It’s an innocent and pleasant pastime to multiply counterexamples to utilitarianism even if they don’t add much to what others have said. Thus, if utilitarianism is true, I have to do so. :-)
Suppose you capture Hitler. Torturing him to death would appal many but, given fallen human nature, likely significantly please hundreds of millions more. This pleasure to hundreds of millions could far outweigh the pain to one. Moreover, even of those appalled by the torture, primarily only Nazis and a handful of moral saints would actually feel significant displeasure at the torture. For being appalled by an immoral action is not always unpleasant except to someone with saintly compassion—indeed there is a kind of pleasure one takes in being appalled. Normally in the case of counterexamples to utilitarianism one worries about making people more callous, the breakdown of law and order, giving a bad example to others, and so on. But the case of Hitler is so exceptional that likely the negative effects from a utilitarian point of view would be minimal if any.
One might think that an even better thing to do from the utilitarian point of view would be to kill Hitler painlessly, and then mark up his body so it looks like he was tortured to death, and publically lie about it.
Yet it is wrong to torture even Hitler, and it is wrong to lie that one has done so (especially if only for public pleasure).
1 comment:
One of my kids had a pretty devastating objection to the Hitler case. Even if Hitler is exceptional, many people incorrectly identify their enemies with Hitler, and hence might follow the example.
Post a Comment