Sure, but that’s avoiding the issue. The technomages predict they WILL be able to stop him non-lethally–they just can’t do it right now. The question is should the city use the certainly-lethal method if the R begins another attack before the non-lethal countermeasure is ready.
That’s not what I meant at all. If I was the mayor, I would be constrained to wait for the non-lethal counter-measure. No cop-outs, no handing it off to a civilian. But if I was just a random guy and chance dropped the lethal option into my lap, I’d push the button.
Gotcha.
While I think your position is wrong, it’s not self-contradictory.
I’ll stand by my original statement that someone who preys on human beings has forfeited their right to live. I will qualify it that IRL, there are so many problems with the death sentence that I’m very reluctant to apply it.
You said ‘exceptions granted for self-defense’, and that’s mostly what my comment about leading a lynch mob was about. My point is that I’m willing to kill someone in very cold blood rather than watch them continue to prey on my community, in a situation where those are the only two viable options. I don’t see this situation ever arising in the world as we know it. It would require not just a failure of the justice system but a complete lack of a justice system to appeal to, and a lack of ability to exile the person. Perhaps in a post-apocalypse world. Maybe. Heaven forbid.
So I think we disagree on a fundamental level (which I respect, and I see why people chose that), but in practice I suspect we’re going to agree most of the time.
Yes,
Just as it’s ethical for your mom to punish you for antagonizing your brother when you hover your hand near his head but chant “I’m not touching you!”
You know, I really was expecting there to be a lot more votes for looking for a non-murderous solution.
I think I understand what’s going on here.
Now if the *police *were to use your gizmo on Roddenberry, that would be ‘wrong’…due process and all. But if someone at the station were…getting coffee, let’s say…and while they were away from their desk, some unknown person were to push the button (or is it ‘pull the lever’ on this one?); well, that would be an unfortunate ‘accident’. And it would then be up to the Police and the District Attorney to conduct a Full Investigation to find the person or persons who were responsible for this act of vigilantism and bring them to justice.
Unfortunately, with the workload that the Department has at the moment, ad with the lack of witnesses to this particular crime, it’s possible that this one will end up in the ‘Cold Case’ file…
When you’re killing someone in self-defense or in defense of others it’s not murder.
Turn around and go home. Your calves will thank you after a long soak in the bath.
Even when the threat is not deadly? How horrible does a non-deadly threat have to be before lethal force is justified? There are plenty of court cases, very difficult cases, dealing with that very issue.
I would kill him. Aside from possibly overriding pragmatic concerns—as others have noted, it might be considered worth the gamble to try and seize his technology—I have to look at it from the psychological standpoint: how long are the non-lethal torture attacks going to satisfy him? What is he going to escalate to?
And that’s presuming that it’s only normally legal or “ethical” to kill someone to protect someone else from being murdered, which I don’t believe is the case either way.
I don’t find that an ethically meaningful distinction. Let’s say that a dude wearing a purple clown wig has been breaking into houses and raping and torturing the folks that live there. Let’s say I wake up one night to see a dude wearing a purple clown wig climbing through my window. I feel pretty ethically confident in using whatever measures I can to stop him, before the rape starts.
And if I see him climbing through my neighbor’s window, and there are no nonlethal measures available to save my neighbor’s family from such treatment, I think lethal measures are ethically permissible.
The OP as stated already includes a potentially non-lethal option. The authorities can publish the information that they intend to stop the attacks, and have authorized the use of deadly force should another attack occur. They might additionally provide evidence that they have the capability to do so: That depends on how easy it would be, in the expert opinion of Skald’s consultants, for the Rod to circumvent the 'splody interference. Then, the ball is in the Rod’s court: He can choose to stop his attacks and continue to live, or he can choose to commit suicide by cop. It would be regrettable if he chose the latter, but it would be his decision.
:: shrugs ::
I think the bastich should be killed post haste. It’s just that I think it’s cold-blooded murder. A necessary murder, yes, but anybody who thinks it’s not murder is kidding himself.
Um…that seems unwise. Assuming that the Roddenberry is competent in the use of his tech, you’ve just warned him that somebody’s found a way to hack into his system, thus giving him the chance to fix whatever vulnerability the EE technomages discovered.
'Sides, he may well just relocate to Los Angeles.
This is a no brainer. Deadly force is authorized in self defense or defense of another, where there is a risk of serious bodily injury or death. The Agonizer thingy qualifies. Fry the bastard.
Hmm. I thought you’d have more reservations. That is, I agree that Roddenberry needs killing ASAP, but I also think doing as the OP describes is flat-out murder: justified morally, mayhap, but not legally. I have due process reservations, but, me being me, I shrug and say, “It’s wrong, but we’re doing it anyway.” Have you no similar concerns?
If the guy beamed himself into my home, I’d have no reservations about shooting him to defend myself and The Druidess. I see this as analogous to a police sniper taking out a terrorist threatening hostages. Due process doesn’t enter the picture unless and until the bad guy is in police custody, which appears unlikely to happen in this scenario given his modus operandi.
Oh, clearly you have the right to shoot a person who appears in your home with mischief on his mind. It was more the state’s pre-emptive offing of him that I had concerns about, since the EE-devised gizmos necessarily offs him before he does anything threatening.
Then you obviously didn’t realize how stupid and ridiculous this hypothetical is.
Of course it’s ridiculous; I call it absurd in the poll options, I think. As for stupid, no one forced you to read it, just as no one forces you to behave in a courteous fashion.
The hypothetical threads are a game. If you find them an uninteresting game, as I find, say, basketball, don’t play. I suggest you simply put me on ignore if you find the threads irksome.