# Would you sacrafice yourself? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 7, 2005, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393 "2005-03-07T17:42:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2005, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/21 "2005-03-07T23:42:27Z")
I would absolutely choose to die under those circumstances. No question about it. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/22 "2005-03-08T02:19:58Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Maybe a better question is how many people are you willing to kill to stay alive? Say you were defending a village from being overrun by the enemy (pick whatever enemy you like - Viet Kong, terrorists, Liberals, whatever)? Would there be a limit to the amount of death you would be willing to wield to defend yourself? No. None. Sure, looking at it objectively, I might say I wouldn’t make the choice to kill a whole village to save myself, but I’ve been in situations where the adrenalin flows once or twice and I don’t know what I would do in situations where an enemy was proactively attacking me, or even causing others to attack me, such as by pushing unarmed people in front of them to shield themselves from attack. On the other hand, if I had to proactively kill unarmed people to, for instance, maintain quiet in order to escape, I might not be able to do it. ---
**Author:** ![Zulema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/db5fbb/32.png) [@Zulema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zulema)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/23 "2005-03-08T03:35:47Z")
> [@nocturnal\_tick](#): > > I’d die for the kid, even if I had kids of my own. But then I can think of much less I’d die for. Just Curious, what are the lesser things you would die for? ---
**Author:** ![Ooner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/c67d28/32.png) [@Ooner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ooner)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/24 "2005-03-08T03:52:35Z")
I’d save my life over a random child’s, I’d save mine over a friend’s or a family member or the prime minister or a random guy on the street or the banker or the candlestick maker or a group of teenagers or a bowling team or the entire staff of an office supply store or a small village in the amazon jungle. It doesn’t mean I don’t love them all. Especially those poor dead bowlers. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/25 "2005-03-08T03:59:13Z")
Since this is just speculation anyway, I think that some of you who think that you _wouldn’t_ save the child’s life might do it on impulse anyway. As for myself, I have no idea what I would do. ---
**Author:** ![MaceMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4bbf92/32.png) [@MaceMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaceMan)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/26 "2005-03-08T05:50:37Z")
We were all children once. Why should the fact that this is a child make any difference in how I respond to the situation? ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/27 "2005-03-08T08:30:20Z")
Yeah, I’d let the gunman kill me. But I’d pretty much always vote to let someone else live at the cost of my own life, if it came down to that. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/28 "2005-03-08T08:36:00Z")
Is there any guarantee that the gunman won’t just shoot me _then_ shoot the child anyway? Is the child cute? I mean like the kids in Mary Poppins? ---
**Author:** ![nocturnal\_tick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3d9bf3/32.png) [@nocturnal\_tick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nocturnal_tick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/29 "2005-03-08T12:10:51Z")
This thread is starting to go the way of ( **Kel** ’s) thread about a bus on a train line or something. I’ll find it later. Is it really that hard to just put reality to the side for a minute and pretend that this little scenario could work, that the bad guy would hold up his end of the deal, that you had no way to attack him, that giant squids (although very cool) did not simply attack the bad guy? > [@Contrapuntal](#): > > There seems to be an assumption implicit in the OP that I reject; namely that I would bear some responsibility for the death of the child. I wouldn’t say implicit but everyone has an opinion. I believe you would bear some responsibility for the child’s death. You don’t. > [@SP2263](#): > > Just Curious, what are the lesser things you would die for? I’d die to stop the kid being hurt badly and tortured for one. But then as you may tell I have strange views of my own life and well being compared to that of others. ---
**Author:** ![nocturnal\_tick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3d9bf3/32.png) [@nocturnal\_tick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nocturnal_tick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/30 "2005-03-08T12:16:43Z")
Finding this took less time than I thought. > **[Would you shoot child and kill your child in this situation?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=289696)** > > You are driving out in middle of the country. There is nobody else around. Your back left tire blows and you lose control of the car and it hits a tree. There is a lot of damage to the car. Your seven year-old child is trapped by the dashboard... It starts out with a “kill your child or kill yourself” scenario. Obscurity ensues. ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/31 "2005-03-08T15:16:38Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Sry…I misread your post. Your button doesn’t even make any sense. It’s a variant on the Twilight Zone “push the button, kill a random person, get a million dollars but someone you don’t know gets the button next.” Instead, you could kill a specific person in the world at the cost of your own life. Perhaps you think a certain political or religious leader is so detrimental to the world, and you would do all of humanity a service. Maybe you think you’d be okay with dying as long as you took Osama bin Laden with you. Maybe you want guaranteed revenge on someone. Or maybe you want to form a doomsday suicide cult and have your followers push the button one at a time and kill three dozen world leaders and then you can revel in your postapocalyptic plans. I’unno. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/32 "2005-03-08T21:48:47Z")
[QUOTE=nocturnal\_tick] > [@](#): > > I wouldn’t say implicit but everyone has an opinion. I believe you would bear some responsibility for the child’s death. You don’t. My belief is based on the premise that each moral agent is responsible for his own behavior. This is a hypothetical situation and must necessarily yield hypothetical results, since it would almost never come up in real life. Why should anyone be held hostage to the caprices of another? I assume (correct me if I am wrong) that if you would hold me partly responsible for the child’s death, then you must assign some positive moral value to my choice to die, and a negative one to my choice to live. It is not immediately clear to me why my death is less of a bad thing than the death of the child, given the restrictions of the OP. Let me ask you another one. Suppose I were to tell you to shoot your dog, a beloved family pet, or I would break the little toe of some random child. How would you choose? ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2005, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/33 "2005-03-08T22:50:24Z")
> [@JThunder](#): > > I would absolutely choose to die under those circumstances. No question about it. Yeah, me too. It boils down to either him killing me, or guilt killing me, and a gun would be quicker and less painful. I’d like to think I’d save both the kid and myself, somehow, instead but if that didn’t work out… ---
**Author:** ![Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angel_of_the_lord/32/2949_2.png) [@Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angel_of_the_Lord)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2005, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/34 "2005-03-09T02:23:11Z")
I’d choose to die. I’m absolutely terrified of death, but I’m not exactly known for making the best decisions. I’m impulsive; I go with my gut and my deepest held morals when it comes down to the wire, for better or worse. So I’d choose to die. ---
**Author:** ![the4thmooncat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ce7236/32.png) [@the4thmooncat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the4thmooncat)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2005, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/35 "2005-03-09T03:44:48Z")
> [@Ranchoth](#): > > Yeah, I’d let the gunman kill me. But I’d pretty much always vote to let someone else live at the cost of my own life, if it came down to that. I mostly agree, except I’d aim more towards a “best of both worlds” scenario - tell him to kill me, wait until he’s no longer aiming at the child’s head, and tackle him, relying on my freakish luck. Yes, I’m serious. And if I died, at least I’d have done something. ---
**Author:** ![nocturnal\_tick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3d9bf3/32.png) [@nocturnal\_tick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nocturnal_tick)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2005, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/36 "2005-03-09T08:00:09Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > My belief is based on the premise that each moral agent is responsible for his own behavior. This is a hypothetical situation and must necessarily yield hypothetical results, since it would almost never come up in real life. Why should anyone be held hostage to the caprices of another? > > I assume (correct me if I am wrong) that if you would hold me partly responsible for the child’s death, then you must assign some positive moral value to my choice to die, and a negative one to my choice to live. It is not immediately clear to me why my death is less of a bad thing than the death of the child, given the restrictions of the OP. > > Let me ask you another one. Suppose I were to tell you to shoot your dog, a beloved family pet, or I would break the little toe of some random child. How would you choose? My last post wasn’t very clear. ‘You’ was meant to imply ‘if I were you’. Responsibility, in this scenario, is subjective. You believe the responsibility lies entirely on the gunman. I believe, in that position, I hold some responsibility since I will be the one who has to decide who lives and who dies. To each, his own. In this case my death is less of a bad thing than the child’s simply because the child does not have any choice. You have your own opinion. If I had to choose between shooting my dog and one broken toe, I’d let you break the damn toe. I mean, come on, I could break a toe walking down the street today. The injury is insignificant. But then if you keep breaking toes and keep hurting the kid then I would probably change my mind. ---
**Author:** ![inkleberry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f17d59/32.png) [@inkleberry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/inkleberry)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2005, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/37 "2005-03-09T08:42:11Z")
> [@Dob](#): > > If you were married, had two kids, and someone put a gun to a strange childs head and said, “I kill him, or you”. Would you sacrafice yourself? > > I would think most people wouldnt, I mean you have a familiy of your own. I wouldnt want my kids growing up without a father. But then the question becomes, How many people would it take for you to sacrafice yourself? 5, 10? 100? > Is there any number that would impell you to do so? I’d kick their fucking ass. I didn’t take Krav Maga for nothin’. But in general, I’d sacrifice myself for just one person- if it were the right one like my husband or baby. But nothing would compel me to do so for say, 1000 nazis. It’s all about the context. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2005, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393/38 "2005-03-09T11:02:56Z")
> [@inkleberry](#): > > But nothing would compel me to do so for say, 1000 nazis. > > It’s all about the context. I’d like to ditto that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-sacrafice-yourself/293393.md?page=1)