Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Bernard Williams on Professor George's Hypothetical
In thinking about the very good questions that Professor George raises below, I was reminded of some of Bernard Williams's arguments in his critique of utilitarianism (the "against" of his classic work with J.J.C. Smart). Readers are doubtless familiar with Williams's points, but briefly to refresh the memory, one of Williams's examples deals with Jim, who is given the choice by a strongman of either shooting one person, or else shooting no one, in which case Pedro will kill twenty people.
Here is Williams:
"[W]hat occurs if Jim refrains from action is not solely twenty Indians dead, but Pedro's killing twenty Indians . . . . On the utilitarian view, the undesirable projects of other people as much determine, in this negative way, one's decisions as the desriable ones do positively: if those people were not there, or had different projects, the causal nexus would be different, and it is the actual state of the causal nexus which determines the decision . . . . The decision so determined is, for utilitarianism, the right decision. But what if it conflicts with some project of mine? This, the utilitarian will say, has already been dealt with: the satisfaction to you of fulfilling your project, and any satisfactions to others of your so doing, have already been through the calculating device and have been found inadequate. Now in the case of many sorts of projects, that is a perfectly reasonable sort of answer. But in the case of projects of the sort I have called 'commitments,' those with which one is more deeply and extensively involved and identified, this cannot just by itself be an adequate answer, and there may be no adequate answer at all . . . . It is absurd to demand of [the "committed" person], when the sums come in from the utility network which the projects of others have in part determined, that he should just step aside from his own project . . . . It is to make him into a channel between the input of everyone's projects, including his own, and an output of optimific decision; but this is to neglect the extent to which his actions and his decisions have to be seen as the actions and decisions which flow from the projects and attitudes with which he is most closely identified. It is thus, in the most literal sense, an attack on his integrity."
https://mirrorofjustice.blogs.com/mirrorofjustice/2011/02/bernard-williams-on-professor-georges-hypothetical.html
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These very compelling hypotheticals bring to mind an actual example of exceptional heroism. There was a German soldier by the name of Schmidt who was serving in Serbia during the world war. He was assigned to a death squad which was sent out to execute an entire village of Serbian resisters. When he saw the victims lined up before his squad, he laid down him rifle and joined the Serbians too. So heroism may be a moral imperative.
The tough part about these hypotheticals, as soldier Schmidt makes clear, is that we cannot simply apply a "greater force" defense. Schmidt could have argued to himself that while he personally was against killing Serbian villagers, some greater force had put them and him in this bind, and it was the greater force that bore the responsibility. More simply stated, one cannot use taking orders as a defense for ones' direct actions.
The case of tactical lying -- the question of whether it is necessarily a sin -- involves that same question, in as much as the defense would be that they lies told to PP were made necessary by the secrecy with which PP cloaks its crimes. So practical necessity is the "greater force." In this instance I find that proposition very compelling, and urge one to consider that to reveal the truth is to tell the truth. Truth is a good in itself, and telling the truth is therefore a good in itself. Put in somewhat more familiar terms, the actions of LiveAction consisted in effect of "bearing truthful witness," which in this circumstance consisted of truthful witness against PP.
Against, as it were, the denial of a blanket "greater force" defense, there is the defense of minimizing injury. We are at least permitted, if not enjoined, to minimize harms. In Professor George's hypothetical about the rape of the Gypsy girl, I don't think anyone would condemn the protagonist regardless of what he decided. To sacrifice his life for the honor of the girl is noble, even though to sacrifice her to save the vulnerable people in his basement is to my mind a legitimate example of minimizing harm too. We should all be very grateful for the fact that while we are required to ponder these troubling cases, there is Another who takes responsibility for deciding them.