Poll: Your Pet is Drowning, and so is a Stranger.

[Thistlehart]

1.Don't fall in that trap, please. "If you're not an apple you're a bannana."

2.I think that is your mistake right there. You believe people can be cornered into an a+b=c statement.

3.I'm leaning more toward the "lazy" verdict.

4.Humans are host to condraditions aplenty. It is in our nature.

5.However, I think you're getting your concepts mixed. It is not impossible to for something to "suck to you" if you do not care. It is possible to have an emotional reaction to something while not having any real investment in it. It's called empathy.

6.You don't have to care about people to not want to see harm come to them.

7.Here's a concept you may have heard before: "There is no black and white, but infinite shades of grey." Your mistake here is that you're trying to work with black and white, while the subject is most certainly grey, or perhaps many shades thereof.

8.You don't want to work out how his statement might be true, but instead endeavour to fit it into your black and white box.

9.Yeah, the lazy verdict is more accurate. You don't look as though you'd be willing to put in the effort of being disingenuous.

In order.

1. Alright, ill try my best not to.

2. I have yet to see valid justification for why someone holding these values wouldnt be cornered by them into caring more about something they deem to have value (money) over something they deem to have no value (other people).

3. Insulting me doesnt get us anywhere. Dont waste your time with it.

4. I can agree with that. Hypocracy exists and is perfectly able to exist in people. Everyone in fact.

5. It is impossible for something to suck for you if you dont care about it. For something to hurt you you need to have emotional investment in it. It needs to matter. If it doesnt matter at all to you it wont invoke an emotional response or even any response.

6. If you dont care about something at all. like a box. You dont care if it is destroyed. If you care about something you dont want it to suffer or for something to come to hurt it. if you care ZERO for something then its passing or existence in the world is irrelevant to you so it shouldn't make you sad or happy that something befalls it.

7. Yep i agree with that. Not really sure how it applies to my point though. What im talking about really doesnt have a lot to do with the scenario at hand.

8. Thats a little presumptuous. Dont try and psyco analyse me... it probably wont be as accurate as you think it is. It isnt even very well explained as to what you mean by that.

9. More passive aggressive insults. Those arnt very useful, can we refrain from those please?

2. It's wrong. Society holds a rather strong hold on most of us, despite what we may think to the contrary. Believe me, I know from experience. Too many times I would have loved to have gone for the knees then the neck, but the simple fact was I had been taught that sort of thing is bad. Even when there was a strong chance of getting away with it. The thing it, I would still know about it. And that would follow me around.
 
3. Sorry, it was meant more as an observation.
 
4. I hesitate to equate contradictions with hypocrisy. To quote Walt Whitman, "I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am vast. I contain multitudes!"
 
5.To care is to provoke action on the part of another. I'm going to use a bit of hypothetical/anecdotal/whatsim here, but please bear with me. Considering the political upheaval in the Middle East and Africa; they need to get their shit sorted out and in a hurry, or they'll be under yet another dictator giving himself heirs. I'm not about to go over there and help them, though. I'm not about to donate money to Amnesty International to help them either. I don't care. Their plight, however, still moves me. Such a thing is not impossible.
 
6. Please see #5, and we're talking about living things here. Please don't get sidetracked.
 
7. You see, based on your arguments thus far, you claim it is impossible to not care about people (black) and still hold them in any regard (white).

 

[Amaury_games]

To all you people confused just ask yourselves...what would Batman do???

Set out to save the pet, but through misinformation accidentally save the stranger instead?

You, sir, deserve a cookie for that!

captcha: "You're welcome". 'nuff said.

 

[Mikejames]

*snip*

I'm saying there's a difference between not supporting an organization saving lives, and leaving someone drowning in front of you. Both may be wrong, but you have an active responsibility to a person in immediate danger with only you in the vicinity.

The other person in the initial scenario was never described as a definite mother, so don't turn this into a competition between my mom and my dog (mom wins). And your absolutely right about my emotional attachment being the driving factor, kind of like how someone would choose their mother over a stranger, because of the emotional attachment.

The stranger is someone's child. That's the attachment I'm talking about.
You're worrying about your own pain of losing a dog as being greater than the pain the stranger's family will feel.

 

[DRes82]

I'd save my pet. I don't understand why people think that humans are more entitled to life than other species.

Does intelligence govern importance? If so, some mentally impaired people have a lower IQ than members of other species, but they're still considered more important. Is it just because humans should look out for their own species? Because that's hardly a strong argument either.

So yes, I'd save my pet, the organism that's been with me for years and not save some random lady I just met just because they're the same species as me.

I've been trying to argue that with this crowd since I started posting here. Intelligence definitely does not make something inherently more important than something else. I find it strange that so many progressive thinking young people can be so narrow minded and illogical when it comes to this particular topic. The idea that one animal is just intrinsically superior because of brain capacity is comparable to believing that the universe revolves around the earth or that we were created by an omnipotent being only a few thousand years ago. It just blows my mind.

Anyways, its pointless. This argument is very polarizing in any community, and no one is going to have their minds changed on the subject based on what is posted here.

saving a dog over a person is monstrous is because it is, in point of fact, monstrous.

It most certainly is NOT a fact. That's a value judgement that you have made based on how you developed. Its offensive when people declare that their moral views are fact and that anyone who disagrees with it is wrong and 'monstrous'. I can come up with several current examples of other people or groups of people who try to impose their values on others, but I'll just assume you haven't been living under a rock and know them off hand.

 

[Powereaver]

Id save my pet... they are part of the family and a much loved member at that i couldnt lose them.

 

[Wickatricka]

What kind of question is that? I would save the other human being not my pet. Pets can be bought again.

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

The game singularity has taught me to never help strangers in need.
So pet.

 

[BiscuitTrouser]

2. It's wrong. Society holds a rather strong hold on most of us, despite what we may think to the contrary. Believe me, I know from experience. Too many times I would have loved to have gone for the knees then the neck, but the simple fact was I had been taught that sort of thing is bad. Even when there was a strong chance of getting away with it. The thing it, I would still know about it. And that would follow me around.
 
3. Sorry, it was meant more as an observation.
 
4. I hesitate to equate contradictions with hypocrisy. To quote Walt Whitman, "I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am vast. I contain multitudes!"
 
5.To care is to provoke action on the part of another. I'm going to use a bit of hypothetical/anecdotal/whatsim here, but please bear with me. Considering the political upheaval in the Middle East and Africa; they need to get their shit sorted out and in a hurry, or they'll be under yet another dictator giving himself heirs. I'm not about to go over there and help them, though. I'm not about to donate money to Amnesty International to help them either. I don't care. Their plight, however, still moves me. Such a thing is not impossible.
 
6. Please see #5, and we're talking about living things here. Please don't get sidetracked.
 
7. You see, based on your arguments thus far, you claim it is impossible to not care about people (black) and still hold them in any regard (white).

2. Why would it follow you around? Why would you feel guilty to wrong a random person over wronging an object? If you hold both in zero regard and care about both equally (not at all in the slightest) why would you mind? Why do you care about immoral acts if you dont care if the victim is wronged.

3. Fine. At least you managed to control the snark in this post. Kudos.

4. Granted. Nice quote.

5. You can care about something in a way that yields no physical response but has an emotional response. If i destroy something and it makes you sad there is no way you couldnt have cared about that something at all in the very slightest. If you are moved by their plight its because you care, to some degree, about if their lives are ok. Sure you might not care enough to do something but you care to a degree. Any tiny degree. Do you care about the fly in the room with me? I killed it. Just now. Are you sad? No? Then its possible to care less about the fly than it is about the people you feel sad for. You obviously care more about the people in dictatorships than about this fly which you care nothing for because one has an emotional response and one doesnt. As such the idea that you care both "nothing" for both the humans and the fly must be false since one gives an emotional response and one doesnt.

6. If we are talking about caring about something why does an object get a different category to a human? Does a human you care nothing about differ emotionally to you from a book you care nothing about? Why? If you care about both the least it is possible to care you must care about both equally since you cant have negative caring.

7. Im saying that if one doesnt care at all about people they have no real reason to prevent them from suffering and every reason to cause them suffering if personal gain is guaranteed. Like you said society usually finds out and condemns us though which i imagine prevents anyone with this view actually doing bad things because the personal gain is far from guaranteed. Im trying to ask you, specifically, if one has no empathy for other people and cares nothing for them at all on the basis they dont know them, what possible motivation do they have to prevent their suffering. Why wouldnt they value anything that they have assigned value to over an apparently "worthless" stranger. Im not trying to fit into boxes. Im asking a simple question. Give me a reason. A reason why people should stop other people being murdered in front of them if they dont care at all about the person and no negative effects would befall them if they didnt.

 

[Mikejames]

Are you more responsible because it's right there in front of you and because society would look down on you for not helping? So any problem that doesn't enter my personal space is totally okay to ignore even if I could help stop it?

This person is going to die soon without immediate intervention, and you're the only one capable of helping. How is that not a difference?

So what if it was between your mother and some stranger? Does the pain you'd feel at losing a mother take priority over the other person's family?

And the pain of losing my dog may not be greater than someone else's after they lost their mother, but since it's my pain, it's my main priority. Yes it's selfish, but most people will agree that avoiding pain themselves is more important than helping others avoid pain.

Comparing a human's life to another human's isn't the point. You're admitting that your argument is based around preventing your own pain by giving others a much greater amount of pain, while also denying someone a chance to live a full life as opposed to your dog's. You don't see something wrong with that?

 

[the December King]

I think this question would have alot more weight on 'saving the stranger' side if there were alot fewer 'strangers' on the planet.

 

[Edl01]

I think this question would have alot more weight on 'saving the stranger' side if there were alot fewer 'strangers' on the planet.

I think this question would have alot more weight on 'saving the pet' side if there were alot fewer 'pets' on the planet .

 

[TKretts3]

My pet, because I like it more. I'd feel stronger for the pet then some stranger.
If, however, the stranger were someone well known, or particularly wealthy I'd be more inclined to save them.

 

[the December King]

I think this question would have alot more weight on 'saving the stranger' side if there were alot fewer 'strangers' on the planet.

I think this question would have alot more weight on 'saving the pet' side if there were alot fewer 'pets' on the planet .

Touche! As of my writing this it seems that the 'Saving the Pet' side is in the lead.

Do you not like pets, then? It seems like the people who vote to save another human life over a pet would vote that way no matter what. It reminds me of a question a while back about whether you would save a single human life, or all cats in the world.

For the record, I haven't voted at all, and won't.

 

[nexus]

I'd save my pet. (Cat)

I would consider saving the "person" if it was a child, not an adult. If a full-grown adult can't save themselves from drowning, then I wouldn't be able to save that full-grown adult, as I'm not a lifeguard. We would both end up drowning.

I could probably save my cat though.

(Also, lol at internet warriors flexing their misanthropy to make themselves feel better.)

 

[nexus]

Comparing a human's life to another human's isn't the point. You're admitting that your argument is based around preventing your own pain by giving others a much greater amount of pain, while also denying someone a chance to live a full life as opposed to your dog's. You don't see something wrong with that?

Why don't you make sure your own house is in order before you go judging others.

You cement your opinion on human morals and dignity based on a ridiculously silly internet poll. You don't see anything wrong with that?

 

[Treblaine]

Hmm, I hate these contrived dilemmas. And they always are "can only save one" is contrived as nothing is so absolute, especially something like drowning. You should always consider and balance who can stand waiting longer.

And if you get to the point of absolute certainties like "evil guy kidnaps your family, makes you chose which to live" is no real choice. it's like choosing to have your right or left leg amputated with a chainsaw I LIKE BOTH MY LEGS!!! Or something else trite like lose your hand or have your nose chopped off.

There is no right answer.

I'll tell you what I'd do, I'd save FIRST whichever would maximise the chances of the most people being saved. Generally I'd save the stranger first as dogs are generally naturally good swimmers, I've never heard of a dog needing a swimming lesson but generally humans who haven't been explicitly taught to swim drown as soon as they land in water deeper than their nose height.

PS: I don't have a pet but I know most pets live shorter lives than humans, so if I'd have one I'd get it totally expecting to see this animal die before I do so I can't be so selfish about sentimetality. Humans however are expected to live till pension age, everything from their family to their employment expects them to live well into retirement. The difference would be giving a human another 40-50 years of productive and fulfilling life, or another 10 years to a dog chasing the same stick like he's done a thousand times before.

 

[Pandabearparade]

It most certainly is NOT a fact. That's a value judgement that you have made based on how you developed.

If all morality is subjective there is no morality.

Though if you want to debate objective vs. subjective ethics I can start a new thread about that.

Its offensive when people declare that their moral views are fact and that anyone who disagrees with it is wrong and 'monstrous'.

I don't care if it's "offensive". I find it offensive that Republicans who lack basic critical thinking skills vote. I find it offensive that Dick Cheney hasn't been tried for war crimes. I find it offensive that so many people would save a fucking dog over a person. We don't have a right not to be offended.

 

[Maleval]

Save the pet. I most likely have an emotional attachment to it. That means it is more valueable to me than a *GASP* HUMAN BEING I've never met before. There are a lot of humans out there. Apart from about 50 of them all the others mean nothing to me.