graded absolutism

Suppose you're a teller in a bank. A robber grabs a customer, holds a gun to the customer's head, and says, "Unless you give me all the money in your drawer, I'll blow his brains out." What should you do?

A. Give the robber the money, thereby playing an active part in a robbery.
B. Don't give the robber the money, thereby playing a passive part in a murder.

Answer: A

Giving the robber the money has the effect of enabling him to commit robbery, but that's not your intention. You're not trying to help him do wrong, either as a goal or as a means to some other goal. Your intention is merely to keep him from committing the even graver wrong of murder.

- Adapted from J. Budziszewski, Ballot Box Blues

Jim finds himself in the central square of a small South American town. Tied up against the wall are a row of twenty Indians, most terrified, a few defiant, in front of them several armed men in uniform. A heavy man in a sweat-stained khaki shirt turns out to be the captain in charge and, after a good deal of questioning of Jim which establishes that he got there by accident while on a botanical expedition, explains that the Indians are a random group of the inhabitants who, after recent acts of protest against the government, are just about to be killed to remind other possible protestors of the advantages of not protesting.

However, since Jim is an honoured visitor from another land, the captain is happy to offer him a guest's privilege of killing one of the Indians himself. If Jim accepts, then as a special mark of the occasion, the other Indians will be let off. Of course, if Jim refuses, then there is no special occasion, and Pedro here will do what he was about to do when Jim arrived, and kill them all.

Jim, with some desperate recollection of schoolboy fiction, wonders whether if he got hold of a gun, he could hold the captain, Pedro and the rest of the soldiers to threat, but it is quite clear from the set-up that nothing of that kind is going to work: any attempt at that sort of thing will mean that all the Indians will be killed, and himself. The men against the wall, and the other villagers, understand the situation, and are obviously begging him to accept. What should he do?

A. Accept the captain's offer, thereby playing an active part in a murder.
B. Refuse the captain's offer, thereby playing a passive part in 20 murders.

- Adapted from J.J.C. Smart and B. Williams, Utilitarianism: For and Against

if the answer to the first example is A (which seems right), then the answer to the second example must be A as well (which does not seem right).

*****

what if we apply graded absolutism?

A. Accept the captain's offer, thereby playing an active part in a murder.
B. Refuse the captain's offer, thereby playing a passive part in 20 murders.

A. Accept the captain's offer, thereby saving 19 lives.
B. Refuse the captain's offer, thereby not saving any lives.

in accepting the captain's offer, Jim is materially cooperating with the captain. however, Jim is innocent because while he is materially cooperating with the captain, he is not formally cooperating with the captain.

in other words, Jim is innocent because while he is materially committing a murder, he is not formally committing a murder (he is formally saving 19 lives).