The morality of the issue is clear and intuitive to me: uncertainty is hugely preferable to death.
However, I also see a blind spot in my reasoning: I don’t understand the implications of making that kind of decision for someone else, including someone (a child) who is incapable of making decisions for themselves yet. I’m not sure if this is significantly different than all the other decisions parents make for their children. Maybe I’ll understand it better when I actually have kids—but right now I know I don’t understand the implications of making big decisions for a non-consenting person.
I wonder if it’s really so different from all the other decisions that parents take and that often end up saving kids lives (and thus giving them some responsibility for exposing them to an uncertain future).
Would someone face the same moral dilemma with seatbelts? I don’t think so, but what’s the difference?
It is possible that a far future would be a bad place for that child that you saved, but it is also possible for the near future to be a bad place (from poverty all the way to surviving a nuclear holocaust and living through The Road), yet we seem to be fine making that choice to save them.
I’m not sure the difference is quite as big as we might first think. There is more uncertainty, but it goes both way (could be much worse, but could also be much better), and maybe it cancels out.
The morality of the issue is clear and intuitive to me: uncertainty is hugely preferable to death.
However, I also see a blind spot in my reasoning: I don’t understand the implications of making that kind of decision for someone else, including someone (a child) who is incapable of making decisions for themselves yet. I’m not sure if this is significantly different than all the other decisions parents make for their children. Maybe I’ll understand it better when I actually have kids—but right now I know I don’t understand the implications of making big decisions for a non-consenting person.
I wonder if it’s really so different from all the other decisions that parents take and that often end up saving kids lives (and thus giving them some responsibility for exposing them to an uncertain future).
Would someone face the same moral dilemma with seatbelts? I don’t think so, but what’s the difference?
It is possible that a far future would be a bad place for that child that you saved, but it is also possible for the near future to be a bad place (from poverty all the way to surviving a nuclear holocaust and living through The Road), yet we seem to be fine making that choice to save them.
I’m not sure the difference is quite as big as we might first think. There is more uncertainty, but it goes both way (could be much worse, but could also be much better), and maybe it cancels out.
Choosing the status quo is still making a decision.