Ethics and Killing
The problem: What is wrong with killing a person?
Killing someone is the worst thing (just about) that you can do to that person. Murder is the worst of evils. It is wrong to lie, steal, burn someone's house down, assault or sexually assault anyone. And furthermore, it is easy to explain why these things are wrong – they cause the victim great harm and misery. So you would expect that it would be straightforward to explain why it is wrong to kill someone. If murder is the worst of evils, then it should be obvious what it is that makes it so. But it isn't. In fact there is an ancient argument, due to Epicurus, which attempts to show that death is not an evil for a person at all.
So death, the most terrifying of ills, is nothing to us, since so long as we exist, death is not with us; but when death comes, then we do not exist. It does not concern either the living or the dead, since for the former it is not, and the latter are no more.
Epicurus' argument amounts to saying that death should not be feared because it is not something we suffer. According to Epicurus, the reason we don't suffer death is that there is no point or period of time at which we could suffer it – neither when we are dead or alive.
I don't want to discuss this argument in detail – it does have its defenders. I simply want to suggest that the reason you may not be convinced by it is that whether or not there can be a time at which you suffer from death it is for you an enormous loss. This goes part of the way to understanding what's (morally) wrong with killing.
Return now to the original question. It needs to be rephrased. “What is directly wrong with killing a person? When someone is murdered there are usually disastrous consequences for family, friends and for the community at large. Ignore these consequences for the moment. The philosophical question concerns the wrong done to the victim himself or herself. That is what the word “directly” means in this context. Further, suppose that all cases of killing discussed here are painless, quick and sudden. The reason for this is that we are trying to identify the wrongness specifically of taking someone's life. Usually, of course, killing is associated with pain and fear which are bad even without death. It is wrong for me to threaten to kill you even if I don't actually kill you, because the threat on its own causes you to suffer. However if I kill you without you suffering at all, it is still something extremely bad for you. And the problem here is to identify in exactly what way it is bad for you. If Romulus kills Remus, what wrong exactly has been done to Remus? After all, as Epicurus might say, Remus is now dead and therefore nothing matters to him anymore. But this seems unsatisfactory. Remus has lost the rest of his life, and that's about the worst thing that can happen to him.
Let's try and answer the rephrased question. Killing people is directly wrong for the following three reasons.
- It deprives them of their future life – the quantity and quality of life they otherwise would have had.
- It overrides their autonomy – overrides their basic desire to stay alive.
- It is wrong because it violates their right to life.
The first reason is not without problems. Can we actually talk sensibly about, for example, “the life Remus would have had”? What exactly is a future possibility? Perhaps these questions can be answered by adopting Thomas Nagel's suggestion that Remus is person who not only exists at a certain time but whose future possibilities are part of being the person he is. Thus, if he dies or, say, receives a brain injury which reduces him to the state of a contented infant, then his loss consists in the fact that his future possibilities are unfulfilled. If Nagel is right then this would solve Epicurus' problem. For then Remus could be harmed even after he died – by preventing the fulfilment of Remus' possibilities Romulus has harmed him. (Remus) But is Nagel right? Are your possibilities part of your identity as a person?
Consider reasons (2) and (3). Romulus violates Remus' right to life and his autonomy at the point of killing him. This has nothing to do with Remus' future possibilities. To say that Remus has autonomy means that he is self directed. His actions are a result of his desires, choices and decisions. It is wrong to override a person's autonomy without the strongest of reasons – for example, if a person decides to act in a way which is harmful to others or perhaps to himself. And since one of Remus' most basic desires is the desire to stay alive, it is wrong to kill him. The notion of a right to life is similar to autonomy. But here there is a problem. What gives a person a right to life? Is it a natural right? What exactly is a natural right? And is your right to life simply a right not to be killed, or does it also include a right to have your life saved?
To conclude, are all of (1), (2) and (3) necessary? Is any one of them sufficient to explain the wrongness of killing?
Applications
- Euthanasia: Euthanasia is mercy killing – killing someone whose life is no longer worth living. Consider voluntary euthanasia. If someone whose prospects are bleak persistently expresses a wish to die, then is it morally permissible to kill him or her? In this case there is no violation of autonomy nor, it would seem, any violation of a right to life – consent would waive that right. Thus, if the person's prospects really are bleak – continuous suffering - then there would be no moral reason against killing him or helping him die.. Does this suggest that something has been left out of the account of the wrongness of killing?
- Capital punishment and assassination: The justification of these seems to depend on the existence of a right to life. The argument here is that a convicted killer or brutal tyrant forfeit their right to life and therefore killing them may be morally justifiable. The notion of a right to life is critical in the following way: Assassinating brutal tyrants and executing convicted killers both deprives them of their future life and violates their autonomy. Thus, if these were sufficient grounds for the wrongness of killing, then assassinations and executions would clearly be morally wrong. However, the defender of assassinations and executions can argue that the wrongness of killing requires all of (1) – (3) above. So if a person forfeits his right to life then, despite the presence of conditions (1) and (2), it may nevertheless be morally justified to kill him. Furthermore, it might be said that it is morally justified to kill a murderer or a brutal tyrant so as to avoid the future deaths of their victims.