To terminate or not to terminate

Unplug. We all meet the same end eventually.

ATB from Fredrik

Now now, Fredrik. No orchestral politics here. Just because it's a violinist... What if it were a bassist...?

Pull the Plug. Lifes to short to worry about such things.

quote:

Originally posted by Deane F:
What do you do?

you make a decision?

quote:

Originally posted by Deane F:
Now now, Fredrik. No orchestral politics here. Just because it's a violinist... What if it were a bassist...?

Even quicker. Frdrik

Aside from it being just a violinist (I'm a bass player too...) without more specifics it seems that the flaw in the story is that now BOTH will be dead in a month. Unless unplugging "you" will prevent "you" from dying.
The Society of Music Lovers, in this case, are guilty of kidnapping, holding a hostage and ultimately the death of one of both. Unplug early and let one of the Society Members be connected.
David

Part 1,

No you do not have to accede to the situation. It is not of your choice, you are only in that situation by the action of others.

Part 2.
It's not murder as you did not choose to be in that situation Unplug and live with no guilt.

Sorry but I find the ethics question you ask very vague, what is the point you are trying to show

Are you saying if we have the "best person on earth" that is going to die and to save them we must take the life of "the most worthless person on earth" is this justified?

My instinct says no they should die. But if the "best person on earth" would ultimately cause the people (even more if Family, Friends etc) to live rather than die then my opinion could change. (Ethics is always complex)

Ultimately I think it's boils down to should you kill 1 person to save another or 10, 100, 1000 and so on. And if so in what circumstances.

For example, if a disease hit the world that would destroy the worlds population and someone by being killed (Say liquidized to make a vaccine) could prevent it should they be killed (It could be you don't forget) even if they didn't want to sacrifice their self.

For example should 1 person die against their will (even if it was me) to let 8 billion people live - I would say yes. However should 1 person die for to 1 person to live (E.g. a forced transplant) then it is NO WAY. Where is the line is drawn between the two, this is interesting and disturbing.

A very thought provoking thread

quote:

Sorry but I find the ethics question you ask very vague, what is the point you are trying to show

The point of the question is really to analogise the moral questions around the issues of choice in respect of termination of pregnancy.

Dear Deane,

There have been one or two riddles along these lines on here in the last few days, and really I am inclined to answer a direct question in a straight forward way!

The whole abhortion issue is fraught with complexity, and difficult moral questions. Infact I would not want to get drawn into it on this board!

ATB from Fredrik

PS: Frank is quite right about the bass being a viol, and the missing link is the old Baroque bass, the Violone [strung with five or six strings and conventionally using the same tuning an octave lower as the Viola da Gamba - from the bottom: D, G, C, E, A, D, with a major third between the middle two strings] which is probably the correct instrument to use for Bach, though the modern bass [ususally three string at that time] had emerged in England during Handel's time here, and which had much better projection. In practice many tuning schemes were used, but it is from the main tuning in fourths of the violone that the tuning of modern double bass is derived and which is all conventionally in fourths. Some Five string basses are tuned with the bottom string at C rather than the expected B. This somewhat strengthens ths power of the very bottom few notes. A visual guide to the ancestry of the bass may be seen in the shape of the top bout, where the shoulders and neck mount are nothing like the shape found in the violin familly, and many basses have a flat back, like their viol ancestors. There was an attempt in England during the eighteenth century to introduce a new double bass violin, but it was very difficult to use because of the higher shoulders of the violin style top bout. Some are still in use today, even two centuries on. Hart made some lovely examples.

The oldest double bass stringed instrument was the Rebec, which became the Violone by a gradual process of building up it projection with weightier strings and more wood thickness in the front and back plates. In viol consorts the Violone was a very rare instrument indeed! The are very few double basses still in use converted from Violones, and the greatest period of bass making really was from the 1740s to the 1840s, when the fine qualities of making of the viol instruments were carried forward in the modern string bass, and theatre orchestras were growing in number and size. Orchestras designed for purely Symphonic work were largely a nineteenth century phenomenon. The great centres of bass making at the time were London, Paris, Saxony and Mitttenwald, and the Tirrol while the great Cremonese Violin makers simply found them uneconomic to make given how prized were their violins, violas and cellos. The old Viol School of making, which was active in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in England produced what are still regarded as the finest instruments of their type, though Amati, and Maggini made some which are just as fine in Italy.

In bed next to a famous violinist eh... can I suggest Vannesa Mae or Nicola Bennidetti ...a whole new group of ethical ramifications... for them

quote:

There you are, in bed with the violinist, and the director of the hospital says to you: "It's all most distressing, and I deeply sympathize, but you see this is putting an additional strain on your kidneys, and you'll be dead within the month. But you have to stay where you are all the same, because unplugging you would be directly killing an innocent violinist, and that's murder, and that's impermissible."

What do you do?

Unplug, of course. My decision might be different if the famous violinist was related to me, but even then there would be no moral/ethical requirement to sacrifice my own life or health to save his life.

quote:

Originally posted by Deane F:

quote:

Sorry but I find the ethics question you ask very vague, what is the point you are trying to show

The point of the question is really to analogise the moral questions around the issues of choice in respect of termination of pregnancy.

The situations, and thus the moral/ethical issues involved, are completely different.

If it happened to be Dutch violinist Janine Jansen, I'd just stay in bed and try to make the most of what time we had left.

Or face to face with Vanessa Mae for 9 months...I think I could stand that.
I wonder what Earwicker would do in that situation?

Should this question not be addressed to the doctors who did this to you both?

You've got your back to him and he's in a coma. How do you know that what they are telling you is true. You can feel something that feels like a body, but you are relying on the doctors telling you this scenario, so can you trust them that it's true, and you are expected to sacrifice yourself for this? That's murder. Time to quit, unplug and get out. What does he being a violinist got to do with anything anyway?

They could pass the time telling each other viola jokes. As you may know for classical music lovers, viola jokes are their version of 'stupid idiot' jokes:
http://www.mit.edu/~jcb/jokes/viola.html
David

You call the press and some black-market surgeons, hook up the hospital director in your place as a 'volunteer' as they arrive - he dies a hero, you become the victim (your rights have been violated, you've been abducted, sedated against your will, and you've been medically assaulted with permanant and life-threatening injury), and get a book deal and a talk show tour (and probably a john-wayne-bobbitt-esque pornstar opportunity to boot), and sue the hospital for the damage to your kidneys and the violation of your rights.

From your immediate earnings, you pay for a series of expensive hookers to entertain the violinist on his road to recovery - a form of torture for the hospital director. From this you can extract the confessions (oh, are we in another thread? sorry.) which will seal the deal in your forthcoming lawsuit. You win. You bankrupt the Society of Music Lovers with your second lawsuit.

You live out your days poking around on internet fora, listeing to the latest naim equipment, record-store touring, and enjoying whatever restaurants your bombarded system can manage, post-recovery. You cancel your opera and symphony subscriptions, hire bodyguards, and order the occasional abduction of key medical and musical players, as well as former members of Society of Music Lovers, just to keep them honest.

Oh, and Jean Luc Ponty lives to play another day.

quote:

Originally posted by Deane F:
Classic beginner's practical ethics prob:

You wake up in the morning and find yourself back to back in bed with an unconscious famous violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment, and the Society of Music Lovers has kidnapped you, and last night the violinist's circulatory system was plugged into yours so that your kidneys could be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. The director of the hospital now tells you: "Look, we're sorry the Society of Music Lovers did this to you - we would never have permitted it if we had known. But still, they did it and the violinist is now plugged into you. To unplug you would be to kill him. But never mind, it's only for nine months. By then he will have recovered from his ailment and can safely be unplugged from you."

Is it morally incumbent on you to accede to this situation? No doubt it would be very nice of you if you did, a great kindness. But do you have to accede to it?

There you are, in bed with the violinist, and the director of the hospital says to you: "It's all most distressing, and I deeply sympathize, but you see this is putting an additional strain on your kidneys, and you'll be dead within the month. But you have to stay where you are all the same, because unplugging you would be directly killing an innocent violinist, and that's murder, and that's impermissible."

What do you do?

Depends what SHE looks like