Which is more ethical?

[Anti-thesisofreason]

Hypothetically:
The race of humans are dying. All resources are depleted, but we have figured out a way to harvest humans in a way that some can survive and maybe create a new future.

What is the right thing to do, harvest the humans, or die with everyone and be done with it?

Edit: When I say harvest humans, I mean kill them for resources in this hypothetical situation.

Soylent Green is made from humans!

 

[Humanistheart]

Well it implies, that in this scenario, humans have figured out a way that survival might be possible, but it will require killing or harvesting lots of humans.

It's hard to answer that, as the conditions of 'harvesting' are unnknown in this example. However our species is a plague. Anything done to save us from extinction would probably not be ethical, unless it was something like curing a horrible plague, which would alleviate suffering.

Let me ask you, would you go back in time and kill hitler before WW2?

 

[McBell]

Why? You'd die for your child I assume. So your survival would be second to ethics in that case.

I disagree.
He did not say HIS or even self preservation.
He simply said survival.

It's hard to answer that, as the conditions of 'harvesting' are unnknown in this example.

I agree.

However our species is a plague.

It is hard to answer this as the conditional modifiers have not been specified.

Anything done to save us from extinction would probably not be ethical, unless it was something like curing a horrible plague, which would alleviate suffering.

this seems contradictory to me.

Let me ask you, would you go back in time and kill hitler before WW2?

No.

 

[Tiapan]

OP Sounds like Soylant Green or Morlock scenerio in H G Wells "Time Machine" to me.
Have you read/seen them?
Your scenario seems a bit unrealistic in that humans will kill each other to get to the remaining few resources and would only consume each other if there was literally nothing else. Still many may prefer to die rather than eat another.

Cheers

 

[Just_me_Mike]

Well take for example, the movie Matrix. We became energy for the new AI machine life. Supposing we found a way to grow and harvest humans for energy & food. A perpetual source of both if done right.

As some have said on this thread, they would rather die, and some say survival is priority.

 

[ManTimeForgot]

If the OP doesn't "make sense" up the ante'. Horrible aliens that like a spectator show for 10 years before moving on infect humanity with a debilitating (life is generally miserable without surgery) genetic illness that requires post stem cell division organ harvesting in order to stave off detriment and eventual death long enough that we might perpetuate the species.

Thus in order for people to survive to reproduce: all of humanity must engage in a kill 4 people that one might survive kind of thing. You either end up donating (possibly forcefully) the few "healthy" organs you have or you end up receiving someone else's.

So the question is is it morally permissible to live under these conditions?

Things to consider:

1) Are the "harvested" actually donors? Do they consign themselves to their fates willingly? (or harvest those who die of accidents/suicide)

2) Quality of life versus Quantity of life. Is it morally superior to force people to persist in conditions of misery rather than killing them and using their parts to promote a tolerable quality of life in a few?

3) Are we FLIPPIN SERIOUS? Let humanity go completely extinct if we have to go "cannibalism" as a route? So the consequences of our lives are meaningless? So the consequences of every single human has come before us all comes to naught because we don't have the staunch to deal with big problems? Our ancestors almost certainly had to do some radical stuff to survive ice ages and what not. What makes us so special that we can just "give up?"

3A) It is not morally permissible to force a healthy person to give up 5 organs to save 5 people because forcing them runs counter to self-preservation. Dying runs counter to genetic imperative. And in the grand scheme of thing allowing your genetics to die off without any effort/fight runs counter to the program for the species. This all boils down to: People do not want to die. And if you tried to implement something like this people would fight back. It would be every man for themselves, and that cannot be allowed since the gains from society far outweigh whatever paltry benefit might be gained by introducing a positive sum game for the number of lives (this completely ignores the relative value people have nor addresses their relative harmfulness: is it appropriate to save 5 sociopaths by making a donor out of Stephen Hawking? Almost certainly not).

4) Sometimes harming is necessary to prevent greater harm. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something. Should surgeries that have lasting painful side effects be completely banned because they do lasting harm to the person? Should police be required to use non-injurious techniques and weapons in every situation so as to avoid doing lasting harm? The very basis for our decision making is pleasure/pain avoidance. In point of fact if you strip away a person's pleasure center of their brain, then they are unable to make decisions (they can't decide which option is superior). Additionally, a little bit of selfishness is NOT a bad thing (nor immoral). Sacrifice sleep, food, water, etc to aid the "needy" and you will not live long enough to make any lasting changes.

4A) Injury (long term/"deep metaphysical harm") is a relative thing. Case in point: S&M is not the same thing as spousal abuse. What if humanity bred a segment of its population to be used for harvesting? (They found the greatest reward in being slain/sacrificed and were profoundly miserable if you forced them to live beyond a certain point) One might be tempted to claim that doing that to a person would be wrong, but what if they were born that way? And who are we to claim that any "natural order" is superior to any other? We eat animals and plants in order to sustain ourselves. Life requires life; or what was once living (even in the case of producers; they need organic materials in order to perform photosynthesis; those soil nutrients are basically dead organisms and waste matter).

4B) If we had developed evolutionarily in a situation where we were required to eat a similar looking being in order to survive, would we even bat an eyelash? Humanity would almost certainly have divorced the idea of the two, referring to the other as a lesser species of sorts. And it would not be anyone's fault that the natural order was that way. So where exactly do we find this notion of "lasting metaphysical harm" or injury? It's not found in anything biological nor instinctual. All of our biological imperatives basically scream that this idea is wrong.

MTF

 

[Jojo777]

i recently had a convorsation with some hi speed lo drag US special forces guys that went through some sort of INTENSE survival training, they asked me if i would eat a dead person to survive. i said YEEEEAH right, ill take my chances with death, then my friend looked at me and said and thats proof you don't have a wife and kids, hahaha

but it really got me thinking.... would i eat someone to survive?

i know I'd kill someone if it meant survival... but eat or use there body to further my own life or other peoples lives?

thats a tough question

probably not but it's one of those things in my head thats hard to say untill the situation arises

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Hypothetically:
The race of humans are dying. All resources are depleted, but we have figured out a way to harvest humans in a way that some can survive and maybe create a new future.

What is the right thing to do, harvest the humans, or die with everyone and be done with it?

Edit: When I say harvest humans, I mean kill them for resources in this hypothetical situation.

Just clone the tasty ones.

 

[Valjean]

Well take for example, the movie Matrix. We became energy for the new AI machine life. Supposing we found a way to grow and harvest humans for energy & food. A perpetual source of both if done right.

As some have said on this thread, they would rather die, and some say survival is priority.

You're proposing a sort of perpetual-motion machine, itwillend. A person would have to eat perhaps fifteen thousand calories of flesh to grow one thousand calories of "food" himself. The scheme's unsustainable.

 

[Sleekstar]

I think Sen & Nussbaum have it spot on in her capabilities approach to ethics (although I think it needs to be slightly revised to include some other animals too).

In a nutshell, they outline 10 categories of conditions necessary to allow a human being to flourish (essentially to grant a human being the opportunity to forge a satisfying life).

So for example some of the principles are bodily integrity, freedom from emotional abuse, permission to own modest property, permission to participate in social institutions, permission to engage in meaningful relationships with other humans, animals and plants, permission to recreate (and it goes on - I can't quite remember them all - you can wiki it if interested).

So they've listed a number of things they feel necessary for a person to have the opportunity to live a happy life, regardless of race, culture, era or location.

Moral deliberations then simply become a matter of deciding whether an action facilitates or inhibits any of these conditions. If you inhibit these conditions, you act immorally. If you facilitate them, you act morally.

I don't think it's a perfect model, but I do believe it's the best one I've ever learned about, because it is objective and very practical (unlike other moral theories which are always ambiguous in some ways).

Wow, this sounds exactly like my "natural morality" idea! This is why I joined this forum; I do all of this thinking, and then I come to find out that there's very little new under the sun.

No-Body, if I'm correct in what MSizer is explaining, the basic idea is not that people agree to adopt this moral standard, but that because it flows logically, it strikes us as correct. For the most part, life seems to go out of its way to perpetuate. Staying alive seems like some kind of prime directive. So if we consider this thing called "life" as some sort of sentient force in itself, and impute a "consciousness" to it, then we can say that from "Life's" perspective, that which fosters, encourages and facilitates survival is "good," and that which inhibits or interferes with it is "bad," generally speaking.

Since there's no other perspective other than that of life, I think we can say that life's perspective is the objectively correct one. And if survival is the goal, then to thrive is better. And in the human context -- where our "good and bad" acts exist almost exclusively within social environments -- that which supports our ability to thrive is inherently (or at least logically) good, and vice versa. The specifics of this are where Sen and Nussbaum come in.

And if this understanding is not innate, then it comes from millennia of participant observation. How long do you suppose society would last if it was founded on a value system that expressly extolled the virtues of sloth, mediocrity, dishonesty and homicidality?