In 28 Days Later, there is a scene where one of the lead characters kills off another charcter because she knew he was bitten by a zombie. He didn’t turn into a zombie right away though, the lead character killed him because she knew he would turn into a zombie. Now here’s the interesting hypothetical question: was what she did morally okay, or should she have waiten for him to turn into a zombie before killing him? If what she did was morally okay, then does that mean that preemptive attacks are moral?
The way zombies work varies between works. The key question is, is the condition curable, and did this man have access to such a cure?
Of course preemptive attacks are morally justifiable. The trouble with the zombie example is that being a zombie is a state of being and attacking someone for a state of being is not morally justifiable. However, preemptively striking to neutralize an imminent threat to life or property is justifiable. The statist doctrine of preemptive war parasitically rides off this moral intuition. Of course, collectivized versions of preemptive strike are logically and morally defunct.
Clayton -
Why is this the key question? In killing a zombie, we have to make some assumptions:
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Zombies lack free will
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By their nature, being a zombie is a threat to those in the area
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It is acceptable to kill things if by their nature, they are a threat
But in this case, the person who was killed had free will, and was no threat - that much is uncontroversial. So can the permission to kill zombies be extended to this case in a non-problematic way? The fact that the condition is incurable, or there is no accessible cure, only seems to help once we accept that the permission might extend to a human, non-zombie who is certain to become a zombie. If that is true, then abortion should be problematic…
Let’s say that I’m driving along a busy street, and all of a sudden I start losing my eyesight. I can tell that I will be blind in a matter of seconds. Although it’s not my fault that this is happening to me, I would still be guilty of reckless endangerment if I did not immediately pull over and stop driving. The chance of being hit by a blind driver is not one of the risks that is assumed by the rest of the drivers when they go out onto the road.
So, if I’m in a group of people and I know that I’m about to become a zombie, then it’s my duty to sequester myself away from the others, even though it wasn’t my fault that I got infected in the first place. If I nonetheless persist in following you around, then you would be justified in using any means necessary (up to and including killing me) to defend yourself, even while I’m still alive.
In your scenario, it seems that the killer reacted too quickly, and did not even try to reason with the infectee to convince him to lock himself up or take his own life. In that case, she is guilty of something, although perhaps we should take into account the fact that he would certainly have died soon anyway.
I don’t think this is analogous to a preemptive attack, since an attacker is still an acting person, whereas a zombie is not.
Ok, and if you don’t pull over, and you haven’t yet harmed anyone, and someone wants to make you pull over, is there any proportionality test as to what steps they may or may not take? Creating a risk or danger, even an unexpected one, is a problem, but it is not a rights violation, at least not yet. It seems to they can do something, but not necessarily everything, in this case.
But it would take some work to make it necessary, wouldn’t it?
It has been awhile since I saw the movie, but didn’t the virus change them almost immediately? It is all well and good to say that you should give the infected a chance to sequester himself, but there is literally only seconds for you to do so and him to comply.
Perfectly justified. Those who have been infected are imminent threat. Had the character waited for the infected to turn into a zombie it might have been too late, and its only a matter of about 10 seconds anyway. Its the same as if I had a gun in my hand and in ten seconds I was about to shoot you down.
Agreed. If someone is holding a pistol, pointing it at you, do you have to wait to see them squeezing the trigger before you act? Of course not. Same thing here - true, the person didn’t want to become a zombie, but the danger was no less imminent.
But taken to its extreme, this “naive non-aggression principle” - where prediction is not permitted in order to protect against risks and threats - would mean that you are an aggressor if you hit the street thug or bar brawler before he hits you, even though he’s waving his fists in your face and threatening to “knock you the f— out.” In fact, you could only justify striking someone while they are striking you, that is, your striking him is justified only at the very moment his fist connects with your face. This is obviously absurd.
I disagree with Zavoi’s reasoning but he comes to the correct conclusion that a blind driver is not entitled to endanger others on the road.
Clayton -
I didn’t suggest a principle, I asked a question, and my question applies here as well. We can rule out what you call the naive non-aggression principle which permits no prediction. But this doesn’t mean that all predictions are valid, or that you can do anything you want once you have a prediction in place. I’d submit all use of force to proportionality requirements, not just “predictive force” but I might suggest that the proportionality test is higher here. If someone has not struck you, you certainly don’t gain over one where he is currently hitting you - in the latter case, I would not permit the use of deadly forcce, and it follows that I wouldn’t permit it before he hits you. You can use some force, but proportionality remains intact. Further, it might matter that the barroom brawler is committing his aggression of his own free will, which is not the case in the pre-zombie situation.
You owe the zombie’s family reparations, granted they haven’t been chewn on already.
Quoted for funny