Is it evil to cause evil? That seems transferable. But is it a reliable inference?
This crops up in debates over Calvinism. Mind you, there are various respects in which the God of freewill theism causes evil.
Now, there are certainly situations in which causing evil is evil. Indeed, that may well be typical. I'm just discussing whether, as a matter of principle, it is evil to cause evil.
Suppose torrential rain causes a damed river to become swollen. That accelerates the downstream current. There's a much greater volume of water, moving much faster, resulting in tremendous kinetic energy pounding the dam. The dam operator has a choice: he can release some water to relieve the strain on the dam. If he does so, that will flood riverside towns downstream, causing major damage. That's an evil. That causes an evil state of affairs.
Or he can let the water build up behind the dam. The cumulative force will make the dam lose structure integrity and collapse, causing an avalanche or wall of fast-moving water to wipe the downstream towns off the map. That's a greater evil.
Is it evil for him to cause the lesser evil, by releasing some water to diminish pressure on the dam?
Someone might object that God isn't subject to the same constraints as the dam operator. But even if that's the case, the point of the example is to illustrate a point of principle: it is not necessarily evil to cause evil.
Moreover, even an omnipotent God is under a self-imposed constraint if he uses a natural process to produce a desired result.
The question is what makes something evil. If some acts are intrinsically evil and other acts are intrinsically good, regardless of their context or motive, then we have the conundrum. But if context and motive are key to determining whether something is evil or not, then what is evil isn't the act itself, but the context and/or the motive.
ReplyDeleteWe're also assuming, correctly I think, that an act has multiple causes. In this case, God is the first cause, and man is some subsequent cause. If by nature God is good and fallen man is evil, then no act will be caused as long as God will be culpable for man's evil as the first cause; that is, unless we can understand God's context and motive to be separate from man's context and motive. Indeed, this very separation is part of being fallen. If God is to save evil men from their sin, he must act among them. He will be the good first cause for evil subsequent causes. It all sounds perfectly Machiavellian, but I don't think it is because it isn't the act but the context and/or motive that's evil. The cause isn't evil, but the purpose behind the cause.
"Is it evil to cause evil?"
ReplyDeleteYes.
"But is it a reliable inference?"
Yes
"If he does so, that will flood riverside towns downstream, causing major damage. That's an evil. That causes an evil state of affairs."
Agreed
"Or he can let the water build up behind the dam. The cumulative force will make the dam lose structure integrity and collapse, causing an avalanche or wall of fast-moving water to wipe the downstream towns off the map. That's a greater evil."
Disagreed. Water building up behind a dam loosing structural integrity and collapsing is neither good nor evil. And there is no sense in which the man can be said to have caused the event. So, not evil.
"Is it evil for him to cause the lesser evil, by releasing some water to diminish pressure on the dam?"
Yes
Remember your Hippocratic Oath: First, do no harm. (I know that is not actually in the Hippocratic Oath, but it should be.)
"Disagreed. Water building up behind a dam loosing structural integrity and collapsing is neither good nor evil. And there is no sense in which the man can be said to have caused the event. So, not evil."
DeleteWhich completely misses the point. He's in a position to limit the scale of the damage.
I didn't suggest he caused the water buildup. That's a red herring.
There is, however, a sense in which he causes a natural disaster if he simply lets nature take its course when he's in a position to lessen the damage.
Suppose I see a toddler wander into a busy intersection. I didn't cause him to do so. Should I let him get run over, or intervene?
"Remember your Hippocratic Oath: First, do no harm."
Oh, good doctors are prepared to do harm to save a patient. They may amputate a gangrenous limb.
Likewise, cancer therapy can be harmful, but doing nothing is worse.
Your position is morally preposterous. On the one hand the dam operator can do nothing, thereby ensuring massive loss of life because the dam will collapse. Or he can take preemptive action that will mitigate the damage. It will still be harmful, but not catastrophic.
For you to say inaction in that situation is morally superior shows how hopelessly confused you are.
"Water building up behind a dam loosing structural integrity and collapsing is neither good nor evil."
DeleteThat's so absurd. We're taking about a humanitarian disaster.
"I didn't suggest he caused the water buildup. That's a red herring."
ReplyDeleteIt is the thesis of your blog post. Is it evil to cause evil?
"There is, however, a sense in which he causes a natural disaster if he simply lets nature take its course when he's in a position to lessen the damage."
No, unless we have different concepts of cause and effect.
"Suppose I see a toddler wander into a busy intersection. I didn't cause him to do so. Should I let him get run over, or intervene?"
Intervene, of course. Unless maybe "intervening" involves causing a 12 car pile up in some contrived scenario.
"Oh, good doctors are prepared to do harm to save a patient. They may amputate a gangrenous limb."
I would not have considered that as harming the patient. Like you said, it is saving the patient.
"Your position is morally preposterous. On the one hand the dam operator can do nothing, thereby ensuring massive loss of life because the dam will collapse. Or he can take preemptive action that will mitigate the damage. It will still be harmful, but not catastrophic."
Contrived moral dilemmas are often preposterous. In your scenario, will the dam operator kill a smallerer number of different people by opening the dam that would have otherwise survive if he did nothing? I was assuming that. Moral dilemmas usually assume that.
Jeff D
Delete"It is the thesis of your blog post. Is it evil to cause evil?"
Ok, sorry to inform you, but you really have to work on basic reading comprehension. Steve's very post answers the question he asks in the title by explicitly stating near the end of his argument and analysis: "it is not necessarily evil to cause evil."
"No, unless we have different concepts of cause and effect."
So your counter-argument is simply to say no and that's it? Nice.
"Intervene, of course."
That's good that you're at least fair enough to concede Steve's point.
"I would not have considered that as harming the patient."
Which, of course, is the very point.
"Like you said, it is saving the patient."
Again, glad you're fair enough to concede the point.
"Contrived moral dilemmas are often preposterous."
Sure, some moral dilemmas can be preposterous. But other moral dilemmas can be quite helpful in elucidating thorny issues.
"In your scenario, will the dam operator kill a smallerer number of different people by opening the dam that would have otherwise survive if he did nothing? I was assuming that. Moral dilemmas usually assume that."
1. I'll start on a positive note: "smallerer" is a worthy Bushism!
2. However, you don't say why you think "moral dilemmas usually assume that."
3. More to the point, how does your assumption save your point? Again, you don't offer a counterpoint to Steve's point. You just ask a question and then state that was your operating assumption. That does nothing to undermine Steve's argument.
4. By the way, you've invoked "first, do no harm" for this "scenario." That's of course known as the principle of non-maleficence in medical ethics.
a. But medical ethics likewise has the principle of beneficence - i.e. "do good." Do what's in the best interests of others. Take positive actions to benefit others.
As such, why not likewise invoke the principle of beneficence to argue it would not necessarily be evil to cause the lesser evil to save lives in this scenario as opposed to taking no action and causing the greater evil of having entire towns wiped out?
b. In addition, the principle of non-maleficence and the principle of beneficence can help vouchsafe one another by setting limits on one another. Minimize harm, but also maximize good.
"It is the thesis of your blog post. Is it evil to cause evil?"
DeleteThe post didn't suggest the dam operator caused the weather. Rather, the question at issue was how to respond to that crisis. What to do in an emergency situation.
"No, unless we have different concepts of cause and effect."
Here's how philosopher David Lewis puts it:
“We think of a cause as something that makes a difference, and the difference it makes must be a difference from what would have happened without it. Had it been absent, its effects — some of them, at least, and usually all — would have been absent as well.”
Hence:
e causally depends on c if and only if, if c were to occur e would occur; and if c were not to occur e would not occur.
"I would not have considered that as harming the patient. Like you said, it is saving the patient."
False dichotomy. You have a simplistic way of framing issues.
"Contrived moral dilemmas are often preposterous."
One function of hypothetical scenarios is to isolate the relevant factors. Because they are artificial, they can eliminate irrelevant variables and focus on the key issues.
That said, dam failure is not just a "contrived" scenario. Take the the Banqiao Reservoir Dam, which resulted in massive loss of life.
"In your scenario, will the dam operator kill a smallerer number of different people by opening the dam that would have otherwise survive if he did nothing?"
Not necessarily kill anyone. Just damage property.
But even if it did, so what? If my brakes fail when I'm driving downhill, I may be unable to avoid hitting some pedestrians. So it's then a choice between hitting more or hitting fewer. That's something I still have some control over. I can't stop, but I can steer.
Although I'm not a dam engineer, I've read one source of dam failure is overtopping caused by floods that exceed the capacity of the dam. Likewise, the Johnstown Flood is a classic real-life example. So this isn't a "contrived" hypothetical.
DeleteGetting back to basics and foregoing unnecessary allegories and hypotheticals, I will state plainly that it is indeed evil to cause evil and not evil to not cause evil. You can try to cloud the issue, but I think you may be the only one who would describe a surgeon amputating a gangrenous limb as causing evil.
ReplyDeleteJeff D
Delete"Getting back to basics and foregoing unnecessary allegories and hypotheticals, I will state plainly that it is indeed evil to cause evil and not evil to not cause evil. You can try to cloud the issue, but I think you may be the only one who would describe a surgeon amputating a gangrenous limb as causing evil."
You're completely mischaracterizing what Steve actually said. He didn't say it would be evil for a surgeon to amputate a gangrenous limb! Rather, he said a good doctor is "prepared to do harm to save a patient." This in turn was in response to your contention to "do no harm" which you apparently equivocate with "evil" when you affirmed "Yes" it would be "evil for him to cause the lesser evil, by releasing some water to diminish pressure on the dam".
You're arguing in bad faith. It's hardly becoming of a professing Christian to behave this way.
However, since you bring it up, it could arguably be an "evil" inasmuch as it could be arguably morally wrong if I as a surgeon were to leave your gangrenous limb alone which in turn would in our scenario kill you even though I could have saved you.
DeleteOr take another example. Take a tension pneumothorax. A tension pneumothorax is a medical emergency. Life-threatening. That's because a tension pneumothorax is gas and pressure buildup in the sac around your lungs which shouldn't be there. Excessive gas and pressure buildup in the sac around your lungs leading to deficient oxygen supply and respiratory failure.
The immediate solution is inserting a chest tube to perform a drain to relieve the gas and pressure buildup. To save your life.
Say I as a doctor have all that's needed to save you. Say you're collapsing and dying right in front of me in the emergency department. Say I'm the only one who can do the chest drain. But say I don't. Am I not arguably negligent? If so, is this not arguably morally wrong?
Not to mention inserting a chest tube would puncture your thorax. That'd be harmful, but it's harming you to save you.
DeleteJeff D
Delete"Getting back to basics and foregoing unnecessary allegories and hypotheticals, I will state plainly that it is indeed evil to cause evil and not evil to not cause evil."
So you've made a statement which you can't begin to back up. And you have no counterargument for the reasons I've given to the contrary.
"You can try to cloud the issue…"
I define key terms, you don't. I present reasoned arguments, you make "plain statements."
"but I think you may be the only one who would describe a surgeon amputating a gangrenous limb as causing evil."
i) As RWH explains (see below), you've done a bait-n-switch. I was merely responding to you on your own terms.
Yes, lopping off an arm or leg is harmful. But it is less harmful than dying of infection.
We could also say losing an arm or leg is an evil (i.e. natural evil), but that doesn't mean it was evil for the physician to do it. To the contrary, it would be evil for the physician to fail to do so.
People like you don't know how to act in a crisis. You just shoot from the hip.
What of this scenario? According to a Wikipedia article:
ReplyDeleteIn his 1974 book The Ultra Secret, Group Captain F. W. Winterbotham asserted that the British government had advance warning of the attack from Ultra: intercepted German radio messages encrypted with the Enigma cipher machine and decoded by British cryptoanalysts at Bletchley Park. He further claimed that Winston Churchill ordered that no defensive measures should be taken to protect Coventry, lest the Germans suspect that their cipher had been broken.[19] Winterbotham was a key figure for Ultra; he supervised the "Special Liaison Officers" who delivered Ultra material to field commanders.[13]