Would YOU kill the baby?

[Sniffles]

For situations like this I find Aquinas's principle of double effect helpful. It seeks to assess the morality of performing an act in pursuit of a good when full knowledge is present that the act will result in an evil consequence.

There are four conditions that must be met:

1 the action contemplated is in itself ethically good or ethically indifferent
I think the analysis can stop right here. The action is the purposeful taking of innocent human life. It is murder. You can't do it.

But, we'll continue anyway...

2 the evil consequence is not directly intended.
The way the question is framed by YWIR seems that the evil would be directly intended. Under other circumstances the baby may be accidentally suffocated while keeping it quiet without the intent of murder.

3 the good result must not be a direct causal result of the evil result.
In this case the saving of other lives would be a direct result of the murder.

4 the good result must be “proportionate to” the evil result.
In this instance the good would outweigh the bad.

Notice that Aquinas is willing to balance consequences, but only after hard principles have been considered.

Good post.

If I don't have principles and things that I'm not willing to do under any circumstances then what makes me better than the nazis?

You're not, that's the irony. SS Reichsführer Himmler famously stated he did not care if 10,000 Russian women died from exhaustion while digging an anti-tank ditch, so long as it was completed. Why? Because it would save plenty of German lives.

 

[Sniffles]

The OP is another example of what's commonly called a Sophie's Choice.

The mother has to make a choice: keep one of her children alive, which means the other will be killed. Pick one, or both kids will be killed.

 

[Beargryllz]

I don't really think it is moral to kill an animal unless it is for sustenance. So if I did kill the baby, I'd have to make sure we ate it, and every part of its body was used for something practical.

More than a few people survived the horrors of WWII through cannibalism. I will admit that this may be the ideal solution. The problem with survival isn't bounded entirely by whether or not noise is produced, but by how much sustenance one can find while hiding.

 

[Virtual ghost]

"looks at: forum name, title, avatar and MBTI type"


YWIR are you pregnant and thinking about killing that baby ?

 

[figsfiggyfigs]

"looks at: forum name, title, avatar and MBTI type"


YWIR are you pregnant and thinking about killing that baby ?

No, you'd have to get'sum first



re:question:

... if it was my own baby, I don't think I'd be able to do it...I'd get someone else to do it for me.
I know some of you thought the ultimatum was too restricting, but you have to consider "muffling their cries" and "getting it drunk" are still extremely risky decisions to be making, and by doing so, you're still putting a lot of people in danger. Killing it would be the most definite way to ensure you're not heard/found.

There is still the possibility of them skipping your house and not hearing the baby at all, so, you would've killed/had the baby killed by another for no reason.

If it was someone else's baby, I probably wouldn't be with those people in the first place. But if I had to be, I'd kill it.

Also, considering a baby doesn't really process information as deeply/quickly as an adult--thoughts that go through its mind, feelings of betrayal and sadness, etc, would probably make the act itself easier to do.

Is it an ugly baby?

You know what, I'm gonna say it is....

I wonder if that actually effects people's decision making... "meh, it was ugly anyways, and I can make a new one later"

 

[Kalach]

There isn't a DOH! smiley big enough.

KILL THE NAZIS!




The only flaw in this plan is, what with all the WWII movies there are now, it's possible to know ahead of time to NOT get in a cellar with a bunch of Jews, but to organise a resistance. But if I hadn't known that and there I was, listening to the baby squawk...

Pffft, the only way they'd let me get away with killing the baby is if they all knew to be afraid of the men outside, in which case we all would have known before getting in the cellar, so getting into the cellar in the first place was the point where we all gave up the right to kill each other in self-preservation.

All that said, there is only one way to justify killing the child: if saving your own life paid back all of the witnesses far more than you took from them... if you had to stay alive not just to stay alive...



Hmmmm, no one elect me to high office, k? You'll all be buried for the greater good.

 

[Amargith]

I'd probably kill it in my panicked attempt to shut it up.

 

[figsfiggyfigs]

get in a cellar with a bunch of Jews

sounds like a beginning to a racist joke.

Actually, I had thought about that a few times... when I watched Inglourious Basterds, I wondered why the fudge would the family hide under the floorboards, when there is a huge ass forest right next to them. They could've just gone there and waited it out, while the nazi's visited the house.

I know that Nazi patrols did search forests with dogs from time to time, but in THAT scenario, the survival rate would've been much greater I think...

I would've climbed trees if I would have had to.

 

[Kalach]

^ some people don't have the inner SP to guide their armchair moral theory making.

That so many people did get on trains and could be herded into camps says... something.



The anti-Godwin rule: should the Simpsons ever be used to prove a point in a Nazi thread, thread will just keep getting better. So-o-o-o...

Homer, Marge and Maggie walk into a cellar...

 

[Totenkindly]

If we kill it, do we get to eat it too? It's morally reprehensile to kill without using the entire body or at least as much of the body as possible.

Jonathan Swift had something there.

There is no rational answer to this question.

That is because it is a moral question, not a rational one.

sorry, but my will to survive is greater than my love of babies (which isn't all that great in the first place)... if it's down to everyone or the baby, the baby is dying... it'd die if the Nazis discovered it anyways, so the kid is doomed

What if you dressed the baby up like a Nazi? They wouldn't kill one of their own, would they? Maybe they would take it in and raise it as their own -- a changeling Jewish Nazi. That is the stuff that great American cinema is made out of... or at least Tarantino could do something with it.

In fact, as far as that goes, how can you tell a baby is Jewish anyway... unless it's a circumcized male baby. But non-Jew males gets circumcized too. Unless the baby is singing the Hava Nagila or wearing a yarmulke on its head, how on earth could they tell it was a jewish baby? Just take the baby upstairs and let the house owner pretend it is her baby; keep it swaddled, if you think appearances could give it away. let her pretend to console it. Then the baby can cry all it wants and it doesn't matter if it is heard. It's kind of a "Purloined Baby" scenario.... risky, but a chance we'll have to take.

I don't really think it is moral to kill an animal unless it is for sustenance. So if I did kill the baby, I'd have to make sure we ate it, and every part of its body was used for something practical.

Did you even read this thread, or do you always crib someone else's answers on ethics tests?

For situations like this I find Aquinas's principle of double effect helpful. It seeks to assess the morality of performing an act in pursuit of a good when full knowledge is present that the act will result in an evil consequence.

If I was holding a crying baby and surrounded by irritable Nazis, I think the last thing I would think to do in a moment like that would be to be digging out my copy of Summa Theologica. "THOMAS! HELP ME!"

Also, considering a baby doesn't really process information as deeply/quickly as an adult--thoughts that go through its mind, feelings of betrayal and sadness, etc, would probably make the act itself easier to do.

It's one thing to rationalize killing a baby.
It's another thing to do it.

I mercy-killed a kitten once by drowning it.
Never again.

The anti-Godwin rule: should the Simpsons ever be used to prove a point in a Nazi thread, thread will just keep getting better. So-o-o-o... Homer, Marge and Maggie walk into a cellar...

Let me guess: Bart and Milhouse are playing Nazis.

Homer: Well, Marge. I guess that's it. We have to smother Maggie. *holds out his hands*
Marge: What are you talking about? Those aren't Nazis, that's just Bart and Milhouse training Santa's Little Helper how to goosestep!

I'd probably kill it in my panicked attempt to shut it up.

 

[Athenian200]

If it were necessary to kill it in order to save everyone else, I would.

But I wouldn't do it if I had an alternative way of silencing the baby, possibly even if that alternative was suicide. In other words, I would kill it to save everyone else, but not just myself. I would regret it for the rest of my life, even though I knew it was the right thing to do. I would probably blame the Nazis for driving me to it, though. I would claim that their inhuman treatment of us, forced me to do something inhuman in order to ensure the survival of the group.

 

[Eckhart]

I don't think I would be able kill the baby, especially when there is a possiblity that you get away without doing so. But yeah, you don't know how you will react when actually being in such a situation, if the fear is so strong that I would forget my moral doubts.

 

[figsfiggyfigs]

I don't think I would be able kill the baby, especially when there is a possiblity that you get away without doing so. But yeah, you don't know how you will react when actually being in such a situation, if the fear is so strong that I would forget my moral doubts.

lol I just imagined myself panicking, and quietly yelling "KILLIT!!!KILLIT!!!! >8E" really fast.

It's one thing to rationalize killing a baby.
It's another thing to do it.

Naturally... But like Eckhart said, at that given situation, you don't actually know how you will react. I could be saying it wouldn't be difficult for me to do it and actually believe that--it rationally makes sense for me to go through with it; but if this was reality and I was put in that situation, I have no idea if I'd actually go through with it- would my morals actually kick in?


I still honestly think I'd kill the fucker.

 

[Red Herring]

Hmm, there seem to have been two different scenarios decribed here. In the first one, the nazis are only in the neighborhood and might or might not search the house we are hiding in. In the second scenario it is certainty versus certainty, they will hear the baby and definitely kill everybody in the house. In the first case probability enters into play. The second one seems a bit more clear cut.

In the first scenario it is the definite death of a baby (that might either live a long life or die of some infant desease or some other cause a week later) versus the possible death of a group of several adults (who might also die the next day or live on for many years). In the second one it is one life against many. Right now.

The question in the second case then only remains if it is ethical to think in those terms and if we think we could do it. Personally, I usually tend to favor the strategy of sacrificing one life to safe many, but putting it into practice is yet another thing. Extreme situations lead to extreme means and I don't think any of us can say for sure how they would react in such a situation until they experience it first hand. And human instinct often overrules rational consideration. We tend to attribute more worth to our own lifes than to that of a stranger. That is only natural but can disturb the calculation of chances here.

So maybe it's take the risk in the first scenario and kill the baby in the second.

 

[Queen Kat]

I'd pretend it's mine or bring it to an orphanage ("hey, look what I've found, a real living baby! TAKE IT!!!!").

 

[figsfiggyfigs]

So maybe it's take the risk in the first scenario and kill the baby in the second.

but you don't know what scenario might take place. They might skip your house, they might not, and they might even come back to check, you don't know. All you know is that they're next door and they might come in your house next(or just listen in from the front doors).

maybe I didn't clarify enough :/

 

[Red Herring]

You explained it quite well. But somebody else hee mentioned the alternative scenario. That's why I gave two answers for the two versions. Yours is the first one (more complex and therefor more interesting).

 

[garbage]

People tend to default toward inaction in situations like this as a way of absolving themselves of responsibility in the outcome. "If everyone in the house is killed," they think, "at least it's not my fault."

If there's absolutely no way to shut the brat up, and if there's a high chance that it'd continue to cry, and if there's a high chance of them stopping by my house, then I'd kill the thing.

 

[Snuggletron]

People tend to default toward inaction in situations like this as a way of absolving themselves of responsibility in the outcome. "If everyone in the house is killed," they think, "at least it's not my fault."

If there's absolutely no way to shut the brat up, and if there's a high chance that it'd continue to cry, and if there's a high chance of them stopping by my house, then I'd kill the thing.

You fiend!

I agree with beefeater. I used the same principle here...

still, I don't think you people would have the balls to snuff a baby. The mother would probably be present, too. Or at least its relative caretaker. Enjoy your crushing guilt.

 

[Sniffles]

How about we assume it's your child you have to kill.