Please answer this ethical dilemma about self-defense.
I have designed this ethical problem as an analogy to a certain other situation, which I won't be disclosing here.
The situation takes place in a combat zone - a city that is being invaded by some enemy X. A soldier with a bazooka is walking across a bridge. Under the bridge is a railway, where a train transports innocent civilians to safety on a regular basis from the various hot-zones in the city.
Suddenly, terrorist insurgents ambush the soldier from the nearby barricaded bridge-control tower. In the ensuing firefight, the soldier gets hit by a stray bullet and the force of the impact throws him over the side-rails of the bridge. He falls down on the rails and breaks his leg, rendering it impossible for him to move.
In the distance he sees a locomotive heading his way with a single passenger - the innocent locomotive operator who is heading back to the safe-zone. The distance does not leave enough time to stop the locomotive - the effective dead-zone of using brakes is far gone.
The soldier is still packing his rocket launcher with a high-performance anti-tank HEAT missle, which is fully capable of utterly destroying the locomotive, thus saving the life of the soldier - but unfortunately at the expense of the innocent locomotive operator.
The locomotive is also moving far too fast for the operator to jump off - jumping off would mean certain death.
The soldier therefore contemplates in his limited time:
''I have a right to defend myself, so it is okay for me to destory the train!...No, wait... damn, but is it right for me to ''defend'' myself from someone who is not responsible at all for the perdicament I am in? The locomotive operator is completely innocent, it is the insurgents who caused this problem. Do I have the right to save my life at the expense of someone who is innocent...
...what do I do???''
Launch the missle
Side Score: 2
|
 |
Don't launch the missle
Side Score: 3
|
|
|
|
|
1
point
1
point
How many more will die if the terrorrist lives? General Sherman said "War is Hell". People are to worried about collateral damage. Look WWII, all the carpet bombing. The nukes we dropped on Japan. You can't win a war and save American lives if you are worried about collateral damage. I'm not saying go in and just kill everybody. But sometimes it can't be helped. Example. Terrorrist will hide behind civilains because they knew we would not fire on them, we had orders not to. But if we would have taken them out anyway. They would not hide behind many more because it would not do any good. Every instance has to be taken by itself and look at the circumstances and what actions you have possible to you. Side: Launch the missle
How many more will die if the terrorrist lives? He doesn't have the option of killing the terrorist. He can blow up the train to save himself. General Sherman said "War is Hell". People are to worried about collateral damage. Look WWII, all the carpet bombing. The nukes we dropped on Japan. You can't win a war and save American lives if you are worried about collateral damage. I'm not saying go in and just kill everybody. But sometimes it can't be helped. The only person being saved is the soldier. Example. Terrorrist will hide behind civilains because they knew we would not fire on them, we had orders not to. But if we would have taken them out anyway. They would not hide behind many more because it would not do any good. Every instance has to be taken by itself and look at the circumstances and what actions you have possible to you. That kind of collateral damage at least takes out a bad guy. Side: Don't launch the missle
|
|
