Locally: can you give an example of when it’s okay to kill someone who didn’t lose deontological protection, where you want to kill them because of the causal impact of their death?
To me the issue goes the other way. The idea of “losing deontological protection” suggests I’m allowed to ignore deontological rules when interacting with someone. But that seems obviously crazy to me. For instance I think there’s a deontological injunction against lying, but just because someone lies doesn’t now mean I’m allowed to kill them. It doesn’t even mean I’m allowed to lie to them. I think lying to them would still be about as wrong as it was before, not a free action I can take whenever I feel like it.
I mean, a very classical example that I’ve seen a few times in media is shooting a civilian who is about to walk into a minefield in which multiple other civilians or military members are located. It seems tragic but obviously the right choice to shoot them if they don’t heed your warning.
IDK, I also think it’s the right choice to pull the lever in the trolley problem, though the choice becomes less obvious the more it involves active killing as opposed to literally pulling a lever.
Locally: can you give an example of when it’s okay to kill someone who didn’t lose deontological protection, where you want to kill them because of the causal impact of their death?
To me the issue goes the other way. The idea of “losing deontological protection” suggests I’m allowed to ignore deontological rules when interacting with someone. But that seems obviously crazy to me. For instance I think there’s a deontological injunction against lying, but just because someone lies doesn’t now mean I’m allowed to kill them. It doesn’t even mean I’m allowed to lie to them. I think lying to them would still be about as wrong as it was before, not a free action I can take whenever I feel like it.
I mean, a very classical example that I’ve seen a few times in media is shooting a civilian who is about to walk into a minefield in which multiple other civilians or military members are located. It seems tragic but obviously the right choice to shoot them if they don’t heed your warning.
IDK, I also think it’s the right choice to pull the lever in the trolley problem, though the choice becomes less obvious the more it involves active killing as opposed to literally pulling a lever.