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Your Country or Your Friend?

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Lets say you are the leader of a country, and another leader from another country threatens your country saying that if you don't hand over such and such we will force you to, and take military actions if need be.

And lets say that this country threatening you would tear you to pieces if it came to war, and the leader is insane enough to actually do it. And the person they want is not a politician or anyone of rank. He or she is just a random person who has a good soul and heart.

And this situation has been made public, heavily exploited by the media. Both countries have major cultural, economical, and technological differences.

What would you do, give in to the demands and sacrifice the person or would you be resilient and have war in which you'd eventually, inevitably lose? And the threatening country has assured the defending country that the person will be tortured throughout the course of his or her life.

Also, do you think this is a great question for Obama and McCain to be surprised with before one is elected? I think somebody should ask them, and the key is the surprise because I don't want a planned answer. It would be interesting.

@Holiday20310401,

Holiday20310401;27344 wrote:

lets say that this country threatening you would tear you to pieces if it came to war, and the leader is insane enough to actually do it. And the person they want is not a politician or anyone of rank. He or she is just a random person who has a good soul and heart.

This question was an underlying theme in a great (but underrated, I think) movie with John Travolta, Hugh Jackman, and Halle Berry called "Swordfish." You'd have to watch it to get the context, but at one point Travolta's character asks Jackman's character (and I'm paraphrasing here from memory) "if you could bring about world peace, and all you had to do was sacrifice one innocent child, would you do it?"

Would you, Holiday?

Holiday20310401;27344 wrote:

Also, do you think this is a great question for Obama and McCain to be surprised with before one is elected? I think somebody should ask them, and the key is the surprise because I don't want a planned answer. It would be interesting.

From your perspective, what would be the right answer?

@TickTockMan,

To bring about world peace... yes if world peace ends up being as good as it sounds at first then I would. But from the scenario I gave, no I would not give up the person. A detailed response in the morning if I may, because its 2:00 am here and I'm too tired. But I'll have to watch swordfish. Thanks.

@Holiday20310401,

Good question:

We should hand 'em Over!: No one person is worth the suffering that could come from keeping them. What is one person against the lives of thousands, millions? Any 'keeper' (read: government, state administration, 'protector of rome', etc) has a moral obligation to make just such hard choices.

No, Hand over No one!: If there's any good time to stand up for a principle it is in protecting the individual. Be they mouse or monster, it is fundamentally in the interests of the state to never be bullied into sacrificing a citizen's life for no good reason. We can't quantify the value of our citizen's life - no price can be fixed; and if we're pained for standing up for this principle, so be it.

Sorry, it's Contradictory Day!

----

@Khethil,

Well, I'd have my doubts that any country so arbitrary and aggressive would be likely to keep their word and keep peace for very long. Might as well fight them while you still have your conscience in on piece, and let the chips fall where they may.

@NeitherExtreme,

I'd really need to understand why they would want some random good natured person. If they didn't have a decent reason, I'd really be tempted to resist. Hopefully they'd be bluffing. But just in case, I'd be rallying for support from all my allies in hopes that we could somehow manage to fight them off if they made good on their promise. Just handing them over for no reason wouldn't sit well with the citizens. No one would feel safe. They'd be wondering if they'd be next. There would be panic and revolt.

@Holiday20310401,

Does any indivdual hold an infinite and intrinsic moral weight, or is his weight comparable and so subject to sacrifice?

As for the politics, civil unrest should be the deciding factor for anyone unsure of which moral system to lean on. Also, nationalism clouds the moral issue with traits such as pride and integrity. So is this an abstract moral question or a practical one? I assume it both so I wouldn't sacrifice the individual, but in the case of Swordfish, I would.

@Holiday20310401,

Holiday20310401 wrote:

What would you do, give in to the demands and sacrifice the person or would you be resilient and have war in which you'd eventually, inevitably lose? And the threatening country has assured the defending country that the person will be tortured throughout the course of his or her life.

It would depend on what ethical school you subscribe to. The Kantian deontologist would never sacrifice one life for the benefit of others because that would be treating the sacrificed as a means to an end. The utilitarian would look at the situation an see that the inevitable loss in a war would cause more suffering than necessary in the population; therefore, it would be rationalized that the sacrifice needs to be made.

My brain tells me that you have to sacrifice the person because it is insane to start a war involving millions for a single person. I just do not find that much intrinsic worth in a single person to allow so many others to suffer as a result. My heart on the other hand, cannot find how one person is less than anyone person and, thus, worthy of sacrifice. In the end, the brain wins. This situation, to me anyway, is one that cannot be decided without looking at the context of the situation to make the right choice.

@Holiday20310401,

Surely the heart should guide cases of morality. Isn't it compassion and empathy; the emotions that navigate our moral path? You can tell I'm not a Kantian, perhaps a utilitarian, but what use is utility if it belies the foundations of morality? The fundamental emotional apperception of similarity between person, and person's feelings. It seems that to ignore the heart is somehow to produce a synthetic surrogate of morality, one which seeks a similar end but with an emotionless and calculating hand.

@SingerNietzsche,

SingerNietzsche wrote:

Surely the heart should guide cases of morality. Isn't it compassion and empathy; the emotions that navigate our moral path? You can tell I'm not a Kantian, perhaps a utilitarian, but what use is utility if it belies the foundations of morality? The fundamental emotional apperception of similarity between person, and person's feelings. It seems that to ignore the heart is somehow to produce a synthetic surrogate of morality, one which seeks a similar end but with an emotionless and calculating hand.

Actually with your belief that emotions guide our moral path would agree with Aristotelian ethics known as virtue ethics. According to Nicomachean Ethics the emotions can be trained and it is through moral education that this is process is realized.

@Theaetetus,

Theaetetus wrote:

Actually with your belief that emotions guide our moral path would agree with Aristotelian ethics known as virtue ethics. According to Nicomachean Ethics the emotions can be trained and it is through moral education that this is process is realized.

I like virtue ethics but I'm not sure that it ticks all the boxes. Whilst it may be productive for the single and assured individual, as a unified system it dwindles providing no real substantive navigational template and is especially ambiguous with concern to defining the virtues. I'm not sure that emotions and virtues are the same thing anyway, I think I'll try to bridge utilitarianism with my previous point... perhaps too ad hoc.

@Theaetetus,

So moral education can be used to train emotion:listening:?

Perhaps to some extent, but any more and that's wishful thinking.

@Holiday20310401,

Is that addressed to me? I don't think moral education can train emotion, the concept of training emotion is quite a difficult one to grasp. I believe morality to be -at least partially- grounded in emotion. Beyond this grounding, emotion serves to remind us of why we follow, in some cases quite blindly, particular moral conduct. We need a system, as emotional responses are fickle and subject to waver at any particular point. So reason structures and organises a system from our emotional observations. However, when a system provides a path which is in conflict with a raw and esteemed emotional response, that system seems to in some way be flawed. That was my point to Theaetetus. However, perhaps that was his error, as supposed to the system's via which he analysed.

@Holiday20310401,

If morality is at least partially grounded in emotion, then that suggests that emotions can be--at least partially--trained. You have actually hit the essence of Aristotle's discussion of morality and the basis for emotional training through moral education.

@Holiday20310401,

Holiday20310401 wrote:

So moral education can be used to train emotion:listening:?

Perhaps to some extent, but any more and that's wishful thinking.

If forgot that in order to do justice to Aristotle's moral philosophy, that I would have to explain the difference between the Greek meaning of words, and the accepted English meanings. Your to some extent is the more specific use of the word emotion in the ancient Greek language.

@Theaetetus,

Well I suppose it would be an absolute influence if not for all the others. Emotion thrives emotion, thrived by sensation or sensory input. To say that external influences such as logic being educated is the priority of emotional cognition would be false, and a pathetic life too.

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