Runaway trolley problem

[BlackFriar]

Is it a valid comparision?
There are not certainties of outcome re 1753 therefore innocence of the one is relatively clear.

But in the trolley example it is not unreasonable to say innocence cannot be assumed. In a passive sense the scenario forces the two captive parties into mutual aggressor status. The situation is objectively ordered such that one group cannot survive without the death of the other.
Is a toddler child bomber walking up to a US checkpoint innocent?

 

[Ender]

Such a change – no one gets hurt – would materially alter the morality of the act (and remove all the drama). If the only end in view and actual consequences are good then there’s no point. Of course, the end in view that an innocent person on the track will die determines the moral object of the act.

Whether or not someone is hurt is a consequence of the act (part of the circumstances), and while the consequences may increase or decrease the moral goodness of the act they cannot change its morality.

CCC 1754: Circumstances of themselves cannot change the moral quality of acts themselves…

And why do you keep insisting that the “end in view” is the death of the innocent person? If all you mean is that it is a foreseeable and inevitable consequence then I would agree, but “end” refers to the intent, the ultimate objective, behind an act, and there is no reasonable way to describe the death of the one, regardless of its inevitability, as the objective of the act.

 

[Ender]

And how can an object of an act be immoral?

It cannot, only the whole act is ever be called immoral.

Welll, not exactly. Abortion, for example, is intrinsically evil regardless of one’s reason for having it, and this can only be so if the object is always and everywhere evil.

These are the acts which, in the Church’s moral tradition, have been termed “intrinsically evil” (intrinsece malum): they are such always and per se, in other words, on account of their very object (JPII, Veritatis Splendor #80)

 

[BlackFriar]

Lets understand the object “abortion”? Can you define it first?

If it is defined in the same way as “murder” (directly killing the innocent") then of course, by the very definition used this killing is always immoral.

But the issue is not defining an abstract principle.
The difficult question with particular real world objects is that they are not abstract. We have to be sure that the killing we see someone doing actually is a valid example of the principle we apply.

Sometimes its murder sometimes its lethal self defence.
Sometimes its abortion, sometimes its a life saving procedure on an expectant mother.

Simply saying all murders or all abortions are intrinsically evil is fine, but such valid definitions dont prove anthing.
The issue is whether they validly apply to this scenario’s object.

BTW a moral theologian, using the word “act” does not mean “object”. He does not mean the perceived physical action. He means the whole moral act, all three fonts.
So in your quote above where JPII speaks of abortion he is not describing just the physical act of surgically or chemically removing the foetus.
If he was speaking of an adult he would have used the word “murder” not “killing”.

I believe you have misunderstood this quote.
The object is not intrinsically evil…it is the whole act that is so. The object is said to be gravely disordered. And the disorder is such that it cannot anchor a good intention.

 

[Ender]

Lets understand the object “abortion”? Can you define it first?

Abortion: the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy

If it is defined in the same way as “murder” (directly killing the innocent") then of course, by the very definition used this killing is always immoral.

If murder is always immoral - intrinsically evil - then what is the difficulty in accepting that other acts may be so as well?

We have to be sure that the killing we see someone doing actually is a valid example of the principle we apply.

Sure, but applying a principle correctly is very different than defining it. That I may or may not apply it accurately doesn’t mean its definition is either inaccurate or irrelevant.

Simply saying all murders or all abortions are intrinsically evil is fine, but such valid definitions don’t prove anything.

If the definitions are valid they prove the existence of intrinsically evil objects, which I thought was something you questioned.

So in your quote above where JPII speaks of abortion he is not describing just the physical act of surgically or chemically removing the foetus.

Perhaps you went to the wrong citation. In the one I provided JPII wasn’t speaking about abortion, he was addressing the very concept of intrinsically evil acts and “objects of the human act”.

 

[Rau]

The bystander’s act is directed at saving five lives; it is assuredly not directed at killing anyone despite having that as a consequence.

When you write “directed”, you refer to Intention, believing this good intention purifies the moral object. When I right “ordered”, I expose the object.

His intention is only to save and the only act that saves is one that is (also) inherently, by its very nature, ordered to the death of an innocent. The structure of the ‘problem’ - the structure of the tracks - elevates (it would seem) his death to object.

 

[BlackFriar]

Abortion: the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy

I do not believe terminating a pregnancy is always wrong, just as choosing to terminate a life in lethal self defence is not always wrong.

However choosing to do so without proportionate goods being sought clearly is.

If the definitions are valid they prove the existence of intrinsically evil objects, which I thought was something you questioned.

Killing is not an intrinsically evil object.
And murder is intrinsically evil but not an object…it is a moral (ie a truly human) act.
Abortion is an act not an object in Church speak.

 

[o_mlly]

Whether or not someone is hurt is a consequence of the act (part of the circumstances)

No, the moral object is more than the physical act alone. An adequate description of the act includes the proximate ends reasonably known to the actor. All proximate ends known are willed. A specific end in view is unique to the subject and is his intended end. Other actors may have different intentions but the moral object is always the same for the same act.

By the object of a given moral act, then, one cannot mean a process or an event of the merely physical order. . . . Rather, that object is the proximate end of a deliberate decision which determines the act of willing on the part of the acting person. . . . The reason why a good intention is not itself sufficient, but a correct choice of action is also needed, is that the human act depends on its object, whether that object is capable or not of being ordered to God, to the One who ‘alone is good,’ and thus brings about the perfection of the person." (VS, 78)

 

[Rau]

Moral object of an act of (direct) abortion: deprivation of life of an innocent (unborn). [Same species as murder.]

 

[BlackFriar]

Exactly so, “abortion” defines a complete moral act, same species as murder, but not of killing.

The object of “abortion” is a killing of the unborn.
Ectopic procedures are also a killing of the unborn.
They are not called the moral act of abortion.

So the intrinsic evil we speak of is predicated of a complete moral act…not its object.

So IE arguments re the trolley are somewhat circular if we are trying to understand if choosing the object in question is actually immoral or not.

 

[Elf01]

All proximate ends known are willed

How would that apply to the operation to save a mother that kills the baby? How is the analysis different there than the trolley problem?

 

[Rau]

How would that apply to the operation to save a mother that kills the baby? How is the analysis different there than the trolley problem?

The death of baby is not the proximate end of the operation because a licit operation cannot be ordered to that (proximate) end. It must be ordered elsewhere.

 

[Ender]

When you write “directed”, you refer to Intention, believing this good intention purifies the moral object. When I write “ordered”, I expose the object.

C’mon, I have several times agreed with, acknowledged, and cited documents that all plainly state that a good intention cannot justify an action with an intrinsically evil object. Let’s put this one to bed. That’s what it means that some acts are intrinsically evil.

The reason why a good intention is not itself sufficient, but a correct choice of actions is also needed, is that the human act depends on its object, whether that object is capable or not of being ordered to God (Veritatis Splendor)

His intention is only to >save< and the only act that >saves< is one that is (also) inherently, by its very nature, ordered to the death of an innocent.

The bomber’s intention is only to >destroy the factory<, and the only act that >destroys the factory< is the one that is (also) inherently, by its very nature, ordered to the death of an innocent.

The mother’s intention is only to >restore her health<, and the only act that >restores her health< is the one that is (also) inherently, by its very nature, ordered to the death of an innocent.

In all three cases the same act that brings life to some brings death to others. The one thing we know, however, is that at least two of those acts are morally justifiable. I’ve seen nothing to differentiate the bystander’s act from the mother’s and the bomber’s.

The structure of the ‘problem’ - the structure of the tracks - elevates his death to object.

Describe the object of this act. JPII defines the object this way:

“that object is the proximate end of a deliberate decision.”

So, what is the proximate end of the act of throwing the switch? As I see it it is to divert the trolley away from the five. There is no conceivable way to define the object - an end - as directing the trolley at the one. That is surely a consequence of the act, but it is no kind of end, let alone the proximate one. The object is not intrinsically evil because the proximate end that defines it is moral.

 

[BlackFriar]

Perhaps you went to the wrong citation. In the one I provided JPII wasn’t speaking about abortion, he was addressing the very concept of intrinsically evil acts and “objects of the human act”.

Yes I speak to the one you provided. What I fairly clearly meant is that “abortion” is a good example of the “IE acts” he speaks of. He does not say that objects are IE, it is the act as a whole (if indeed the killing is one of murder or abortion) that is IE. Obviously just because the killed object is a foetus that physical tragedy alone does not define the whole moral act as abortion just as objectively choosing to kill an adult does not constitute murder.

Such objective killings are necessary before we can start predicating such judgements as abortion or murder…but the choosing of these objects alone is not sufficient to recognise abortion or murder as the actual moral acts present.

 

[BlackFriar]

No, the moral object is more than the physical act alone.

Agreed.

An adequate description of the act includes the proximate ends reasonably known to the actor.

I think this is tangential or at least ambiguous as it assumes the trolley death is directly willed to get to the remote good end. This is not inherent to explaining your original point that moral acts are not physical acts.

I think you have misunderstood what is meant by “proximate” or are trading on an ambiguity.

All proximate ends known are willed.

Agreed, but you are assuming all such ends are directly willed. Aquinas disagrees. A composite but single moral act involving the willing of different goods and evils by definition has different freedoms involved in each choice. You perhaps assume that two choices cannot be proximate concurrently where one is direct and one indirect.

If the choices were both direct then we would not have a single moral act but two moral acts with one subordinated to the other as a means to an end.

Yet this is the very argument we are trying to decide here.

Is the trolley scenario one composite moral act (PODE) or two different moral acts subordinating an evil means to a good end. The latter is of course morally evil.

So you are using the word “proximate” to imply the latter.
I do not believe that is what the word means when you use it to explain that a moral object is not physical.

The usual criterion for deciding if we are dealing with two moral acts or only one seems to be the “means” criterion of the PODE. That is a modern (secular philosophy?) invention, Aquinas never used it, the Magisterium has never endorsed it either as far as I know. Nor does it seem to work in some cases.

 

[Ender]

I do not believe terminating a pregnancy is always wrong, just as choosing to terminate a life in lethal self defence is not always wrong.

The definition of abortion was not merely “terminating a pregnancy”; it was “deliberately terminating a pregnancy.” And a case of lethal self defense is immoral if one deliberately and intentionally kills someone. We may act in a way that will inevitably lead to death but we may not will it.

 

[Ender]

No, the moral object is more than the physical act alone.

I was speaking of the consequences, not the moral object, and in any event I myself cited that very passage from VS.

An adequate description of the act includes the proximate ends reasonably known to the actor. All proximate ends known are willed. A specific end in view is unique to the subject and is his intended end. Other actors may have different intentions but the moral object is always the same for the same act.

One object has one proximate end, and yes, it is willed. I don’t understand what you’re trying to say with the rest of this comment.

 

[BlackFriar]

This is still circular.
Is this concrete pulling of the switch or this use of the scalpal that results in the death of an adult or a baby (objective murder, objective abortion) such a direct choosing of such objects?

Simply seeing the physical termination of a man or a foetus does not always answer that question.

Nor does the definition of the objects of intrinsically evil acts (eg terminating a foetus) always seem to help much.

 

[BlackFriar]

We may act in a way that will inevitably lead to death but we may not will it.

I call that a form of choosing and willing, though not as direct as doing so when the victim is innocent or could be easily restrained by non lethal means.

 

[Ender]

So the intrinsic evil we speak of is predicated of a complete moral act…not its object.

No. According to JPII this is not accurate. An intrinsically evil act refers specifically to the object.

“Reason attests that there are objects of the human act which are by their nature “incapable of being ordered” to God, because they radically contradict the good of the person made in his image. These are the acts which, in the Church’s moral tradition, have been termed “intrinsically evil”…on account of their very object” (VS #80)

What makes acts intrinsically evil is that is the nature of their objects.