Moral Dilemma Questions

Re the lifeboat.

Have to agree that the solution is a) ask for volunteers and then b) draw lots.

Its unfair to single out the old guy simply because we are aware of his condition. After all someone else could be hiding a worse condition or be equally likely to peg it in the near future.

Someone else might be a regular drink driver/drug abuser and be likely to die on their way home in a car smash or overdose within a day.
 
Last of the Fraggles said:
Re the lifeboat.

Have to agree that the solution is a) ask for volunteers and then b) draw lots.
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In the Time article they talk about a lethally injured fellow. I think the guy should sacrifice himself but if he doesn't, how do you politely ask someone to do it?

Either way the old guy should too, but it's a difficult thing to ask as well.

What's the etiquette?
 
Just explain it straight. "Look, I hate to say it, but there's just no way we can all make it. The boat wont support this many people for this long. And believe me I don't like it, but... well you won't make it either way. So you either hang on, and take us all with you, or... well, go now and give us a chance."
 
Pardalis said:
In the Time article they talk about a lethally injured fellow. I think the guy should sacrifice himself but if he doesn't, how do you politely ask someone to do it?

Either way the old guy should too, but it's a difficult thing to ask as well.

What's the etiquette?
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You: [tap on shoulder]

Old Dude (or other, as appropriate): Yes?

Y: Hey, look over there. [point] Think that might be a rescue boat?

OD: [straining to look] Where?

Y: [shove OD into water]
 
One could also announce him that his mother was actually his uncle, but I don't think that would fly.
 
I still don't see how you can rationalize that if you say "I don't have any right to take a life" you can give that right to anyone else.


In the life boat scenario - If you don't have the right to save yourself by pushing someone else overboard, how then can you give the right to save you to anyone else?
By saying that you wouldn't kill the dying man unless he volunteered is really putting your own life into his hands. Likewise with anyone else that volunteered or "won" the lottery.

Also how can you justify the loss of one over the others if you have no right to take a life? As has been mentioned you don't know if any of the others is secretly a mass murderer or what the outcome of their life would or wouldn't be.

In most ways I see this situation as a way to express natural selection. My survival depends on being the stronger, or more cunning. While you are drawing straws and otherwise being distracted I will have made the drawing moot by having taken action and snuffed someone.
 
Cold one said:
In most ways I see this situation as a way to express natural selection. My survival depends on being the stronger, or more cunning. While you are drawing straws and otherwise being distracted I will have made the drawing moot by having taken action and snuffed someone.
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And you will have snuffed someone in front of witnesses, many of whom probably will take a dim view of what you have done. The possible reactions of your fellow passengers must be taken into account before you act. Your survival may very well depend more upon your ability to be chummy with and/or esteemed by twenty-eight other people than on your being strong enough to push one weakling into the sea.

Cunning would not shove. Cunning would find a way to make someone else jump.
 
Didn't say how or who I would snuff, just that the act would be done.

If I talk them into killing themselves or volunteer then the act is done.
If the dying guy "mysteriously" or "conveniently" dies while everyone is focused on the debate of murder then my objective is comlete.
 
Marquis de Carabas said:
And you will have snuffed someone in front of witnesses, many of whom probably will take a dim view of what you have done. The possible reactions of your fellow passengers must be taken into account before you act. Your survival may very well depend more upon your ability to be chummy with and/or esteemed by twenty-eight other people than on your being strong enough to push one weakling into the sea.

Cunning would not shove. Cunning would find a way to make someone else jump.
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While I agree with the thought, we are now hypothesizing a lifeboat that not only will float/sink based on the body mass on one person, but now will stay afloat for whatever duration is needed to talk somebody into suicide. Hmmm...


Anyway, that point aside, this scenerio just makes me reflect that life is not fair, and doesn't fit neatly into our human invented morals sometimes. The scenerio is simply that at least somebody is going to die very soon. You need to decide how to handle it. This happens all the time on the battleground, in ERs, etc. I'm not going to sit around and wring my hands about the possibility that some person might in fact be more injured than the plainly injured person, etc. Doctors do it when they decide who to save. Should I implant this liver in this patient who has lung cancer and continues to smoke, or this other patient who is older, but otherwise healthy. Very tough decision, somebody is going to die, and the doctor is in the extremely unpleasant position of making the decision. I'd rather the doctor actually process the information and make her best guess, than just draw straws. Yes, in hindsight we will discover that sometimes she chose wrong, and there will be cases that are forever ambiguous, but overall she will have served her patients by giving the best chance to the people who could make the most of it.
 
Cold one said:
I still don't see how you can rationalize that if you say "I don't have any right to take a life" you can give that right to anyone else.
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It's like with cars; if I want to smash my car up and set fire to it, I have every right to do so. If I want to suggest to you that you do that with your car, I can do that too. But I cannot destroy your car without permission, because it's not mine to destroy.

My life belongs to me. If I want to end it I will. If I want to suggest that you end your life, I will. But what I won't do is take your life against your wishes, except in direct defence of myself or others.

In most ways I see this situation as a way to express natural selection. My survival depends on being the stronger, or more cunning. While you are drawing straws and otherwise being distracted I will have made the drawing moot by having taken action and snuffed someone.
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But I'll be watching closely, and if I see you attack somebody then I'll kill you.
 
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