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Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter O'Brien who wrote (15903)	11/24/1998 11:13:00 PM
From: Johannes Pilch	Respond to of 67261

>Person A is injured in an auto accident. Person B has nothing to do with the accident and doesn't even know person A. Person A requires blood transfusions to survive. However, person A has an extremely rare blood type, and the only other person in the world known to be an acceptable donor is person B. Knowing this, the paramedics bring person A over to person B's house in the middle of the night, and hook up person A to person B while person B is sleeping.< _______________________________________________________ >Question: When person B wakes up, can person B request that the connection be broken (thereby resulting in person A's death), or does the government have the right to force person B to provide all necessary blood donations?< Yes. These circumstances are similar to that of a pregnancy resulting of rape. The paramedics in one regard are "rapists" violating the body of person B, resulting in a human (person A) who depends upon B's life. We will for now discard the fact of A's original condition and simply state that A's final condition (dependence upon B) was a direct result of the paramedic "rapists". Let us also add a condition that person B's giving of his blood necessarily results in a lifelong burden of some sort. (This condition is similar to that of a mother who gives birth, even should she give the child up for adoption). In these circumstances I think moral principle (Judeo/Christian) yet demands we preserve the human, and thus person B is morally obligated to use his resources to the benefit of a very fortunate A. Nevertheless, in that a lifelong burden is placed upon B I can understand his wanting to detach himself from A (thereby destroying A). If person B's morality is dictated exclusively by logic, then person A is possibly doomed because B has no logical obligation to him. It is on this basis that I think a mother can POSSIBLY "detach" herself from an unborn child attached to her by a rapist. I say possibly because unlike person A, the child's condition is NOT one of imminent death. In this case we must assign blame to the rapist. And this reveals to us another flaw of the analogy. We cannot now say that the death of A represents a continuance of an assault upon B, because the paramedic rapists had a motive to save A. So then who would be the blame for A's death? Now we will refer back to A's original condition: his imminent death caused by his accident. Person B is merely an intermediate attempt to halt what would have certainly occurred (NOT so in the case of a child). That B had not the will to incur the burden of saving A is to me a morally defunct position, but I do not think we can logically force B to preserve A. Person A's condition and death was ultimately caused by a car accident. So then a moral government would by law encourage B to preserve A (this, for B's sake). A logical one would not. >Question: Does your answer change if the circumstances are changed so that instead of being injured in an auto accident, person A was assaulted and stabbed by person B (in other words, person B is responsible for person A's condition)?< Well yes. If B is to blame for A's condition, then a logical disparity exists allowing A or his representatives to make a claim against B's life, this, regardless of whether or not A's life can be restored. If B can restore A, then he is logically required to do so. Looking forward to your response. To bed I go.