echidna

Nope, couldn’t do it.

Out of curiosity, for those preaching altruism, do you do you do it now ? Your lunch could have paid for someone else’s fresh water for a month. The last time you saw a movie could have immunised 10 children. Your new car could have supported a village for a year.

Ouch, I’m not even Catholic & I feel guilty at times.

Good observation, christ-on-a-stick !!

ohwilleke

I think the converse of your question is even more interesting. Is blood money moral, and if so when?

Just before I saw this topic, I had read a newspaper article about a case in Pakistan where two murders agreed to pay $130,000 as compensation (lots of money in Pakistan), and provide five girls who were the murder's relatives to the family of the victims, in exchange for the family of the victims asking that they be pardoned from their pending executions.

I frequently bring wrongful death actions myself as an attorney, which is basically a request for bloodmoney.

Icelandic law orginally mostly consisted of a blood money system which was then privately enforced by going and seizing the other guy's stuff.

In the Western World, we draw a line. If you are intentional, reckless or criminally negligent, we send you to prison for a long time if you kill someone, unless a whole host of factors from geography to intent to poverty coincide, in which case we sentence you to death. If you carelessly kill someone, even if you were careless in a way that could predicably result in somebody dying, we make you pay blood money.

On one hand, it seems only fair to provide compensation for a wrong that has been done to someone. On the other, putting a life in such stark monetary terms (basically allowing you to make a forced purchase of someone else's life) has a macabre flavor to it.

And, is blood money always so different than marrying off the girls?

Suppose that you have a family with a husband, wife, three girls of their own, and a couple of other girls they take care of. They live in a nice house, in a nice neighborhood, the kids go to private schools, have health insurance, ride horses, and generally live a very nice life. Let's suppose further that the wife owns a business which pays all these bills. Then, one day, wife gets stone cold drunk and runs a bus full of girl scouts off the road and down a cliff, killing them all. She is sued, loses, and a judgment is entered against her for far more than her insurance, causing her to have to turn over all of her assets to a trust for the families of the scouts.

Suddenly, this judgment has brought her family from material bliss, to poverty. Mom's actions have sent the entire family to a rickety rented house, mom's income has no doubt plummetted, dad may need to return to work too to provide for the family, and the life chances of the five girls in the household have been signficiantly reduced. It isn't like being sold into sexual slavery, certainly, but it is a form of collectively punishment, despite the fact that only one member of the household did anything wrong.

[ July 29, 2002: Message edited by: ohwilleke ]</p>

Jamie_L

I don't know if it's moral, but I would say it's not immoral - IF it's money.

When you are talking about other human beings, then I believe it becomes immoral. You inflict a result on uninvolved people, against their will, much as the original murder.

Wrongful death lawsuits do have a macabre flavor. It's unsettling to put a dollar value on a life that was dear to you. However, I think it boils down to reality. In an ideal situation, you would sue to get that person brought back to life. But you can't do that. The best you can do is sue for money. And money can create new opportunities to try and make up for lost opportunities. Money can alleviate other hardships to try to make up for the hardship created by the loss. It's far from perfect, but I think it's also far from immoral.

Jamie

tronvillain

No one has anything else to say? 99Percent?

99Percent

Sorry Tron, I have been quite busy lately. I am thinking of a response for you. I also have a long response pending for bd-from-kg.

Scorpion

There are some additional factors that should be made neutral, i.e. who is making the offer and where the money comes from. If these are granted, and everything else being equal...

The problem is that I just can't think myself in such situation. I couldn't possibly help thinking *why* someone wants me to kill a J. Random Loser and where would all those billions of dollars come from...

(BTW, an amusing sidenote: some Russian PhD estimated that there are more dollar bills in Russia than in U.S. - sorry I can't give you any pointer to this as the article was in Finnish and I haven't found this from any international press yet)

...anyway, point being that if there was someone to take such pains to arrange me an opportunity to kill without fear of punishment just to see what it takes, (s)he wouldn't be someone whose test I'd feel like participating in *no matter what the price*...

-S-

Edited by Scorpion (changed an unwarranted chauvinism into an unwarranted dichotomy)

[ August 07, 2002: Message edited by: Scorpion ]</p>

Autonemesis

What if I accept an offer to kill someone for $X,000,000. But then instead of carrying out the deed, I defraud my benefactor by faking the death of the target. Perhaps the target and I are in on the scheme and split the proceeds.

Have my partner and I committed a moral transgression? Who is more morally reprehensible, the person who commissions a murder, or the person who defrauds him?