Harm is harm. If my recklessness gives you covid, that’s harm. I harmed you. If my wanton habits strain the Healthcare system such that they’re expending money on my emphasima instead of more MRIs, and the lack of MRIs mean the diagnostic delays kept you from finding a brain tumor before it became inoperable, that’s harm too. I harmed you.
It’s comfortable to hide behind layers of abstraction. That’s just morality laundering.
If I give you covid, and you die, that’s bad.
If I give you covid, and you spread it to your grandma and she dies, that’s bad.
If I give you covid, and you give someone else covid, and THEY give it to THIER grandma and she dies, that’s bad.
And if I give… etc etc etc etc. How far down this chain do I gotta go before you say “ah ok, no morality issue there”?
Does it matter if you expose people but none actually get it? Does it matter if people get it, but as a result of the chain reaction nobody dies?
Probably not, right? The irresponsibility of the act has already established that it was wrong, regardless of the dilution along a chain and regardless of the actual outcome. You don’t KNOW what will happen, you just have statistical models.
You might never know WHICH bean made you fart. It doesn’t matter. The collective effect produced a result.
And what if spending money on the MRI for the guy with the brain tumor delays a study on Alzheimer’s disease? And what if that Alzheimer’s study took money that could have been used to further develop gene therapy?
I don’t really understand the point of this.
If a guy has a dildo stuck up his arse, he needs help. …There’s no follow up point, he just needs help.
I would find a medical industry that harbors contempt for the indignity of having to help this guy… pathetic. Like, it’s silly.
[edit] Let me amend one thing, 'cause I reread the original comment.
I think that neglectfully spreading an illness is more morally objectionable than recklessly contracting one. A known one, anyway. Covid is somewhat special because disease vectors and not actually knowing if you had it or how it spread was more on people’s minds.
Kinda, I think we’re in the same zone, but I feel you’re kinda glancing off some important points, and also bringing in unrelated concepts.
What if the money spent on the mri could have been spent on alzheimers?
Well, if at the time it was reasonable to expect that the investment in MRIs was the most effective thing to do for society that’s fine. That’s just a choice made with reasonable expectations of a positive outcome that ultimately turned out to be suboptimal. It isn’t reasonable to expect that smoking won’t statistically be detrimental to your health. It’s a self-inflicted wound, done knowing this was a likly outcome. This is the critical difference there.
Now, as for unrelated topics, you’ve muddled two distinct ideas: “moral evaluation of actions”, and “evaluation of worthiness to recieve care”.
If you need an ER doctor to pull a dildo out of your ass, but didn’t reasonably expect to demand society to end up having to pay for it, then I see no moral issue, just like if someone forgets thier hair straightener on and thier house lights on fire and the firefighters risk thier lives to rescue you.
If you fully expected to require an ER doctor beforehand, yah, morality issue there. If you light your own house on fire on purpose because you wanted to get carried down a ladder, same deal.
Doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to be helped. Doesn’t imply that you must not, may, or are obligated to feel contempt or whatever. Evaluating the STATE of a moral agent RESPONDING to a moral transgression of another is several steps removed from the ideas of the morality of self-harm in a social collective with finite support resources.
Anyways, long story short… I don’t mean to say that the two cases are morally identical. They’re both actions that needlessly risk degrading the overall health of your society.
There are OTHER moral considerations around fucking roadkill. I’m not saying being obese and fucking roadkill are somehow GENERALLY morally equivalent.
Yeah, that’s basically it.
Harm is harm. If my recklessness gives you covid, that’s harm. I harmed you. If my wanton habits strain the Healthcare system such that they’re expending money on my emphasima instead of more MRIs, and the lack of MRIs mean the diagnostic delays kept you from finding a brain tumor before it became inoperable, that’s harm too. I harmed you.
It’s comfortable to hide behind layers of abstraction. That’s just morality laundering.
If I give you covid, and you die, that’s bad.
If I give you covid, and you spread it to your grandma and she dies, that’s bad.
If I give you covid, and you give someone else covid, and THEY give it to THIER grandma and she dies, that’s bad.
And if I give… etc etc etc etc. How far down this chain do I gotta go before you say “ah ok, no morality issue there”?
Does it matter if you expose people but none actually get it? Does it matter if people get it, but as a result of the chain reaction nobody dies?
Probably not, right? The irresponsibility of the act has already established that it was wrong, regardless of the dilution along a chain and regardless of the actual outcome. You don’t KNOW what will happen, you just have statistical models.
You might never know WHICH bean made you fart. It doesn’t matter. The collective effect produced a result.
And what if spending money on the MRI for the guy with the brain tumor delays a study on Alzheimer’s disease? And what if that Alzheimer’s study took money that could have been used to further develop gene therapy?
I don’t really understand the point of this.
If a guy has a dildo stuck up his arse, he needs help. …There’s no follow up point, he just needs help.
I would find a medical industry that harbors contempt for the indignity of having to help this guy… pathetic. Like, it’s silly.
[edit] Let me amend one thing, 'cause I reread the original comment.
I think that neglectfully spreading an illness is more morally objectionable than recklessly contracting one. A known one, anyway. Covid is somewhat special because disease vectors and not actually knowing if you had it or how it spread was more on people’s minds.
Does this touch on anything you’re saying?
Kinda, I think we’re in the same zone, but I feel you’re kinda glancing off some important points, and also bringing in unrelated concepts.
What if the money spent on the mri could have been spent on alzheimers?
Well, if at the time it was reasonable to expect that the investment in MRIs was the most effective thing to do for society that’s fine. That’s just a choice made with reasonable expectations of a positive outcome that ultimately turned out to be suboptimal. It isn’t reasonable to expect that smoking won’t statistically be detrimental to your health. It’s a self-inflicted wound, done knowing this was a likly outcome. This is the critical difference there.
Now, as for unrelated topics, you’ve muddled two distinct ideas: “moral evaluation of actions”, and “evaluation of worthiness to recieve care”.
If you need an ER doctor to pull a dildo out of your ass, but didn’t reasonably expect to demand society to end up having to pay for it, then I see no moral issue, just like if someone forgets thier hair straightener on and thier house lights on fire and the firefighters risk thier lives to rescue you.
If you fully expected to require an ER doctor beforehand, yah, morality issue there. If you light your own house on fire on purpose because you wanted to get carried down a ladder, same deal.
Doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to be helped. Doesn’t imply that you must not, may, or are obligated to feel contempt or whatever. Evaluating the STATE of a moral agent RESPONDING to a moral transgression of another is several steps removed from the ideas of the morality of self-harm in a social collective with finite support resources.
Anyways, long story short… I don’t mean to say that the two cases are morally identical. They’re both actions that needlessly risk degrading the overall health of your society.
There are OTHER moral considerations around fucking roadkill. I’m not saying being obese and fucking roadkill are somehow GENERALLY morally equivalent.