Another Animal Axiom Question

[J1mmy Dool1ttle]

Actually torturing a cat is sick and if you'd stand there and watch it then you are too.

[Al68]

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Actually torturing a cat is sick and if you'd stand there and watch it then you are too.

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He didn't say he would stand there and watch, he said he wouldn't blow the guy's hand off, and I agree. Of course the guy deserves his hand blown off, or worse, but that doesn't obligate me to commit a violent crime, even if there were no consequences.

[sandman-54]

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Absolutely not. And anybody who thinks they would needs to either pull their head out of their ass and get back to reality, or they're really sick.

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Actually, I would rather a guy's hand be blown off. I think if he were just going to kill the cat painlessly, that would swing my decision the other way. But an animal being tortured to death, one capable of feeling pain very similar to ours, seems worse to me.

[samsonite2100]

I think from a purely utilitarian standpoint, you're making the world a worse place by blowing someone's hand off than you are by saving a cat's life. The burden of hospital bills + a lifetime of diminished utility + whatever mental damage you do to someone by blowing their hand off.

It's a valid point that animal torture does not typically bode well for a young person's future self, but it's by no means 100% predictive. I think people saying yes to this question are answering with their emotions and not their brains.

[Dan.]

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It's a valid point that animal torture does not typically bode well for a young person's future self, but it's by no means 100% predictive. I think people saying yes to this question are answering with their emotions and not their brains.

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I value the life of a cat over the potential benefit from a cat abuser with two hands. It's quite rational really.

[eurythmech]

Of course I would

[Dromar]

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It's a valid point that animal torture does not typically bode well for a young person's future self, but it's by no means 100% predictive. I think people saying yes to this question are answering with their emotions and not their brains.

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I value the life of a cat over the potential benefit from a cat abuser with two hands. It's quite rational really.

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I agree, sort of. I don't really value the life of a cat very much (though I do like cats). OTOH, I consider people who get pleasure from torturing others (animal or human) to have a very negative value. There's only two things that I really hate: rape, and torture (they're basically the same though).

I'd probably shoot them both. They're both equally corrupt in this scenario.

[Brocktoon]

Just so we're all clear. We're assuming that the person whose hand is to be blown off (or not) in this scenario is in fact one of the guys doing the torturing, right?

It seems to me that this is what Sklansky is asking but if you read the original post it is ambiguous enough to be interpreted as the hand of a random third party.

[Dominic]

I'd do it in a second. Can I then put the blown-off hand into the microwave and force the now one-handed [censored] to watch it cook?

[Phil153]

No. The cat will have to suck it up.

I might do the tip of a finger or toe.