Thedesolateone:His question was: "If there was a situation in which stealing someone's fountain pen would save 1,000,000,000 lives, would you take that action?" (Obviously this situation is near-impossible, but as a thought experiment, it is still useful as a theoretical and logically possible scenario).
Yes. And I'd gladly make restitution to my victim.
The need of 1,000,000,000 does not negate the rights of the pen's owner, so stealing his pen is still a crime. However, I would apply my personal valuation to the situation, and accept the consequences.
I gave another answer, but I decided to re-think that answer.
My final anser is that there are too many ifs in that question. Really, when you get down to it, this is an attempt to trap you into a no-right-answer situation. The problem is that to actually come up with an answer you need more information, because there is simply not enough information to make a judgement on. It is like people who come on to self-defense/gun forums and ask questions like "you're in a crowded area [i.e. mall, college campus, movie theater, etc] and some psychopath comes in and starts shooting people, what do you do?" There just isn't enough information to go on.
I would steal it if I could. Then I would try to get away with it.
CShirk:this is an attempt to trap you into a no-right-answer situation
That's the whole point. In order to come to a theory of ethics one can stand by, it is important to seek out seemingly no-right-answer situations, and try as best you can to resolve them. It's a hypothetical thought experiment that is meant to test the validity of the theory; not an attempt to plan for potential future situations.
Austrian Theory of the Business Cycle in 9 steps (Soliciting comments)
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