knowing that u know nothing
can u divorce intention from action? can we at this time n age tell for sure wad’s right n wrong? i was thinking n thinking n i realised that we cannot really say for sure. lets use a simple controversial example, euthanasia.
A is dying of incurable cancer.
A will die in about 7 days.
A is in great pain, despite high doses of painkilling drugs.
A asks his doctor to end it all.
If the doctor agrees, she has two choices about what to do:
choice 1:
The doctor stops giving A the drugs that are keeping him alive, but continues pain killers A dies 3 days later, after having been in pain despite the doctor's best efforts.
choice 2:
The doctor gives A a lethal injection - A becomes unconscious within seconds and dies within an hour.
in both cases some might say that there’s no diff between either choice since in the end, A dies.
in choice 2, doctor acts to bring about patient’s death. does that make the doctor a murderer?
wad about choice 1? the doctor practically knows that the patient is going to die but does not act, nor take part in the actual killing process, so u can say she’s not guilty of murder. but in failing to prevent her patient’s death (which is impossible in this case), but in participating in causing her death nonetheless, is the doctor guilty then?
then u say we should consider the intention of the doctor to ascertain if she’s really right or wrong. so if the doctor does not intend to kill the patient then she is blameless. well is that it then?
if u’re saying yes to this u might as well say that everyone should b excused from raising their voice n getting angry once in awhile since many a time, that feeling of anger was, n is an act of brashness, n was unintended. excusing someone from this act, as we know, is often difficult.
if i intend to get straight As for the A levels, but i don’t work to achieve my grades n fail the exam, i’m not guilty of failing since the intention was opposite of the action.
the confusion doesn’t end here. lets go back to the euthanasia example n look at it from another angle.
suppose that the reason A wants to die is because he wants to stop suffering pain, and that that's the reason the doctor is willing to allow euthanasia in each case. choice 2 reduces the total amount of pain A suffers, and so choice 2 should be preferred in this case.
OR...
Causing death is a great evil if death is a great evil; we assume that either way the doctor is already committing a crime.
A lesser evil should always be preferred to a greater evil.
If choice 1 would be preferred in this case then the continued existence of the patient in a state of great pain must be a greater evil than their death.
So allowing the patient to continue to live in this state is a greater evil than causing their death.
Causing their death swiftly is a lesser evil than allowing them to live in pain.
choice 2 is a lesser evil than choice 1.
the verdict of the matter can end here. but logical as it may sound, it just sounds unfinished if u noe wad i mean.
Well u can say that if doing something morally good has a morally bad side-effect then its ethically ok to do it provided the bad side-effect wasn’t intended, even if u forsaw that the bad effect wd probably happen. this would make choice 1 n 2 r both ethically acceptable, n either way the doctor won’t b guilty.
i thought this was the solution to the case.
then i realized that others can also say “we r responsible for all the anticipated consequences of our actions”. if we foresee the 2 effects of our action we have to take the moral responsibility for both effects, n not absolve ourselves from blame by deciding to intend only the effect that suits us.
n who said in the first place that death n suffering was a bad thing? i realized that this pointer is important coz if death is good, then the doctor won’t b guilty in the first place....but so will murderers. similarly, prolonging sufferingcan b seen as an opportunity for the patient to grow in character, wisdom, n blah blah. its sounds crappy i noe but yeah...
will there ever b an answer? r our moral ethics n principles that we believe to b so sensible actually so flawed that they contradict one another?
will we ever know?
alvin ong dozed and watched the sawdust trampled night @ 11:45 PM
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