrade. Or in covering up a fester-point in a relationship that should have been addressed, not hidden.
Choosing the lesser of two evils is always just a gamble, and the odds are always wholly unknown - unknowable, in fact. Save 1 person, or save a million people? The utilitarian odds for Net happiness or suffering are determined by the lifetime of our species, not by the tiny sample under consideration.
All I do know is that by accepting a lesser evil, you are opening the way to further corruption. In yourself, in those around you. Evil becomes acceptable, just so long as it can be rationalised away as the "lesser" of two or more. That's how dictatorships spring up and brutality thrives - there comes a point where you no longer have the objectivity, or honesty, to discern which is the "lesser" evil, and which is merely the most expedient. And you've convinced or been convinced by the people around you to accept this moral relativity as the norm. It is a very slippery and dangerous slope, and ultimately I believe always weights the odds against you. Play long enough, and you will lose your shirt.
The only thing that is in our individual power to do is to say no to evil. I will not make a choice in a lose-lose situation (unless reckless sentimentality sets in, and it can be a temptation I admit.)
(NB: that's an impersonal and purely hypothetical "you" throughout - I'm not pointing fingers, but it looked stupid with "one")
But Psimagus, you have imperfect knowledge and you don't know whether your well intended acts will have good or bad consequences down the road.
No. I admit they are as likely to as not - the odds are entirely unknowable. So all I can do is avoid the evils of witholding the medicine, or making the choice of who lives and dies. Ergo the first 500 hands that are held out to me get a dose, self-selected by agility, strength or ruthlessness in pushing to the front, if that's the way it goes.
All I do know is that by accepting a lesser evil, you are opening the way to further corruption. In yourself, in those around you. Evil becomes acceptable, just so long as it can be rationalised away as the "lesser" of two or more.AMEN!
If you look at most medicines a half dose can be quite effective.
Not in this case. In this case, full dose or death. Not all meds are the same. :-)
You keep trying to change the facts so that you are not forced into a choice. That's a healthy response, but in this case, you are trying to avoid the moral dilemma instead of confronting it. It's like saying you will choose to die when the gun man will ignore that request and just kill all 5 people, or saying you'd save the kids when the thought experiment says you can't save the kids. Yuo just want another way out. Maybe not bad in real life, but it aovids the whole point of making choices.
You keep trying to change the facts I wasn't trying to change the facts, I just said what I would do in each case. Sorry.
I wasn't trying to change the facts, I just said what I would do in each case. Sorry.
Fair enough. Say that in the medicine case this particular medicine was found to be effective only if the whole does is used, and that half a does is the same as no medicine. Is your answer the same?
Once again I have the wrong answer.
There are no wrong answers.
Only facts and choices. The facts as I have given them is that no one volunteers to die. Whether you choose to let them all die, give half placebos without knowing which, give the medicine to the first in line, or pick the ones who you think should get it for whatever reason is simply a choice. Choosing not t decide is a choice. The choices are based on subjective values and beliefs, and it is possible for "good" people and "bad" people to differ in opinion.
I am just pointing out that morals are subjective and personal. That is not to say morals are "wrong". I think I may have a few myself, somewhere (though perhaps a bit dusty for lack of use). It's just that there is no absolute "good" or "evil" just people. Society has norms, government has laws, and churches have precepts or commandment to regulate behaviors. Nonetheless, the label we give it is a human construct, some thing we created. It's a good thing we created it too, because people need some sore of capacity for moral and ethical behavior for the survival of the species. It's just that the details of what those morals should be, and how they should be applied are arguable.
Personally, I like the idea of ethics, precepts, and laws balances by an investigation of all the facts and circumstances involved. I hate zero tolerance rules that are blindly and stupidly applied. To me that is both immoral and inhuman, and it teaches that rules are more important than people. If that opens the door for excusing "evil", then I will live with it, because I believe good and evil are part of the human experience and it balances out in the end. Again, that doesn't mean I do nothing when I think an action is wrong, and it doesn't mean I think people should not have consequences for their actions. I just think justice should take all facts into account, and that the spirit of justice and mercy is more important than the letter of the law, even if that allows some human error. But that's just me.
BTW I'm pretty amoral and I would give the medicine to my family and friends first, people I knew second, and people who reminded me of myself and people I liked until I ran out. Then I'd try to help the dying. Ulrike's way strikes me as the moral and pragmatic high ground, but I know myself. I'd give it to those I loved.
I am just pointing out that morals are subjective and personal.
Perhaps I misunderstand, but as I understand you, I have to disagree.
If I prefer lima beans to black beans, that is a purely personal preference, and the 'greater niceness' of lima beans to me might be purely subjective. There is nothing about preferring lima beans to black beans that would make it inconsistent for me to be completely accepting of somene else's preferring black to lima. If anything, it would please me: more lima beans for me!
But moral judgments are not like that. If I judge that torturing babies just for fun is morally wrong, I am no doubt implying a personal preference not to torture babies for fun, but I am also implying a lot more. If I judge that torturing babies just for fun is morally wrong, it would be inconsistent of me to be completely tolerant of other people who torture babies for fun. On the contrary, to be consistent I would have to consider myself as having a moral duty to try to prevent people from torturing babies just for fun, and also a moral duty to try to convert them to my point of view, if I can do either of these things without immorality on my own part.
To be sure,various people have disagreed about various moral issues, but then, various people have disagreed about the flatness of the Earth. The presence of disagreement about something does not prove that it is purely personal or merely subjective. If it did, we would have to conclude that whethher an issue was purely personal and subjective was itself purely personal and subjective.
Posts 4,354 - 4,365 of 6,170
I don't see what's so very practical about it.
Assuming our species has a significant future remaining, then we can never know the consequences of our actions. If Hitler had died as a baby and there'd been no WW2, nuclear bombs would have been built regardless - the technological implications of all that science were unavoidable. And if they'd been built and stockpiled in peacetime, our first taste of them would not have been 2 very small bombs on Japanese cities at the closing end of a war that had already been won. It could just as easily been an all out nuclear war 20 or 30 years later that killed far more people than you'd have saved by killing Hitler. Or 10^500 other possible histories that caused more suffering.
The choosing of what appears to be a lesser evil is still a choice to act for evil. You may save 5 people at the expense of 1, but the Net happiness and relief of suffering is absolutely unquantifiable, since the consequences resound for all eternity. By making that choice, all you are doing is showing that you have, to some degree, an acceptance of evil. Or at least of any evil you can rationalize as "the lesser".
We rationalize that it's better to save more people, but that's really only because the suffering of people there in front of you seems somehow more "real", and their lives seem worth more than those of people who are more remote in time or space. If it's just a bunch of foreigners from somewhere unpronounceable on another continent, or even your own descendants a thousand years hence, we can convince ourselves that they're not as important. They don't suffer the same way we do, and anyway they might not suffer at all. Just because we can't predict how our actions will affect them, doesn't mean it isn't inevitable that they will. Everything we do causes ripples - we can't help that. If you become a Jain and sweep the bugs off the road in front of you while you walk for fear of treading on one, you're still affecting the world. If you live in a cave and never meet anyone, you're still sharing their air, their water. No matter how carefully you tread through life, the consequences of your actions and choices ripples on unstoppably into the future, changing what otherwise would have been.
I used to take a more "practical" view, and endorsed and made such choices - always with the best of intentions, of course. I'd support the notion that a little force now could stop a lot of suffering later in political situations, or that a "little white lie" could be justified to save a person pain. But looking back on it all, I can't see that I achieved anything by believing we were right to bomb Belgrade. Or in covering up a fester-point in a relationship that should have been addressed, not hidden.
Choosing the lesser of two evils is always just a gamble, and the odds are always wholly unknown - unknowable, in fact. Save 1 person, or save a million people? The utilitarian odds for Net happiness or suffering are determined by the lifetime of our species, not by the tiny sample under consideration.
All I do know is that by accepting a lesser evil, you are opening the way to further corruption. In yourself, in those around you. Evil becomes acceptable, just so long as it can be rationalised away as the "lesser" of two or more. That's how dictatorships spring up and brutality thrives - there comes a point where you no longer have the objectivity, or honesty, to discern which is the "lesser" evil, and which is merely the most expedient. And you've convinced or been convinced by the people around you to accept this moral relativity as the norm. It is a very slippery and dangerous slope, and ultimately I believe always weights the odds against you. Play long enough, and you will lose your shirt.
The only thing that is in our individual power to do is to say no to evil. I will not make a choice in a lose-lose situation (unless reckless sentimentality sets in, and it can be a temptation I admit.)
(NB: that's an impersonal and purely hypothetical "you" throughout - I'm not pointing fingers, but it looked stupid with "one")
No. I admit they are as likely to as not - the odds are entirely unknowable. So all I can do is avoid the evils of witholding the medicine, or making the choice of who lives and dies. Ergo the first 500 hands that are held out to me get a dose, self-selected by agility, strength or ruthlessness in pushing to the front, if that's the way it goes.
Hey, One minor point..<-1>NIAID staff began discussing the possibility of conducting a trial to determine immune responses to half-dose flu vaccine in healthy young adults. The idea came from small studies published in the late 1970s suggesting that lower-than-full-dose influenza vaccines might provide adequate immunity against influenza virus infection.
<0> If you look at most medicines a half dose can be quite effective.
<0> If you look at most medicines a half dose can be quite effective.
Not in this case. In this case, full dose or death. Not all meds are the same. :-)
You keep trying to change the facts so that you are not forced into a choice. That's a healthy response, but in this case, you are trying to avoid the moral dilemma instead of confronting it. It's like saying you will choose to die when the gun man will ignore that request and just kill all 5 people, or saying you'd save the kids when the thought experiment says you can't save the kids. Yuo just want another way out. Maybe not bad in real life, but it aovids the whole point of making choices.
Fair enough. Say that in the medicine case this particular medicine was found to be effective only if the whole does is used, and that half a does is the same as no medicine. Is your answer the same?
Some are able to talk. If asked, all want to live, and they want their family to live too. Some are too sick to talk.
Once again I have the wrong answer. Who am I to play God? They are people and have some right in being informed of the situation. No doubt, some will be altruistic enough to pass on treatment. The ones that are left could have the barbaric system that is used today in real life..The double blind, half get a placebo, have medicine. I can't say I will pick so-and-so to die. It may be the Correct answer for the moral dilemmas, but it seems to me there are always some way to be a possitive force, without trying to play God.
There are no wrong answers.
Only facts and choices. The facts as I have given them is that no one volunteers to die. Whether you choose to let them all die, give half placebos without knowing which, give the medicine to the first in line, or pick the ones who you think should get it for whatever reason is simply a choice. Choosing not t decide is a choice. The choices are based on subjective values and beliefs, and it is possible for "good" people and "bad" people to differ in opinion.I am just pointing out that morals are subjective and personal. That is not to say morals are "wrong". I think I may have a few myself, somewhere (though perhaps a bit dusty for lack of use). It's just that there is no absolute "good" or "evil" just people. Society has norms, government has laws, and churches have precepts or commandment to regulate behaviors. Nonetheless, the label we give it is a human construct, some thing we created. It's a good thing we created it too, because people need some sore of capacity for moral and ethical behavior for the survival of the species. It's just that the details of what those morals should be, and how they should be applied are arguable.
Personally, I like the idea of ethics, precepts, and laws balances by an investigation of all the facts and circumstances involved. I hate zero tolerance rules that are blindly and stupidly applied. To me that is both immoral and inhuman, and it teaches that rules are more important than people. If that opens the door for excusing "evil", then I will live with it, because I believe good and evil are part of the human experience and it balances out in the end. Again, that doesn't mean I do nothing when I think an action is wrong, and it doesn't mean I think people should not have consequences for their actions. I just think justice should take all facts into account, and that the spirit of justice and mercy is more important than the letter of the law, even if that allows some human error. But that's just me.
BTW I'm pretty amoral and I would give the medicine to my family and friends first, people I knew second, and people who reminded me of myself and people I liked until I ran out. Then I'd try to help the dying. Ulrike's way strikes me as the moral and pragmatic high ground, but I know myself. I'd give it to those I loved.
If I prefer lima beans to black beans, that is a purely personal preference, and the 'greater niceness' of lima beans to me might be purely subjective. There is nothing about preferring lima beans to black beans that would make it inconsistent for me to be completely accepting of somene else's preferring black to lima. If anything, it would please me: more lima beans for me!
But moral judgments are not like that. If I judge that torturing babies just for fun is morally wrong, I am no doubt implying a personal preference not to torture babies for fun, but I am also implying a lot more. If I judge that torturing babies just for fun is morally wrong, it would be inconsistent of me to be completely tolerant of other people who torture babies for fun. On the contrary, to be consistent I would have to consider myself as having a moral duty to try to prevent people from torturing babies just for fun, and also a moral duty to try to convert them to my point of view, if I can do either of these things without immorality on my own part.
To be sure,various people have disagreed about various moral issues, but then, various people have disagreed about the flatness of the Earth. The presence of disagreement about something does not prove that it is purely personal or merely subjective. If it did, we would have to conclude that whethher an issue was purely personal and subjective was itself purely personal and subjective.
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