Poll: The End Justifies The Means...

[Epitome]

The end justifies teh means so long as something justifies that end. There are countless examples of these but take my fvourite for example

" There are six people taking a hot air balloon ride over the ocean, halfway throught the journey something goes wrong and cannot be fixed. The balloon starts to sink towards the ocean, below a school of man eating sharks can be seen circling waiting for their luch to hit the water. The only way to get the altitude required is to dump some ballast, the one fattest man in the group is the only one whos single body weight will allow them the altitude tehy eed to reach the shore. The 5 others push him overboard and are saved"

Thos i smy favourite example because its simple Now this is a hypothetical so dont poe holes in the story. Just assume that The ballon was going to crash and nobody could fix it, there were a school of sharks who woul dhave eaten everybody and they could not call for help. In this example the ONLY way for them to survive is to dump weight over the side.

Now the crux of the matter, Was it wrong for them to kill the man to save themselves? He would have been eaten alive in a few minutes anyway, apart from the unpleasent drop it really doesnt make a difference to him.

In my opinion they were justified, but there are others who believe that the act of killing is intrinsically wrong and that there is no justification for it.

 

[Therumancer]

Yes, always. I do not believe that things nessicarly become tainted by the methods used to achieve them.

Generally speaking the only way to deal with a B@stard is to be an even bigger B@stard. Not ideal, but that's the world we live in.

As nice as science fiction and fantasy are, and as much as I wish it was possible to get things done while retaining a moral high ground, I do not believe in such idealism. In reality you do not have an author on your side conducting a morality play.

I feel people who do not agree with me tend to forget the old maxim that "Evil will always win, because good is dumb".

Please note that there are some limitations on what I think is acceptable, but in general I see the need to occasionally mass murder innocent people who simply think differantly than you do (for example) is a nessecity. Basically if a set of ideas contrary to your own constantly leads to the development of people who become a serious threat, then all of the people who simply hold to that idealogy and help produce these people by their existance also become a threat. This is part of my overally attitude that the only way to achieve anything is to target cultures as an enemy, rather than individuals or even nations. In many cases I feel the ideal way to go about this is through the simple spread of ideas over a long period of time. In others, well... that's what mass graves are for.

 

[Kiutu]

Sometimes it does, sometimes it does not. Alot of the times it does not.

 

[ThePirateMan]

Depends on what end and what means we are talking about now..

 

[Stabby Joe]

A good example of this notion is a Pyrrhic victory; a win but at a cost close or equal to the loss of the enemy.

 

[theSovietConnection]

It's really a gray area to me. I picked yes though, because I believe the end usually justifies the means. There are situations where I believe it doesn't, but hey, that's just me.

 

[bluepilot]

Using your example from Africa, I think that I would be okay with this plan providing that the AIDs victims were given adequate food, water, and resources for a comfortable life not to mention the healthcare needed so they could live their remaining days with dignity.

Means can be an end but there has to be comprimise to meeet Human needs

 

[Yoshemo]

To quote Claudia from Silent Hill 3: "Even if it was to save mankind, my sin was too great. I will never go to heaven"

 

[Nigh Invulnerable]

Well, HIV and AIDS started with monkeys, so shouldn't we kill all the monkeys (and people) with HIV?

Does that mean that the first human with HIV had sex with a monkey?

Or it means they got bitten by said monkey when it had a sore around its mouth. Or maybe they ate some of the meat and had a cold sore of their own. Somehow there was bodily fluid contact.

 

[WehrmachtDan]

Yes, always. I do not believe that things nessicarly become tainted by the methods used to achieve them.

Generally speaking the only way to deal with a B@stard is to be an even bigger B@stard. Not ideal, but that's the world we live in.

As nice as science fiction and fantasy are, and as much as I wish it was possible to get things done while retaining a moral high ground, I do not believe in such idealism. In reality you do not have an author on your side conducting a morality play.

I feel people who do not agree with me tend to forget the old maxim that "Evil will always win, because good is dumb".

Please note that there are some limitations on what I think is acceptable, but in general I see the need to occasionally mass murder innocent people who simply think differantly than you do (for example) is a nessecity. Basically if a set of ideas contrary to your own constantly leads to the development of people who become a serious threat, then all of the people who simply hold to that idealogy and help produce these people by their existance also become a threat. This is part of my overally attitude that the only way to achieve anything is to target cultures as an enemy, rather than individuals or even nations. In many cases I feel the ideal way to go about this is through the simple spread of ideas over a long period of time. In others, well... that's what mass graves are for.

We are very much alike, I rarely come across another person who shares my philosophy.

we have a recruit

 

[obliterate]

No. The ends never justify the means.

I totally agree

 

[Dancingman]

Eh, too many morality threads on here lately, even if some of those questions were real noodle-scratchers.

 

[theultimateend]

Do you guys agree with that? Would you guys be comfortable with, for example, isolating everyone who has HIV on an island to die, just so that we can get rid of HIV once and for all? (I know, the problem with this is that we don't know everyone who has HIV is, but just assume that we do.)

There are other examples of such problems which could theoretically be solved by such means, but that is the only one I could think of off the top of my head.

Unless the ends were an orgasm and the means were awesome (consensual) love making, no. Never ever.

Yes, always. I do not believe that things nessicarly become tainted by the methods used to achieve them.

Generally speaking the only way to deal with a B@stard is to be an even bigger B@stard. Not ideal, but that's the world we live in.

As nice as science fiction and fantasy are, and as much as I wish it was possible to get things done while retaining a moral high ground, I do not believe in such idealism. In reality you do not have an author on your side conducting a morality play.

I feel people who do not agree with me tend to forget the old maxim that "Evil will always win, because good is dumb".

Please note that there are some limitations on what I think is acceptable, but in general I see the need to occasionally mass murder innocent people who simply think differantly than you do (for example) is a nessecity. Basically if a set of ideas contrary to your own constantly leads to the development of people who become a serious threat, then all of the people who simply hold to that idealogy and help produce these people by their existance also become a threat. This is part of my overally attitude that the only way to achieve anything is to target cultures as an enemy, rather than individuals or even nations. In many cases I feel the ideal way to go about this is through the simple spread of ideas over a long period of time. In others, well... that's what mass graves are for.

A common theme in psychology is that organisms rise to the level you set for them (most specifically applies to humans). If you assume that all people are shit then you create a self fulfilling prophecy because you act in a manner that treats people, even at some small level, like such.

The mean world hypothesis is one of the largest errors in thinking that humanity has ever known. If the world was ANYWHERE near as bad as most people think, we'd all not be here to talk about it.

Most wars are brought around not by necessity but by greed and laziness. Most deaths are not of people who even want to be involved in the wars but mass civilian slaughter. These sort of events are rarely supported by the masses but are instead instigated by a very small portion of the population.

Especially in the case of some of our more popular mass genocides, the key was misinforming the public so they didn't realize what sort of atrocities were actually going on.

Overall there are very few situations where you need to do something drastic to get what you need. In most cases the drastic action isn't even as fast or efficient as the more methodical and less destructive one (for instance torturing people to get information, something that has since its inception been known to be highly inaccurate yet people still do it).