Subject A is frail, on death’s door, desperately in need of a life-saving organ transplant. As luck would have it, Jenny, a tender-hearted selfless polygamous mormon, is willing to give what’s necessary to keep subject A alive and thriving. Jenny is the only person on the planet with the right compatibility to avert subject A’s demise. When subject A = Amos, I propose kidnapping Jenny, and killing her immediately. When subject A = anyone other than Amos, it is of utmost importance to support Jenny through the surgery and even gift her an extra £4,000 at the end of the emotionally draining process as a reward to allow her to grow her increasingly delightful eraser collection.
Regarding organ harvesting cases, I was always struck by how treating someone as a mere organ bag was so morally terrible, as opposed to, say, social fallout, which isn’t a necessary entailment of the act.
I never understand why people attempt to conduct moral reasoning using their intuitions. I remember first thinking of some of these topics a long time ago and instantly realizing that because if I were in a Nazi society I would likely have different moral intuitions, intuitions obviously cannot be the sole basis of moral truth. And yet it seems every person I read uses appeals to intuitions all over the place, simply assuming they are linked to actual moral correctness. It's even more ironic when I then see these people who use moral intuitions to guide their ethical thinking claim their morality is objective, because that's riddled with so many obvious problems, but that's not really the thing that annoyed me in this article in particular.
I will admit that there are more realistic/accurate hypotheticals to question the relevant ideas. But they aren't supposed to be "realistic". That's not the point. if you focus on that, you missed the point. Moral Philosophy (western, and contemporary) has this presupposition that moral reasoning should be consistent. That consistency is key. Not "realism"--and I don't even want to begin to try to define that.
So a hypothetical is useful if it tests consistency. Whether or not it will ever happen is totally meaningless. This hypothetical tests for consistency among the utilitarian, and does so in a very thought provoking and critical manner. That what makes it relevant.
I’m pretty new to normative ethics, so virtue ethics and particularism are unexplored options for me. I also find NL and DCT implausible. I like Rossianism though, so I’d like to see if I can rescue that before jumping ships.
We talk about this stuff most days: I’m sure we’ll do that at some point, but probably not yet. It makes sense to wait until my own views are more developed
Subject A is frail, on death’s door, desperately in need of a life-saving organ transplant. As luck would have it, Jenny, a tender-hearted selfless polygamous mormon, is willing to give what’s necessary to keep subject A alive and thriving. Jenny is the only person on the planet with the right compatibility to avert subject A’s demise. When subject A = Amos, I propose kidnapping Jenny, and killing her immediately. When subject A = anyone other than Amos, it is of utmost importance to support Jenny through the surgery and even gift her an extra £4,000 at the end of the emotionally draining process as a reward to allow her to grow her increasingly delightful eraser collection.
hope this helps.
💀
Here, I annihilate Amos' entire worldview. https://benthams.substack.com/p/contra-wollen-on-organ-harvesting
Good article! Soon, however, I will rip it to shreds.
Regarding organ harvesting cases, I was always struck by how treating someone as a mere organ bag was so morally terrible, as opposed to, say, social fallout, which isn’t a necessary entailment of the act.
I never understand why people attempt to conduct moral reasoning using their intuitions. I remember first thinking of some of these topics a long time ago and instantly realizing that because if I were in a Nazi society I would likely have different moral intuitions, intuitions obviously cannot be the sole basis of moral truth. And yet it seems every person I read uses appeals to intuitions all over the place, simply assuming they are linked to actual moral correctness. It's even more ironic when I then see these people who use moral intuitions to guide their ethical thinking claim their morality is objective, because that's riddled with so many obvious problems, but that's not really the thing that annoyed me in this article in particular.
Attackin my whole position here.
I'm afraid I've lost the plot
Why do you think that the Nazis are wrong? I do based on intuitions, but why do you?
https://theaspiringhumanist.substack.com/p/solving-for-meta-ethics
I will admit that there are more realistic/accurate hypotheticals to question the relevant ideas. But they aren't supposed to be "realistic". That's not the point. if you focus on that, you missed the point. Moral Philosophy (western, and contemporary) has this presupposition that moral reasoning should be consistent. That consistency is key. Not "realism"--and I don't even want to begin to try to define that.
So a hypothetical is useful if it tests consistency. Whether or not it will ever happen is totally meaningless. This hypothetical tests for consistency among the utilitarian, and does so in a very thought provoking and critical manner. That what makes it relevant.
I agree that hypotheticals test for consistency--they also test for moral truth. 😉
I’m pretty new to normative ethics, so virtue ethics and particularism are unexplored options for me. I also find NL and DCT implausible. I like Rossianism though, so I’d like to see if I can rescue that before jumping ships.
Thanks! I’ll have a read.
We talk about this stuff most days: I’m sure we’ll do that at some point, but probably not yet. It makes sense to wait until my own views are more developed