Malevolent liberty or benevolent tyranny

Malevolent liberty is better than benevolent tyranny? The answer defines whether you value ends or means, actions or outcomes. Malevolent liberty is better than benevolent tyranny? A lot of this boils down to the Trolley Problem: is it more ethical to kill one to save many, or to let many die to avoid murder? The root of the problem is whether you value others' free will more than your ego and desire to control the outcome. ℹ️ Info           ~ Aristotle Sabouni Created: 2022-02-09

Trolley Problem

           Main article: Trolley Problem

The Trolley Problem is a stylized ethical dilemma on whether to sacrifice one person to save a larger number. Usually a runaway trolley is on course to kill a number of people (originally five), but as a bystander you can intervene and divert the vehicle to kill just one person on a different track. What is acceptable human sacrifice, and participation in it? There are many variants of the Trolly Problem. Each can tease out the biases of the participant. What if the one is a child and the 5 are old people? Or race, what if you know the one (or the 5), and other biases? But the basics are not really whether 1 is less than 5, it's whether you think action that kills someone is better than inaction which will let many more die (if you do nothing). A utilitarian view asserts that you have an obligation to save the most lives (the best course you can). Being present in this situation and being able to influence its outcome constitutes an obligation to participate and do the least harm. ≈90% of the public believes this, on surveys. The opposing viewpoint is that since moral wrongs are already in place in the situation, moving to another track constitutes a participation in the moral wrong, making you partially responsible for the death when otherwise no one would be responsibility. Death happens, but choosing to kill (even to save others) is still a choice you are making for the victim.

The problem for me isn't just whether the ends justifies the means -- but who chooses what happens?

Self Driving Cars will make the choice for you

A kid runs in the street from a hidden position. The car must choose:

• (a) kill the kid
• (b) swerve into a tree and probably kill the driver/passengers but save the kid
• (c) swerve into oncoming traffic and hope the other side avoids you and it doesn't kill the people in both cars.

Which is the right answer?

The lowest of the lawyers are excited at the thought of the first accident with these cases. If there’s no pre-defined precedent they get to invent ethics (and liability) based on the gullibility of the first Jury. Does the grieving Mom get millions from the evil/rich car company, because a car's computer chose to save the life of the driver? With people, we think, “accidents happen”, but since this was programmed in advance, it’s a conscious decision.

NOTE: To me the proper answer is have it a software selector. The driver is not the cause of the outcome, the kid is. But many are going to advocate/require that the state gets to hard code the choice. The companies will want to remove that choice, because they don't want people to think about it.

Right to die

End of life (right to die / euthanasia), abortion, vaccinations anyone?

Right now, we take away the choices of individuals involved for euthanasia. We assume that life is so precious, that even people that want to die, should not be allowed to. But what kind of rights do you have if you don't have the right to make your own health (life and death) choices?

Part of that is because old people can be manipulated, and we don’t trust families who may have a vested economical interest in the elderly dying to make those decisions. But a lot is just historical superstition and biases: God makes those decisions, not mortals. Thus we criminalize dying with dignity (as if there is such a thing). But for me the question isn't the choice of whether they're going to die : that's a given. The choice is when/how and who gets to control that.

Abortion

I support the choice of an individual to murder potential life, but not actual life. e.g. until the baby is viable outside the womb (say 16-20 or so weeks), I might not like it, but I think the Woman gets the choice until viability. At viability that’s not longer a potential life, but something that could self-sustain, thus killing it at that point, is clearly murder and not just lost potential. But I understand it’s a grey area, and others disagree -- thus legally, it should be up to states to decide for themselves, and not other states to force their will upon them.

Conclusion

In all these cases it's still not whether one is more than many, it is whether we leave the choice to individuals or some authority. I lean towards individuals... mostly. You might think you know more about what's in their own good, but that's you forcing your values on them.

I often agree with the mathematics... just not the ethics.

I would rather let people make the wrong choices for themselves and learn and grow from them (as can others/society), than to force people to do something they don't agree with (even if it's for their own good). In the latter case, they and society don't grow... or more accurately, they only grow to resent the system/voters that took their liberty/choices away. And we become a more divided society.

Death Panels

Death Panels • [3 items]

Alfie Evans
In 2018 a repeat of Charlie Gard. Another victim of Single-Payer "Healthcare". A death paned decided a child should die. The parents got him Italian citizenship, but the NHS still removed his ventilator and killed him.

Charlie Gard
In 2017 the leftist Press put a near blackout on the topic, but Charlie Gard was a victim of a Single-Payer Healthcare death panel, they decided that while children with the same disease had been treated and saved in the U.S., they wouldn't allow it, despite it being paid for by others. They put the child in hospice, and pulled life support until it died. Cost/face savings achieved.

Sarah Murnaghan
Sarah Murnaghan (2013) wanted a lung transplant, and the death panel called United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS), wouldn't make an exception to their "under-12" policy to give her the life saving treatment. Obama's Secretary of Health and Human Services refused to intervene to grant an exception to the rule.

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👁️ See also

• Malevolent liberty or benevolent tyranny - Malevolent liberty is better than benevolent tyranny? The answer defines whether you value ends or means, actions or outcomes.
• You are what you do - Your actions become habits. Your habits define what kind of person you are. You are what you (repeatedly) do.
• Ends and means - Ends and the means: which justifies which? If you do the wrong things, do the reasons really matter?

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Thought Things that make you go, “hmmm…”, or at least made me write about it.

Issues These are issues that people fight over... current events or consistent divisions.

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