A little conundrum to mull over..........
Two chaps spend an evening in their local and drink 2½ pints before leaving, each driving himself home in his own car.
Bill drives home, has a cuppa, takes himself to bed and is snoring within 2 minutes. In the morning he wakes up and goes to work with maybe a slight headache and has an uneventful day.
Ben drives homeward but en route a pedestrian who has taken illegal drugs suddenly trips over a banana skin and falls onto the road directly in the path of Ben's car and is hit by it. Ben calls an ambulance but by the time it arrives the pedestrian has died.
After making all due enquiries into the circumstances leading to the event Ben is charged with causing death by driving under the influence of alcohol and is sent to gaol.
What is the ethical basis for sending Ben, and only Ben, to gaol?
And some responses.................
Comment from jeadie05
Ben was the unfortiunate one who caused the accident ,????
I said:
Jan - did Ben cause the accident or was the pedestrian also partly culpable? Bill broke exactly the same law a Ben remember, so did Ben simply have bad luck to have a drugged pedestrian fall in front of his car rather than in front of Bills's car, or even that the pedestrian fell at that time and in that exact place??
Comment from sdrogerson
Well Bill didn't get caught did he. Therefore while breaking the law he escaped detection. There is no difference.
I said:
Stuart - the question was not about the law but about the ethical dilemma presented by the facts and the actors involved. All 3 actors in this event were law breakers remember. Another factor to perhaps consider is the arbitrary nature of drink-driving limits and of being apprehended for it.
Comment from icklemisssexpot
Ethically it's really the pedestrians own fault they are dead...Legally it's a sod because Ben is deemed at fault
I said:
Cathy, you say the pedestrian is the author of his own misfortune, but he could have fallen 60 seconds earlier or later, or to his left instead of his right, and the result might have been no more than a banged elbow.
Didn't bad luck play a part in the misfortune of both the pedestrian AND Ben?
Didn't bad luck play a part in the misfortune of both the pedestrian AND Ben?
If you agree then consider - should bad luck be punished?
9 comments:
Ben was the unfortiunate one who caused the accident ,???? love Jan xx
Well Bill didn't get caught did he. Therefore while breaking the law he escaped detection. There is no difference.
Ethically it's really the pedestrians own fault they are dead...Legally it's a sod because Ben is deemed at fault
Jan - did Ben cause the accident or was the pedestrian also partly culpable? Bill broke exactly the same law a Ben remember, so did Ben simply have bad luck to have a drugged pedestrian fall in front of his car rather than in front of Bills's car, or even that the pedestrian fell at that time and in that exact place??
Stuart - the question was not about the law but about the ethical dilemma presented by the facts and the actors involved. All 3 actors in this event were law breakers remember. Another factor to perhaps consider is the arbitrary nature of drink-driving limits and of being apprehended for it.
Cathy, you say the pedestrian is the author of his own misfortune, but he could have fallen 60 seconds earlier or later, or to his left instead of his right, and the result might have been no more than a banged elbow.
Didin't bad luck play a part in the misfortune of both the pedestrain AND Ben? If you agree then consider - should bad luck be punished?
Comment from sdrogerson
Well Bill didn't get caught did he. Therefore while breaking the law he escaped detection. There is no difference.
I said:
Stuart - the question was not about the law but about the ethical dilemma presented by the facts and the actors involved. All 3 actors in this event were law breakers remember. Another factor to perhaps consider is the arbitrary nature of drink-driving limits and of being apprehended for it.
=========================
Yes they were all law breakers. Personally I think it it morally and ethically wrong to drink and drive at all. In my opinion both were culpable. Ben however truly reaped what he had sown by having his actions coloured by his drinknig which affected his driving capabilites.
Drinking and driving is a dangerous combination in any form. They were taking a legal drug.
The person who had taken illegal drugs was probably the least guilty of any ethical wrong doing since drug use is a decision of the state as to what is illegal.
Probably the really guilty person here is the careless person who dropped the banana skin as they too should be jailed. ;)
In fact just lock the lot up ;)
The culprit is the person who deliberately dropped the banana skin.
You ask about the ethical basis for the actions taken in law, but the law does not principally decide the etics of the situation. It primarilly serves to establish social cohession and limit anti social behaviour. The case is an example of the law using deterent powers to produce social cohession and in its self does not establish the ethics. Ethically all three are/were guilty of anti social behaviour, the deceased punished (by dying), the second convicted and made the 'bad' example, with the third left to somberly reflect on the lessons given. Morally the law acted as society would want it to, and thus was entirely ethical in doing so.
Affa said:
You ask about the ethical basis for the actions taken in law, but the law does not principally decide the etics of the situation. It primarilly serves to establish social cohession and limit anti social behaviour.
>>>>>>>>>
I'm immensely honoured to have your screenie here Affa <g>
I do take your point but isn't the law supposedly meant to represent in practical form a common understanding of what is just? - and Justice to be just must be based on commonly held moral standards = a shared ethical belief system.
As you might guess my personal opinion is that the Justice system is far from just and is, as you say, about coercing the population to abide by rules which are not, for the purposes of the individual actor, necessarily rational.
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