Moral dilemma: would you kill this man?

[catharina]

I would NOT kill the man.

I couldn’t claim self-defense to do so.
The other captured person has no intention of hurting me.
So killing him would not be a defense of self against his intention to kill me.
He has no intention of killing me.

 

[John_Hiner]

This is an excellent exercise in elementary moral reasoning and basic catechetics.

Christ’s command in this circumstance is explicit:

“Human life is sacred because from its beginning it involves the creative action of God and it remains for ever in a special relationship with the Creator, who is its sole end. God alone is the Lord of life from its beginning until its end: no one can under any circumstance claim for himself the right directly to destroy an innocent human being.”(1997 Catechism of the Catholic Church 2258, quoting CDF, instruction, Donum vitae, intro. 5; emphasis added.)

Add to this the general principle of moral reasoning accoding to the Mind of Christ:

A morally good act requires the goodness of the object, of the end, and of the circumstances together. An evil end corrupts the action, even if the object is good in itself (such as praying and fasting “in order to be seen by men”).The object of the choice can by itself vitiate an act in its entirety. There are some concrete acts - such as fornication - that it is always wrong to choose, because choosing them entails a disorder of the will, that is a moral evil.

It is therefore an error to judge the morality of human acts by considering only the intention that inspires them or the circumstances (environment, social pressure, duress or emergency, etc.) which supply their context. There are acts which, in and of themselves, independently of circumstances and intentions, are always gravely illicit by reason of their object; such as blasphemy and perjury, ***murder ***and adultery. One may not do evil so that good may result from it. (1997 Catechism of the Catholic Church 1755-56; emphasis added.)

The real challenge is not to the intellect but to the whole heart; the challenge proposed is to find the courage to do what God wills.

In another sense, the choice is not between killing the man and returning home. The choice is between returning to one’s earthly home or to one’s heavenly home. If you murder the other man, you may return to your earthly home for a little time (a naive assumption given the apparent character of your captors), but you will risk giving up Heaven – in fact you will be explicitly choosing against Heaven and its King, who has given you explicit orders and confirmed them with the warning:

If a man does not abide in me, he is cast forth as a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire and burned. . . If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. (John (RSV) 15:6,10.)

Rather than trusting your captors to send you “home,” you would be much better advised to trust Christ. Refusing to kill the innocent man, even if it means the machine physically kills you, is your best hope of going home.

Spiritus Sapientiae nobiscum.

John Hiner

 

[Redratfish]

This is a trick question. There is no right or wrong answer.

Self preservation is (correct me if im wrong) on the same level as self defense. If your life is in danger, you have (almost) unlimited control on how you can save your life. If that involves you killing someone, even though he may be guilty of no crime, how can someone not choose to save themselves?

IMO even if you decided to save the other man, the men may kill him, he has no weapon. However, if you live, but they decide to kill you, you have a means of defense, and then it becomes self defensive.

However, that risks Heaven for the man who killed the other. In a case like this I highly doubt that someone can think straight, we can all say we would save the other man, but in a highly stressed area like this, it is unlikely we would think of much but out own self preservation

 

[catharina]

This is a trick question. There is no right or wrong answer.

Self preservation is (correct me if im wrong) on the same level as self defense. If your life is in danger, you have (almost) unlimited control on how you can save your life. If that involves you killing someone, even though he may be guilty of no crime, how can someone not choose to save themselves?

IMO even if you decided to save the other man, the men may kill him, he has no weapon. However, if you live, but they decide to kill you, you have a means of defense, and then it becomes self defensive.

However, that risks Heaven for the man who killed the other. In a case like this I highly doubt that someone can think straight, we can all say we would save the other man, but in a highly stressed area like this, it is unlikely we would think of much but out own self preservation

The only correct (right) answer (no tricks) is:
You may not kill the innocent even to save yourself.

Moral law supports absolute truth.
This example of killing is a bow to relativism.

 

[Redratfish]

The only correct (right) answer (no tricks) is:
You may not kill the innocent even to save yourself.

Moral law supports absolute truth.
This example of killing is a bow to relativism.

Now reading my post, I see that I didn’t make it clear, right now I would not kill the man. He is defenseless. However, I was just making a point that it is unlikely either of you would survive, and that chance are, people would not be thinking about morality at a time like that.

 

[catharina]

Now reading my post, I see that I didn’t make it clear, right now I would not kill the man. He is defenseless. However, I was just making a point that it is unlikely either of you would survive, and that chance are, people would not be thinking about morality at a time like that.

All the more for the need to develop the habit of morality.

 

[Podo2005]

Evil people capture you and another man and take you to a warehouse. They handcuff you to a wall and give you a gun. The put the other person in a machine, and connect him to the controls in such a way that as long as he is alive the machine is coming at you (for example, machine is operated by a sensor that detects his heartbeat).

If you do nothing, you will be killed. If you shoot the man the machine will stop operating and you will survive (and be let go to return to your life).

Would you shoot the man?

There are no other ways to stop the machine. So please don’t cheat. If you don’t want to respond to the dilemma, don’t. But don’t invent third options that don’t exist in what I am asking.

John 15:13

 

[blaskoman]

If Flyingfish was attached to the machine I shoot, anyone else I dont…LOL