What If Respecting Rights Kills Me?

[Minarchist]

A cursory look over the "Ethics" forum and this one yielded no similar threads, and in attempting to search for it I found that there were simply too many ways to phrase the question.

Since ethics is based on the choice to live, what if respecting rights ended my life?

Let's say, for instance, that I were to get lost in the desert and came upon a man with several water bottles. If he refused to give them to me, and my death were certain otherwise, should I respect his rights, or would that be unethical in that it would kill me?

I guess I could phrase it this way: Should I hold another man's rights superior to my life, and if so how would that be ethical?

I imagine this question's been asked before, I just can't seem to find it. Apologies if I just didn't look hard enough.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[Tordmor]

Since ethics is based on the choice to live, what if respecting rights ended my life?

What if not eating ends your life?

What if jumping off a cliff ends your life?

What if not respecting traffic rules ends your life?

In each case you did something wrong. Thus it's not respecting rights that ends your life. It's whatever got you into that situation.

Let's say, for instance, that I were to get lost in the desert and came upon a man with several water bottles. If he refused to give them to me, and my death were certain otherwise, should I respect his rights, or would that be unethical in that it would kill me?

Imaginary scenarios can sometimes help to clear up a point. However, you must always think about the borders of your scenario. It must be wide enough and detailed enough so that whatever is missing from your scenario or is set as given does not change the results. In your case however it is relevant how you got into the desert without enough water in the first place and why the man refuses to trade you water. Maybe the man himself would face risk of dying should he give enough water to you so that you could survive. Why then should he hold your life more worthy than his own? The border cases of your scenario are what makes a difference here therefore you do not provide enough information to apply the principles. If on the other hand he has enough water to give to you, then why doesn't he want to trade? The "he's just evil" argument doesn't hold because humans aren't "just evil". And even if you assume he were, then whatever answer you get out of your scenario would only hold when dealing with one person who is "just evil". What good would that knowledge bring you in the real world?

[Minarchist]

What if not eating ends your life?

What if jumping off a cliff ends your life?

What if not respecting traffic rules ends your life?

In each case you did something wrong. Thus it's not respecting rights that ends your life. It's whatever got you into that situation.

Imaginary scenarios can sometimes help to clear up a point. However, you must always think about the borders of your scenario. It must be wide enough and detailed enough so that whatever is missing from your scenario or is set as given does not change the results. In your case however it is relevant how you got into the desert without enough water in the first place and why the man refuses to trade you water. Maybe the man himself would face risk of dying should he give enough water to you so that you could survive. Why then should he hold your life more worthy than his own? The border cases of your scenario are what makes a difference here therefore you do not provide enough information to apply the principles. If on the other hand he has enough water to give to you, then why doesn't he want to trade? The "he's just evil" argument doesn't hold because humans aren't "just evil". And even if you assume he were, then whatever answer you get out of your scenario would only hold when dealing with one person who is "just evil". What good would that knowledge bring you in the real world?

This is a complete evasion of the question being asked.

I'm going to simplify it and make it abstract so you can't analyze the hypothetical situation into uselessness: If respecting another man's rights will destroy my life, how is that ethical?

I'm asking because I'm still trying to grasp Objectivism fully, and I'm not quite convinced of the direct connection between the choice to live and inalienable rights.

What you're implying is that situations in which other people's rights vs. your own life aren't situations that will ever exist in the real world, and that seems... dishonest.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[claire]

Read Ayn Rand. She covered it. Do you need to be pointed to the correct reference?

[Minarchist]

Read Ayn Rand. She covered it. Do you need to be pointed to the correct reference?

I suppose so, since I have yet to find it.

[TuringAI]

I suppose so, since I have yet to find it.

It's not ETHICAL to violate rights, but it may be MORAL to do so if the situation is an emergency. Since rights are wholly dependent upon the nature of humans in a social context then any time, when a person could not have avoided being in such a dire situation, can correctly asses that it is such, and has no choice BUT to violate rights, they can choose to do so just as long as they also accept that there will be consequences and to not try to evade that fact nor the responsibilities themselves.

It is an EXCEPTION to the rule and NOT the rule itself, and is based on treating your life as an end in itself first, THEN treating other people's lives as ends in themselves as a consequence of your choice to live, and not as some sort of axiom.

[Minarchist]

It's not ETHICAL to violate rights, but it may be MORAL to do so if the situation is an emergency.

I'm sorry, I'm not aware of the distinction, and an immediate look at the Lexicon (bare as it is) does not yield one. In fact, it yields the opposite. The first sentence under "Morality" is "What is morality, or ethics?"

Since rights are wholly dependent upon the nature of humans in a social context then any time, when a person could not have avoided being in such a dire situation, can correctly asses that it is such, and has no choice BUT to violate rights, they can choose to do so just as long as they also accept that there will be consequences and to not try to evade that fact nor the responsibilities themselves.

It is an EXCEPTION to the rule and NOT the rule itself, and is based on treating your life as an end in itself first, THEN treating other people's lives as ends in themselves as a consequence of your choice to live, and not as some sort of axiom.

That's the understanding I have, but it seems to contradict the idea of inalienable rights. The implication seems to be that "rights" are a value potentially subordinate to others. For instance, would it be moral for me to kill another to save my mother? I certainly value her life above his. In fact, I might go so far as to say that I value her life both over his life and the value of his rights.

Perphaps even more damning of such an implication, how does a man have a right to his own life or property if another man is "morally" allowed to violate those rights? It seems just plain irreconcilable.

Thank you for answering, though.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[DavidOdden]

It's not ETHICAL to violate rights, but it may be MORAL to do so if the situation is an emergency.

That is a spurious distinction.

[RayNewman123]

A cursory look over the "Ethics" forum and this one yielded no similar threads, and in attempting to search for it I found that there were simply too many ways to phrase the question.

Since ethics is based on the choice to live, what if respecting rights ended my life?

Let's say, for instance, that I were to get lost in the desert and came upon a man with several water bottles. If he refused to give them to me, and my death were certain otherwise, should I respect his rights, or would that be unethical in that it would kill me?

I guess I could phrase it this way: Should I hold another man's rights superior to my life, and if so how would that be ethical?

I imagine this question's been asked before, I just can't seem to find it. Apologies if I just didn't look hard enough.

I think you may be looking at it ina limited way. My right to life is not antagonistic to your right to life. The "right" to life is predicated on the valuing of life in general...I value life the way I value a Rembrandt painting, whether I own it or you do.

If the other guy has "excess" water and you need it to live, he ought properly respect that and benevolently give you some. He cannot, if he doesn't need that water. claim the right to life and not help you save yours. That is a contradiction. And perhaps the words "help you" is misleading...it is not his responsibility to help you, that is not what he is doing...he is being consistent and helping himself by being true to his principles.

Yes, you can morally take some of his water to live, provided you do not endanger his life. If he fully comprehends the beauty of life, he should be happy to give it to you.

Stampedingherd.blogspot.com

[A is A]

A cursory look over the "Ethics" forum and this one yielded no similar threads, and in attempting to search for it I found that there were simply too many ways to phrase the question.

Since ethics is based on the choice to live, what if respecting rights ended my life?

Let's say, for instance, that I were to get lost in the desert and came upon a man with several water bottles. If he refused to give them to me, and my death were certain otherwise, should I respect his rights, or would that be unethical in that it would kill me?

I guess I could phrase it this way: Should I hold another man's rights superior to my life, and if so how would that be ethical?

I imagine this question's been asked before, I just can't seem to find it. Apologies if I just didn't look hard enough.

Rights arise in a context, and such a situation as you describe is not a context in which rights would apply. If your life is indeed in immediate jeopardy, then do what you must to sustain yourself and be prepared to suffer the consequences, such as being attacked or arrested for stealing someone else's water.

[DavidOdden]

If respecting another man's rights will destroy my life, how is that ethical?

Acting in accordance with moral principles is not a guarantee that you will always survive in the best possible fashion. Morality is necessary, but not sufficient. In your proposed scenario, your immoral conduct (evasion) was a necessary precondition for your current predicament. You've been attempting to maintain a contradiction, but reality, which enforces non-contradiction, will eventually correct you.

You have already lost in your feeble attempt to exist as a man, you simply have not admitted that fact to yourself. You have adopted the moral code of the wild animal, by assuming that another man's life is yours by right. Given that this is the moral code that you have adopted, you will probably attempt to kill the stranger in order to survive. For you, man's morality is simply irrelevant.

Perhaps you can construct a better thought out dire-straits scenario where you are not harvesting the fruits of your own immorality, and you are not the victim of the initiation of force. One reason why hypotheticals are so loathsome in ethics is that they seem trivial to construct and yet they fail logically because they don't control important facts (such as ultimate culpability). The key to a better hypothetical is understanding that man applies moral principles to his knowledge context in order to evaluate choices. If there is some crucial fact that you do not know (and did not evade knowledge of), then you have the ingredients for a non-culpable victim scenario. Now, the important thing to understand is that a proper moral code does not confer omniscience. As I said, morality is not a formula that guarantees success.

As you choke the life out of your victim, you should not think that you have a right to his life and to his water, and that you are acting morally. You are acting outside of morality. Whether or not you can live with the consequences of your act, I cannot guess.

[Minarchist]

My right to life is not antagonistic to your right to life. The "right" to life is predicated on the valuing of life in general...

This seems completely wrong. The base of ethics is the individuals choice to live his life.

Do not claim to hold my life equal in value to yours.

If the other guy has "excess" water and you need it to live, he ought properly respect that and benevolently give you some.

I agree under a certain context (there is little risk to his life and little cost to him).

Yes, you can morally take some of his water to live, provided you do not endanger his life.

Let's assume I must.

Rights arise in a context, and such a situation as you describe is not a context in which rights would apply.

I was under the impression that rights apply for ALL interpersonal relationships.

If your life is indeed in immediate jeopardy, then do what you must to sustain yourself and be prepared to suffer the consequences, such as being attacked or arrested for stealing someone else's water.

I certainly agree there.

Acting in accordance with moral principles is not a guarantee that you will always survive in the best possible fashion. Morality is necessary, but not sufficient. In your proposed scenario, your immoral conduct (evasion) was a necessary precondition for your current predicament. You've been attempting to maintain a contradiction, but reality, which enforces non-contradiction, will eventually correct you.

What contradiction? Take whatever liberties you must with the hypothetical situation to make it apply to the abstraction I'm trying to get across. The hypothetcal concrete is immaterial for anything other tha that.

You have already lost in your feeble attempt to exist as a man, you simply have not admitted that fact to yourself.

Not quite. If I manage to procure the water I can go on being a man.

You have adopted the moral code of the wild animal, by assuming that another man's life is yours by right.

In this situation, should I choose to kill the man, I've simply tailored my ethical code to the purpose of an ethical code: To live.

For you, man's morality is simply irrelevant.

Not at all. I'm simply asking how an ethical code with the purpose of allowing you to live can be considered valid if your death is caused by following it.

Perhaps you can construct a better thought out dire-straits scenario where you are not harvesting the fruits of your own immorality, and you are not the victim of the initiation of force.

Why do you assume that an individual wandering in a desert got there by his own immorality? Accidents happen.

One reason why hypotheticals are so loathsome in ethics is that they seem trivial to construct and yet they fail logically because they don't control important facts (such as ultimate culpability).

I don't want to make culpability the issue here. That's not it. Assume either that I'm culpable or otherwise: Just keep the hypothetical true to the moral question at hand.

[brian0918]

Not quite. If I manage to procure the water I can go on being a man.

Living as a man requires the use of reason, which requires that you are neither the victim of, nor the initiator of force, which you are in this case. You may survive as a living creature, but you are not living as man qua man. A moral action would be to realize that you have brought this on yourself through your past irrationality, and either attempt to find water or resign yourself to death.

In this situation, should I choose to kill the man, I've simply tailored my ethical code to the purpose of an ethical code: To live.

But not to live as a man.

Not at all. I'm simply asking how an ethical code with the purpose of allowing you to live can be considered valid if your death is caused by following it.

You're equivocating on what it means to "live". The ultimate standard is not longevity or survival - free of all context - but survival as a man. You can live as man the rational being, or as a wild animal, but you cannot pretend to be living as both pragmatically.

Why do you assume that an individual wandering in a desert got there by his own immorality? Accidents happen.

You've demonstrated with this statement why hypotheticals such as this are pointless and useless.

I would also note that he was very clear that morality does not guarantee success.

Edited May 30, 2010 by brian0918

[Minarchist]

Living as a man requires the use of reason,

That's true, but completely meaningless in this particular concrete.

That water was purified and bottled by use of man's reason, but only through force is this particuar man capable of surviving.

I don't quite see how an ethical code held for the purpose of living is valid if it requires the ethical man's death.

You may survive as a living creature, but you are not living as man qua man.

Nor is a man who uses force to defend himself. Make no mistake, a man who uses force to defend himself is using something other than reason to survive. This doesn't matter, since life is the ultimate value to be attained. Force is proper in some scenarios.

A moral action would be to realize that you have brought this on yourself through your past irrationality, and either attempt to find water or resign yourself to death.

Why is this assumpion being made? Let's assume my plane crashed.

You've demonstrated with this statement why hypotheticals such as this are pointless and useless.

No I haven't. The hypothetical is being used to pose a valid moral question in a simple manner. Other people's attempts at evasion are what make hypotheticals useless.

I would also note that he was very clear that morality does not guarantee success.

Which serves only to make my point. It's possible that my situation may not be caused by past immorality.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[claire]

Minarchist, as I have stated above, Ayn Rand answered that question in her Ford HAll Forum lecture. The answer is in the Ayn Rand Question and Answer Book. Just look it up.

[Minarchist]

Minarchist, as I have stated above, Ayn Rand answered that question in her Ford HAll Forum lecture. The answer is in the Ayn Rand Question and Answer Book. Just look it up.

Coincidentally I'm listening to her lectures as I post here. After I'm through with the current one I'll skip on over to that one. Thank you.

[claire]

You're welcome. Maybe someone else can remember the specific year. I can't.

[DavidOdden]

What contradiction?

The contradiction is that on the one hand, at an earlier point, you refuse to act according to a proper moral code because you reject the premise of morality -- that's how you got into the predicament -- but then you want to appeal to a moral code to guide you in making a decision.

Take whatever liberties you must with the hypothetical situation to make it apply to the abstraction I'm trying to get across. The hypothetcal concrete is immaterial for anything other tha that.

No, the nature of the concrete is highly material. Morality is not just a code of principles applicable to a single sound-bite of life, it is an integrated system of principles applicable to and evaluated in terms of the long run -- not just the range of the moment. You can learn nothing about ethics if you base your reasoning on a rejection of ethics followed by a miraculous appeal to ethics. You need to provide us with a plausible scenario where consistent application of ethical principles still fails. The fact that you can't do that ought to tell you something about your presumption.

Not quite. If I manage to procure the water I can go on being a man.

No, you apparently are not aware of the Objectivist position on ma's nature. "Man" does not just refer to "non-dead instance of the species homo sapiens".

In this situation, should I choose to kill the man, I've simply tailored my ethical code to the purpose of an ethical code: To live.

You've forgotten the second axiom. The choice to exist entails living as something. It means you are to live as man, not as an animal. The Objectivist ethics does not advance the morality of morgue-avoidance (indeed, that "morality" is what enables the so-called problem of the prudent predator).

Suppose that you decide that Objectivist morality is just too inconvenient for you, so you decide that you'd rather pursue hedonic pleasures, not a productive professional life. You keep yourself from dying by various immoral means such as bank robbery, shoplifting, fraud and so on. A proper moral code simply plays no role in your choices. One day, you attempt an robbery of a guy who happens to be in contact with deactivated high-voltage power lines, and you are surprised to discover that he has a gun and he is willing to kill you to save his own life. Fortunately for you, all you have to do is press the red button next to you and you'll fry his ass. At this moment, you have a moral epiphany, that you can justify your action on the grounds that you are faced with a choice between your life and your death. Thus you believe that you can claim the right to take this man's life, on moral grounds.

Hopefully I've made the absurdity of a last-minute appeal to morality clear. If had an interest in a more refined understanding of the limits of morality, you would focus on that which you have rejected, name the distinction between culpability and innocence.

[Hairnet]

I would suggest that rights are useless if they get you killed. Take the man's water. Pay him back later as much as you can and apologize and hope that he agrees to forgive you.

As others have pointed out though, you wouldn't be surviving as a man, just a surviving by the labor of others, and that isn't a healthy position for people. So robbing the man should be the last course of action on the list of actions to solve the problem. Imagine, your hypothetical man would be alienating and possibly injuring the only other person in the dessert, which can be suicidal. While individual humans may be able to survive on their own, the dessert provide challenges that I don't expect any humans to be able to deal with in general, especially alone. So cooperation would most likely be necessary for both parties to survive.

[Minarchist]

The contradiction is that on the one hand, at an earlier point, you refuse to act according to a proper moral code because you reject the premise of morality -- that's how you got into the predicament -- but then you want to appeal to a moral code to guide you in making a decision.

I don't see why you assume the predicament arises from some form of immorality.

No, the nature of the concrete is highly material.

In the case of a hypothetical it is only material in the sense of the moral question at hand.

Asking for more details is a form of evasion in this case. You have all of the relevent information. I cannot survive unless I rob or kill the man. Since the purpose of ethics is to live, I don't see how any ethical code that kills me if I follow it is valid.

Morality is not just a code of principles applicable to a single sound-bite of life, it is an integrated system of principles applicable to and evaluated in terms of the long run -- not just the range of the moment.

Correct. That doesn't mean we can ignore the immediate moment, especially in so critical a situation.

The choice to exist entails living as something.

Obviously. To exist as a man is not a question of choice (beyond the choice to live), bud. To exist as a man means to recognize your own nature and act accordingly. This does not preclude force as a means of life, as sometimes that's the only means available (like in self-defense).

Suppose that you decide that Objectivist morality is just too inconvenient for you, so you decide that you'd rather pursue hedonic pleasures, not a productive professional life. You keep yourself from dying by various immoral means such as bank robbery, shoplifting, fraud and so on. A proper moral code simply plays no role in your choices.

There's a huge difference between the two scenarios.

In one, force is my ONLY means of survival. Reason will get me nowhere.

In the other I'm still capable of living by means of reason short-range, and, in fact, the choice to do so would advance my own life FAR more than resorting to force.

Thus you believe that you can claim the right to take this man's life, on moral grounds.

Any man who believes in the right to self-defense believes that.

I'm not condoning a flexible morality system, I'm saying that I don't yet understand why the use of force is precluded in ALL situations, even those in which it's necessary to save my life.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[Minarchist]

I would suggest that rights are useless if they get you killed. Take the man's water. Pay him back later as much as you can and apologize and hope that he agrees to forgive you.

This is an easy way out. Let's assume now that he defends his property with his life, and my only means of my acquiring it is to kill him.

As others have pointed out though, you wouldn't be surviving as a man, just a surviving by the labor of others, and that isn't a healthy position for people.

I agree completely (on that it's not healthy). However, in that particular case it's 100% necessary for survival.

I don't yet understand the supremacy of rights over the supposed purpose of those rights (to advance my life). That's why I'm here.

Learning Objectivism requires the destruction of a large number of subconciously-held beliefs for someone raised in this culture, and I'm curious as to whether or not another one is the cause of my disagreement here, or if my argument is valid.

Edited May 30, 2010 by Minarchist

[nanite1018]

This seems interesting, and so I'll pose the hypothetical with details so as to make it clear, and hopefully Minarchist will agree it gets his point across.

You are an engineer on a flight in from a Saudi oil field (you work for ExxonMobil, say), and have always strived to be honest and productive. Something happens, a bird flies into the engine say, and your plane crashes in the middle of the Sahara. The plane is ablaze, and you barely make it out alive. Everyone else is dead, and their bodies burned. All the supplies on the plane were burnt up in the fire. You wait for a day or two, but no one comes. You start walking north, thinking that maybe you'll eventually hit the Mediterranean, though when that will be you have no way of knowing. Finally, on your third day without water, you stumble across an oasis, where an old man lives. He's lived in the Sahara all his life, and found this oasis years ago, and made a life for himself there, alone. He built a fence around it, and tells you that you may not enter (he was taught English years ago by a Westerner, when he lived in Egypt many years ago). He is afraid you'll try to kill him, and he is armed with a bow and arrow. There is a small spring in the middle of the oasis, and he refuses to give you any water, even though you beg. He tells you to go away, though there isn't anyone else or any water that he knows of for many miles in any direction. You are on the edge of death, but find a nice rock, and you love to play baseball in your spare time as a pitcher. You know you could knock him out with a throw (possibly killing him), and then hop the fence and take the water. What do you do?

There, you are in the situation through no fault of your own, and the man refuses to give you water, and there is no other water or people around for many miles. Take it or die. Dum dum dum....

Hope that satisfies everyone's need for detail. Now, as for my opinion: you could knock him out and take the water and be prepared to be charged with assault, possibly murder, and theft (that is always an option that you could, if you chose to, take). What you should do, in my opinion, is keep begging, for it is better to die as a man that live as an animal. And a moral code which lets you run roughshod over other people for any reason whatsoever is automatically invalidated because it is not universal and exceptions to it cannot be objectively determined (so suggesting that this is a moral exception is nonsense).

[smyjpmu]

I don't quite see how an ethical code held for the purpose of living is valid if it requires the ethical man's death.

Every man's death is metaphysically inevitable. No ethical code can allow you to live forever. So every ethical code requires the ethical man's death.

[smyjpmu]

This seems interesting, and so I'll pose the hypothetical with details so as to make it clear, and hopefully Minarchist will agree it gets his point across.

You are an engineer on a flight in from a Saudi oil field (you work for ExxonMobil, say), and have always strived to be honest and productive. Something happens, a bird flies into the engine say, and your plane crashes in the middle of the Sahara. The plane is ablaze, and you barely make it out alive. Everyone else is dead, and their bodies burned. All the supplies on the plane were burnt up in the fire. You wait for a day or two, but no one comes. You start walking north, thinking that maybe you'll eventually hit the Mediterranean, though when that will be you have no way of knowing. Finally, on your third day without water, you stumble across an oasis, where an old man lives. He's lived in the Sahara all his life, and found this oasis years ago, and made a life for himself there, alone. He built a fence around it, and tells you that you may not enter (he was taught English years ago by a Westerner, when he lived in Egypt many years ago). He is afraid you'll try to kill him, and he is armed with a bow and arrow. There is a small spring in the middle of the oasis, and he refuses to give you any water, even though you beg. He tells you to go away, though there isn't anyone else or any water that he knows of for many miles in any direction. You are on the edge of death, but find a nice rock, and you love to play baseball in your spare time as a pitcher. You know you could knock him out with a throw (possibly killing him), and then hop the fence and take the water. What do you do?

There, you are in the situation through no fault of your own, and the man refuses to give you water, and there is no other water or people around for many miles. Take it or die. Dum dum dum....

Hope that satisfies everyone's need for detail. Now, as for my opinion: you could knock him out and take the water and be prepared to be charged with assault, possibly murder, and theft (that is always an option that you could, if you chose to, take). What you should do, in my opinion, is keep begging, for it is better to die as a man that live as an animal. And a moral code which lets you run roughshod over other people for any reason whatsoever is automatically invalidated because it is not universal and exceptions to it cannot be objectively determined (so suggesting that this is a moral exception is nonsense).

Keep begging? Maybe you should try using reason. Tell the man why it's to his advantage to let you have some water. While you're at it, tell yourself why it's to your advantage not to kill the man.

One common flaw with these sorts of scenarios is that they're told from a perspective of omniscience. "Your death is certain unless you drink within X hours". "You know the man will not listen to reason." "There is no one around and no water for miles in any direction." But in reality, you just know you're really really thirsty. And you know there's a man who has access to water. And you know that when you ask him for water he says "no". So what do you do? Most likely, you ask again. You continue to try to negotiate because you believe that men are rational beings and that if the old man weren't capable of reason he wouldn't have managed to make such a nice life for himself in the first place. You figure the old man must value your life, because even though he's got a bow and arrow in his hand and you're a sitting duck, he hasn't threatened you with it. You assume it's in your best interest as well as his that the two of you cooperate rather that battle to the death. Even if this hypothetical situation does occur in a malevolent universe where all these assumptions are false, you don't know this, so you keep trying to use reason.

Edited May 31, 2010 by smyjpmu

[L-C]

One reason why hypotheticals are so loathsome in ethics is that they seem trivial to construct and yet they fail logically because they don't control important facts (such as ultimate culpability).

Typically they teleport those involved into some manufactured arena of trials straight out of a fantasy novel, without regard for the entire chain of events.