this post was submitted on 22 Dec 2024
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The Heinz dilemma is a frequently used example in many ethics and morality classes. One well-known version of the dilemma, used in Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development, is stated as follows: A woman was on her deathbed. There was one drug that the doctors said would save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: “No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it.” So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's laboratory...

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[–] bizarroland@fedia.io 29 points 2 days ago (10 children)

Universal human ethics: Saving a human life is a more fundamental value than the property rights of another person.

This is the camp I am in.

[–] uniquethrowagay@feddit.org 7 points 2 days ago (9 children)

Is this your universal position? I guess you don't give everything you possibly can without starving to a charity that saves human lives.
With the cost of your phone alone you could fund dozens of vaccinations in poor regions that save lives but you don't.

You let those people die for your own selfish reasons.

I'm playing the devil's advocate of course, but it's interesting where people draw the line.

[–] bane_killgrind 2 points 2 days ago

You are just guessing that giving away all your worldly possessions to charities will help people, and not just make some charity management obscenely wealthy.

The Devil's advocate position should be about things the person can directly witness or experience, like do they volunteer their time or have looked for a local place to contribute to etc

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