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rene
Member
since 2000-04-24
Posts 113


0 posted 2000-10-17 06:34 PM



when i was first learning ethics one of the countless hypothetical questions our ethics tutor asked us was:
if your two year old son who had cancer (terminal) was drowning but at the same time the scientist who had just figured out the cure (and so was the only one who knew it) was also drowning, who would you save knowing you could only save one of them.

i tell you, we used to leave those lecture suicidal!

© Copyright 2000 rene - All Rights Reserved
Christopher
Moderator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-08-02
Posts 8296
Purgatorial Incarceration
1 posted 2000-10-17 08:06 PM


save the kid ... i'm sure the scientist kept good notes...lol
Brad
Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705
Jejudo, South Korea
2 posted 2000-10-17 08:22 PM


Again, my question is the same. If ethics or moral learning doesn't influence what you do, then why do we bother to study it in the abstract?

Brad

PS Would the scientist want you to save him or the child?

Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669
Michigan, US
3 posted 2000-10-17 08:57 PM


quote:
… then why do we bother to study it in the abstract?


Maybe for the same reason, in other threads, we ask people what they drive; because we learn more about human nature from intercourse than from discourse. If ethics really isn't influential in these situations, isn't it even more important to determine what is?

Local Rebel
Member Ascendant
since 1999-12-21
Posts 5767
Southern Abstentia
4 posted 2000-10-17 10:00 PM


again I'd save my son because if the scientist just discovered the cure it wouldn't be more than oh... say... 20 or 30 minutes before someone murdered him anyway...

barring that... it would be 20 to 30 years before the cure would be allowed to be used in the US...

Daniel Nowack
New Member
since 2000-10-18
Posts 1

5 posted 2000-10-18 10:18 PM





Be or not to be - that is here the question!





You think the guy who had to decide would the one who is alife at the end for sure? But he isn't! By loosing a life by making a decision that is, at least for the not rescued individual, mortal he lost a part of his own life. A decision about another life is always a decision about your own life. So let's hope that such a situation will never appear in our life because even the ethic will not allow us to make a decision that means the end of one part of our human being: self-respect.



Isis
Member Ascendant
since 1999-09-06
Posts 6296
Sunny Queensland
6 posted 2000-10-29 10:06 PM


I'd hate to be responsible for making that decision.  But as a mother I'd save my son....
No real answers can be reached on this I believe...
Isis

*I believe every time you put your words to paper, you change. Each feeling is set free, and you may follow.....*
~Isis~~Sovereign of the Spirit.

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