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| title | aliases | tags |
|---|---|---|
| hypotheticals |
Is it immoral to keep free will from people if you had the power to grant it.
This is really two questions. Firstly, is free will a good thing? Secondly, if it is a good thing — is withholding it immoral? Before I answer these questions, Is deciding things for other people moral or immoral? There's no way to know what people want, and I don't think you have the right to decide for them. To answer the first question, I think each person must come to their own conclusion. This means it would be immoral no matter what decision you make. However, from a purely consequentialist perspective, if we assume that most people think free will is a good thing, there is a net positive amount of "goodness" that results from forcing free will on everyone — even those who don't want it. Therefore, enforcing free will is a moral thing to do. The questions remains however, of whether it is immoral to not do a moral thing. My opinion is that it would not me immoral. For example, I don't think it is immoral for me to not volunteer for 3 days a week picking up trash. I think there is a difference in the two circumstances though which is the effort required to do the moral thing. I also dont think it would be immoral to not pick up a piece of trash if there was a bin nearby, but I do think it littering is immoral. This implies that there is a line between immoral and moral that depends of the effort of the moral action and the amount ogThus the answer to your hypothetical, from a consequentialist perspective, depend