It’s not an equation to be worked out. It simply boils down to respecting the wishes of a currently living and conscious being. Otherwise anyone’s life could be forfeit based purely on some arbitrary valuation of what that life is worth. Why don’t we just harvest your organs and give them to people we deem more useful, ya know?
If I had come about through the unwilling merger of two people, and my death could restore those people, it’s probably ethical to kill me to make it happen.
I don’t think it’s necessarily reasonable to call the two component people dead either. Death is a not a particularly well defined term, but we don’t tend to apply it to people who might get better.
Why don’t we just harvest your organs and give them to people we deem more useful, ya know?
The knowledge that you live in a society where you could be legally killed at any point for the greater good, and the resultant fear and uncertainty probably would cause more harm overall than doing so could actually alleviate.
If you consent to it, it’s ethical. It is not otherwise.
The knowledge that you live in a society where you could be legally killed at any point for the greater good, and the resultant fear and uncertainty probably would cause more harm overall than doing so could actually alleviate.
Is that not exactly what happened to Tuvix? Complete with him begging in helpless fear?
One for one, sure. One for two? I can see the argument.
So what if you could save five lives by harvesting the organs on one little old person?
How many people could we save if we harvested you for spare parts? You can’t, or at very least shouldn’t, make moral decisions on arithmetic alone.
It’s not an equation to be worked out. It simply boils down to respecting the wishes of a currently living and conscious being. Otherwise anyone’s life could be forfeit based purely on some arbitrary valuation of what that life is worth. Why don’t we just harvest your organs and give them to people we deem more useful, ya know?
If I had come about through the unwilling merger of two people, and my death could restore those people, it’s probably ethical to kill me to make it happen.
I don’t think it’s necessarily reasonable to call the two component people dead either. Death is a not a particularly well defined term, but we don’t tend to apply it to people who might get better.
The knowledge that you live in a society where you could be legally killed at any point for the greater good, and the resultant fear and uncertainty probably would cause more harm overall than doing so could actually alleviate.
If you consent to it, it’s ethical. It is not otherwise.
Is that not exactly what happened to Tuvix? Complete with him begging in helpless fear?
What you are saying is it is ethical to kill a being that has specifically said it doesn’t want to die, in order save two others.
Same reason it’s ethical to kill billionaires and eat the rich.