Do real moral dilemmas exist?

[You]

So an unbeliever-in-anything is standing on the side of a hill. This unbeliever is unusual in that she has ‘second sight’.
Above her on the top of the hill are two men being tortured to death. One man is God the other is a criminal.

Your second sight tells you that the criminal any moment now will appeal to God suffering beside him and God will respond giving the criminal paradise.

However as you can see, the poor man is suffering, he is in fact being tortured to death.
You have a weapon strapped to you and you could end it for him now. But then if you do that you know that he will loose his chance to call for help and get the response that he will have paradise that day.

Your dilemma is whether you should end his suffering now and deny him paradise or look to your second sight and accept suffering as a prerequisite for entry into paradise.
What is morally right?

 

[Trident_H]

This whole message is pain to me. Having abandoned someone to die already in my life. Having felt the horrible sense of guilt that comes with that. Every day.

If I could do it again I would have stayed. Had I stayed she would still be alive. And I wouldn’t have had to hide myself in an alcoholic haze for so many years. I wouldn’t have lost my marriage. I wouldn’t have had to die a little bit myself. Every day. Because she should have lived. Why the **** did I come to this thread.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

Your dilemma is whether you should end his suffering now and deny him paradise or look to your second sight and accept suffering as a prerequisite for entry into paradise.

If there would be a second sight, then we would KNOW the outcome, and obviously we should take it into consideration…

But, since there is no such thing as second sight, we must make our decision based upon what we know and can reasonably foresee. Since the suffering is visible, here and now, also the reaction of the rodents is easily foreseeable, these are the deciding factors. No rational person would base a decision on the “maybe there is something else that we don’t know and cannot surmise”.

What is morally right?

The decision MUST be based upon what we know. Sometimes the cards dealt do not allow one to make a decision which will be “right” for all the “ethical systems”. In such a case you do what will minimize the negative outcome.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

In the general sense, we may “hope” for the salvation of infants.

That is not what I heard. This “hope” only applies to the unbaptized fetuses in the womb. It is a definitive teaching that baptism washes away the stain of the original sin. And if there is no possibility to acquire some actual sin, then the person is in the state of “sinlessness”, and as such heaven-bound.

But yes, you described my view better than I described it myself: his fate is decided on what he would do if he had the opportunity to grow up and become a moral agent. This is the only solution that makes sense to me. The other explanations posed by some Catholics seem completely absurd to me.

Sorry, what you say is absurd. To make a judgment on what someone did not commit and cannot commit (not living long enough) is crazy.

It is also severely problematic to deliberately commit a grave sin, then to immediately go back and (on the surface) confess & repent of it, with that idea already in mind before you even did the deed. Contrition, and a valid Confession, requires the acknowledgement of the sin and the sincere desire to sin no more, preferably out of love for God, but also out of fear of the lose of Heaven and for the pains of hell.

That is the logical corollary of the teaching that you can repent and get absolved of your sins. There is nothing wrong with taking the LITERAL teaching into consideration. When there is a “loophole” in the laws, you cannot be punished for taking advantage of the sloppy wording.

 

[Trident_H]

Sorry guys. Please ignore my post from this morning. I was low on sleep. And just projecting. Again. Carry on.

Peace.

-Trident

 

[You]

If there would be a second sight, then we would KNOW the outcome, and obviously we should take it into consideration…

But, since there is no such thing as second sight, we must make our decision based upon what we know and can reasonably foresee. Since the suffering is visible, here and now, also the reaction of the rodents is easily foreseeable, these are the deciding factors. No rational person would base a decision on the “maybe there is something else that we don’t know and cannot surmise”.

The decision MUST be based upon what we know. Sometimes the cards dealt do not allow one to make a decision which will be “right” for all the “ethical systems”. In such a case you do what will minimize the negative outcome.

What we have learned is that we know there may be possibilities which we don’t know about. And we know that unilaterally ending his life means removing all of these possibilities that we don’t know about.

 

[Pallas_Athene]

What we have learned is that we know there may be possibilities which we don’t know about. And we know that unilaterally ending his life means removing all of these possibilities that we don’t know about.

Yes, this is correct, but nothing new.

Every time we make decisions we evaluate those consequences that we KNOW about, and those which MIGHT happen. When we ponder those which are possible, but not certain, we try to evaluate the likelihood of them happening. And then we do a cost-benefit analysis and choose the action which maximizes benefits and minimizes the cost. Now this analysis does not have happen in the conscious area of the mind, though it could.

In the original scenario, we KNOW how the rats will behave. They will attack and tear the injured person apart, thereby causing incredible harm to the person. Not just simple death, but useless, gratuitous suffering, both physical and mental. Of course it might happen that some rescue party will show up and saves the person. But what are the chances? Slim to none.

If possible, the injured person is the one who has to make the decision. If he wishes to spend his final hours in prayer, if he wishes to be abandoned, then that is the correct course of action. If he wishes a quick way out, then we should honor his wishes. If he is not in the position to make such a decision, then we need to make it for him - painful as it may be. And in this case we must rely on the golden rule, do whatever we would like to be done to us, if the situation would be reversed.

To choose the second option (abandoning the person) is only acceptable if the person explicitly requests it.

 

[You]

Yes, this is correct, but nothing new.

Every time we make decisions we evaluate those consequences that we KNOW about, and those which MIGHT happen. When we ponder those which are possible, but not certain, we try to evaluate the likelihood of them happening. And then we do a cost-benefit analysis and choose the action which maximizes benefits and minimizes the cost. Now this analysis does not have happen in the conscious area of the mind, though it could.

In the original scenario, we KNOW how the rats will behave. They will attack and tear the injured person apart, thereby causing incredible harm to the person. Not just simple death, but useless, gratuitous suffering, both physical and mental. Of course it might happen that some rescue party will show up and saves the person. But what are the chances? Slim to none.

If possible, the injured person is the one who has to make the decision. If he wishes to spend his final hours in prayer, if he wishes to be abandoned, then that is the correct course of action. If he wishes a quick way out, then we should honor his wishes. If he is not in the position to make such a decision, then we need to make it for him - painful as it may be. And in this case we must rely on the golden rule, do whatever we would like to be done to us, if the situation would be reversed.

To choose the second option (abandoning the person) is only acceptable if the person explicitly requests it.

You mean the default position is to kill everyone unless they ask you not to?