Morality - what would you do?

[Lakitu]

Here's the situation:


It's war time, and you're hiding in a basement with a group of other people. Enemy soldiers are approaching outside and will be drawn to any sound. If you're found, you'll all be killed immediately.

A baby hiding with you starts to cry loudly and cannot be stopped. Smothering it to death is the only way to silence it, saving the lives of everyone in the room. Assume that the parents of the baby are unknown and not present and there will be no penalty for killing the child.

Could you be the one who smothered it if no one else would?

[Ice.Maiden]

I'd stick my hand over the baby's mouth to stifle the cries, and hope that the soldiers passed by before any permanent damage was done - although angeldraws's idea'd probably work!!! I'm sure there'd be a few similar options, if ever the situation was to arise - and this post's revealed a lot about those who'd have no qualms in killing an innocent child!

[wildwood]

I hope to never find myself in such a situation, but I don't think I could do the babs in - even if it meant 100 or a lot more people would die.

[jake-the-peg]

A number of answers here attempt to circumvent the problem - try to make the baby quiet a different way.

That kind of misses the point of the question.

Actually the question is rather imperfect - becasue in this situation without the adults the baby will surely die anyway and I assume we're meant to make a mathematical choice whether or not to kill one to save many.

So killing the baby is the only really rational choice.

If you modify the question somehow so that the baby would survive and proseper you then get into a game of numbers with those who'd kill the baby.

What if there was only two adults?

What if the adults were all old?

You effectively force people to place a relative value on different human lives which is something we don't like doing.

[Octavius]

But Ice Maiden, that was my original point. Whichever you choose will never be right.

(In theory)
I choose to do the baby in, 1 dead, 100 lives saved.
Wildwood does nothing, 101 are dead, including the baby.

Obviously if I was able to lactate I may have chosen an easier option, even stuck a thumb in its mouth or something, but the Q specifically says to �smother it to death is the only way to silence it�. So angeldraws is effectively clearing her moral conscience by changing the permittable parameters.

[Octavius]

Great minds jake.

[Lakitu]

The runaway tram scenario was also in the site I found this question. The situation there was that you had the choice of leaving the tram to plough into 5 people, or pull a lever to change the track and have the tram run into only one person. Without as much difficulty as I am with this question, I chose to pull the lever.

I'm guessing I didn't have as much difficulty because I'm not actually touching the poor soul who is going to die because of my action, whereas I will be the baby.

I'm still umming and ahhing over this. I was visiting my friend last night who gave birth to a little girl on Sunday. As I was holding her this question came to my mind again and I knew coudn't live with myself if I did.

It's just aswell this isn't real, by the time I'd have finished pondering the soldiers would have found us ayway!

[chakka35]

That is the simplest version of the runaway train dilemma, and the easiest to resolve.

The next version stipulates that the only way to stop the train is to drop a heavy weight in its path from an overhead bridge, and the only heavy weight on the bridge is a fat man. Do you push him over to save the other X lives?

In discussing this and similar problems in The God Delusion Richard Dawkins points out that most people who would have little hesitation about pulling the lever in the first version would jib at pushing the fat man over in the second version , but are not sure why.

[Lakitu]

I guess my theory isn't far off when I said it's about physically touching the doomed person then.

[joggerjayne]

It's not a question of killing the baby, it's a question of saving some lives.

Your starting point is that you are all dead, including the baby.

The only thing that you can control is whether to save the others.

Could you let them all die?

[joggerjayne]

Wake up here ... Any person with an ounce of morality would take the life of the baby kindly, rather than let it fall into the hands of vicious, bloodthirsty, enemy soldiers, who might make the baby suffer an agonizing death.

[Velvetee]

No, I'd not smother it, I'd grab it and stick my nipple in it's mouth. That usually shuts them up. (Not that I'm in the habit of sticking my nipple into the mouths of strange babies)

[Octavius]

All (or most) decisions we make are based on a preconceived conception of what we think is moral and whether we think we will be perceived as moral or immoral through our actions.

If someone in a desperate situation takes desperate measures, chances are that their systemic yet nebulous subconscious decision/reaction, would ultimately be the one that looked better on paper and in the eyes of the world.

Exceptions to this rule are generally the �sod the world� sociopaths as Waldo mentioned previously.

[spudqueen]

It may not be real to you Lakitu, but this really happened during the second world war, and yes, the Mother smothered the baby to save everyone else. It must have been horrendous for her, but she was obviously thinking of the greater good.

[dundurn]

The question was addressed in the final episode of M*A*S*H on TV, when a refugee mother smothers her baby and Hawkeye has a nervous breakdown as a result - (he having been the person who said SHH!)

[cavan]

I doubt if all of your group would be atheists so there would be a penalty to pay. If you believe in Jesus.

[Octavius]

And if you don�t you are free of moral conscience?
That kinda confirms my recent understanding of atheism.

[chakka35]

Then, Octavius, you misunderstand, as usual.

[mibn2cweus]

The scenario described is one of many that inevitably arise as a consequence of moral bankruptcy that has come to collect on it debt. When we turn a blind eye to brutal regimes and sit on our hands while allowing them to come into power and gain control over a society that recognizes the moral repugnancy of the initiation of force the only logical step to take at that point is to say, �It�s too late! You dug your own grave . . . now lie in it!�

[funkymoped]

other than my own family, i wouldnt have a problem killing.
my first and ONLY priority in that situation would be to protect my own !
sad but true.