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Ethics vs. Life, Make Your Choice.

When life hangs in the balance, which do you choose?

  • Ethics

    Votes: 5 16.1%

  • Life

    Votes: 15 48.4%

  • On Planet X, anything that extends your life is ethical.

    Votes: 11 35.5%
  • Total voters
    31

Tsukasa Buddha

Other (please write in)
Tsukasa Buddha
Joined
Sep 10, 2006
Messages
15,302
This is more abstract, because I want more than the typical Moral Dilemma.

Which would you sacrifice for the other? Would you chose to live ethically and die, or live unethically and live?

Now we could go into specifics, like how bad a breach in ethics are we talking about? Does it make a difference as to how high the offense?

Would you kill to stay alive?

Would you survive by stealing, raping, pillaging?

Would you torture another?
 
Obviously, this question can't really be answered in the abstract. You would need a concrete situation, and even then you wouldn't know what you would do, because you won't know how you respond in a life threatening situation until you have been there.

I chose "life" because I decided that in any case where I would be likely to have to face a true ethical challenge, it wouldn't be so serious that it was worth my life.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
Would you kill to stay alive?
Click to expand...

i think i would. who knows what i would really do in that situation.

the rape/torture to stay alive thing is really puzzling to me. i cant think of a situation where that would ever be neccesary for your personal survival, so imma ignore it for now.
 
I'm with Meadmaker on this one; the question really is unanswerable as written. Ethics are all about priorities. Certainly, the continuation of my own life is a rather high priority of mine, above many ethical principles. Are there ethical principles I hold to be of higher priority than my life? Possibly so, but I hope to never have to find out.
 
I answered ethics, and by that I mean:

There are some thing I consider so unethical I'd kill myself before doing them if I was faced with it.

But, I'd steal food to stay alive if I needed to, and I think stealing is basically immoral/unethical.

So it depends.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
This is more abstract, because I want more than the typical Moral Dilemma.

Which would you sacrifice for the other? Would you chose to live ethically and die, or live unethically and live?

Now we could go into specifics, like how bad a breach in ethics are we talking about? Does it make a difference as to how high the offense?

Would you kill to stay alive?

Would you survive by stealing, raping, pillaging?

Would you torture another?
Click to expand...
Life

I know what I'll kill for.

I know what I'll risk my life for.

I have yet to find something that I'll simply die for. If you die fighting, you still die, but you were fighting for it as you died. Go down swinging.

DR
 
I used to have a vegetarian friend who told me (more than once) that he was vegetarian because he didn't really like the taste of meat that much and in this day and age you didn't need meat to survive. He would then add, "But if we're ever stranded on a desert island with no food, watch out, 'cause I'll have your leg!"
 
This question is almost like a differential equation...

Would I choose ethics over life? Well, that is a question of ethics, but to answer it I need complete knowledge of all my ethical considerations, which I can't have until I answer that question, unless I...

I can't remember how to solve differential equations either...
 
Oh, I'm very sorry. I just always liked abstract questions :p .

Anyway, let me try traditional moral dilemmas. Ahem,

1. You are on a sinking ship. As you rush to a life raft, you see that someone has beaten you to it and is getting ready to set off. All the other ones have left. You have a gun. The raft is only large enough for one family (Yes, you both have families, the same size). Do you shoot him and the other family so that you and your family can get the life raft? Or do you accept defeat and let them escape. Oh, and the boat was over a thermal phenomena that attracted hundreds of sharks that will eat anyone bleeding who enters the water, and you are all bleeding.

2. Your plane crash lands in a place with no modern technology. You aren't MacGyver. A tribe is kind enough to take you in, as you are injured. As you heal, you find out that the area is in a state of constant warfare for survival between competing tribes. You can't communicate with the other tribes, and can barely do so with this one. Being male (For the purposes of this situation, lets say you are), they arm you and take you with them on their next attack. Will you steal, rape, pillage with the tribe to stay alive? Or would you decline and lose the relationship with the only people you know, facing certain lonely death?

3. You are with the Government, and have uncovered a terrorist plot to blow up an important, and very tall, building just in time. The building is being evacuated and on the top floor you catch a terrorist just as he activates the bomb. It is on a timer, and the correct password will deactivate it. You can't move it and there isn't enough time for the bomb squad or escape from the building, as the building is very tall and the elevators are down, and the bomb is huge. Oh, and the windows don't open, and a jump would be fatal. And the roof is a spire, so no helicopter. The terrorist isn't talking. Do you go like Jack Bauer and try to torture the password out of him in the time you have left? Or do you call your spouse and or significant other before you die?
 
I would have died for my ethics without question before two years ago. Now, I'd commit any moral attrocity necessary for the lives of my children.

You didn't have a choice for that.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
Oh, I'm very sorry. I just always liked abstract questions :p .

Anyway, let me try traditional moral dilemmas. Ahem,

1. You are on a sinking ship. As you rush to a life raft, you see that someone has beaten you to it and is getting ready to set off. All the other ones have left. You have a gun. The raft is only large enough for one family (Yes, you both have families, the same size). Do you shoot him and the other family so that you and your family can get the life raft? Or do you accept defeat and let them escape. Oh, and the boat was over a thermal phenomena that attracted hundreds of sharks that will eat anyone bleeding who enters the water, and you are all bleeding.

2. Your plane crash lands in a place with no modern technology. You aren't MacGyver. A tribe is kind enough to take you in, as you are injured. As you heal, you find out that the area is in a state of constant warfare for survival between competing tribes. You can't communicate with the other tribes, and can barely do so with this one. Being male (For the purposes of this situation, lets say you are), they arm you and take you with them on their next attack. Will you steal, rape, pillage with the tribe to stay alive? Or would you decline and lose the relationship with the only people you know, facing certain lonely death?

3. You are with the Government, and have uncovered a terrorist plot to blow up an important, and very tall, building just in time. The building is being evacuated and on the top floor you catch a terrorist just as he activates the bomb. It is on a timer, and the correct password will deactivate it. You can't move it and there isn't enough time for the bomb squad or escape from the building, as the building is very tall and the elevators are down, and the bomb is huge. Oh, and the windows don't open, and a jump would be fatal. And the roof is a spire, so no helicopter. The terrorist isn't talking. Do you go like Jack Bauer and try to torture the password out of him in the time you have left? Or do you call your spouse and or significant other before you die?
Click to expand...

#1 & 2...I really don't know.
For 3, though, I'd torture the snot out of the terrorist for sure, and not even feel bad.
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
Oh, I'm very sorry. I just always liked abstract questions :p .

Anyway, let me try traditional moral dilemmas. Ahem,

1. You are on a sinking ship. As you rush to a life raft, you see that someone has beaten you to it and is getting ready to set off. All the other ones have left. You have a gun. The raft is only large enough for one family (Yes, you both have families, the same size). Do you shoot him and the other family so that you and your family can get the life raft? Or do you accept defeat and let them escape. Oh, and the boat was over a thermal phenomena that attracted hundreds of sharks that will eat anyone bleeding who enters the water, and you are all bleeding.

2. Your plane crash lands in a place with no modern technology. You aren't MacGyver. A tribe is kind enough to take you in, as you are injured. As you heal, you find out that the area is in a state of constant warfare for survival between competing tribes. You can't communicate with the other tribes, and can barely do so with this one. Being male (For the purposes of this situation, lets say you are), they arm you and take you with them on their next attack. Will you steal, rape, pillage with the tribe to stay alive? Or would you decline and lose the relationship with the only people you know, facing certain lonely death?

3. You are with the Government, and have uncovered a terrorist plot to blow up an important, and very tall, building just in time. The building is being evacuated and on the top floor you catch a terrorist just as he activates the bomb. It is on a timer, and the correct password will deactivate it. You can't move it and there isn't enough time for the bomb squad or escape from the building, as the building is very tall and the elevators are down, and the bomb is huge. Oh, and the windows don't open, and a jump would be fatal. And the roof is a spire, so no helicopter. The terrorist isn't talking. Do you go like Jack Bauer and try to torture the password out of him in the time you have left? Or do you call your spouse and or significant other before you die?
Click to expand...

1. : Don't know for sure this is the last raft, would be prepared to keep looking.

2. : S'pose so.

3. : Try bluffing.
 
Loss Leader said:
I shoot the husband and wife, put my kids in the raft with their kids and shoot myself. If that's not an option, I shoot them all, save my family and then kill myself later.
Click to expand...

Sorry, but that just doesn't make sense to me. You prioritise your family in the first instance, but then follow that up with the concession that you will end up committing suicide, an action that will have drastic consequences for your family (both emotional and financial).

Why not try therapy?
 
1. Armchair reply: ethics. Heat of the moment: maybe ethics.
2. Not knowing the reasons for the war, I'd let doubt benefit my helpers and fight on their side.
3. Torture.
 
1. Alas, I don't know.
2. I hope I wouldn't help the tribe in their war.
3. Probably torture, unless I chickened out...
 
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