You are an American B-52 bomber pilot during the 1991 Persian Gulf war. Your assignment is to carry out "carpet bombing" of Iraqi army positions. Your commanders believe that such bombing will cause many casualties among the Iraqi troops, which will have a demoralizing effect on the enemy and make the job of the Allied ground forces much easier when the war reaches later stages. Because B-52s carry huge bomb loads and drop their bombs from very high altitudes, they can do massive damage when they hit their targets, but they are much less accurate than "smart weapons" like laser-guided bombs and cruise missiles. Although your targets are military ones, there is no way to guarantee that there will be no collateral damage to civilians and it is likely that the bombs your aircraft delivers will cause some civilian casual ties.
A 17-year-old girl, Carolyn Marshall, is in the hospital with leukemia. Her physician, Dr. Kirkland, has determined that her condition is very serious and that she will die within weeks if she does not receive blood transfusions. Even with the trans fusions, she will not be cured and can expect to live no more than 5 or 6 additional years. Both Carolyn and her adoptive parents are members of the Jehovah's Witness church, and they strongly believe in its teachings. Those teachings prohibit the use o f blood transfusions. Because of their religious convictions, Carolyn and her parents refuse Dr. Kirkland's recommendation that Carolyn receive the transfusions, which offer the only hope of prolonging her life. Despite his strong urgings, he cannot cha nge their minds. Her parents are willing to let Carolyn make the final decision, but they make it very clear that they do not believe that she should desert her religious belief, even in order to prolong her life. They suggest to her that she transfer t o a Jehovah's Witness physician, but she refuses to do so. Dr. Kirkland knows that he can get a court order compelling the transfusions, since Carolyn is only 17. He must decide whether to get the court order overruling the wishes of Carolyn and her par ents.( This case was shown on videotape in class.)
A famous puzzle that has interested philosophers and others is the Prisoners' Dilemma. Two partners in crime, Tom and Dick, have committed a serious crime. They have been arrested and lodged in separate jails while awaiting trial. They are not perm itted to communicate with each other. The prosecutor offers each of them a deal: confess and testify against the other in return for a reduced sentence. If only one confesses, he receives a one-year prison term while the other gets ten years in prison. If both confess, each gets a five-year sentence; if neither confesses, the prosecutor's case is weakened and each gets a three-year term. The situation is summarized in the following table:
| Dick confesses | Dick does not confess | |
|---|---|---|
| Tom confesses | 5 yrs. (T), 5 yrs. (D) | 1 yr. (T), 10 yrs. (D) |
| Tom does not confess | 10 yrs. (T), 1 yr. (D) | 3 yrs. (T), 3 yrs. (D) |
As hospital authorities despair over budget cuts and a lack of funds, a child is rushed to emergency in need of a liver transplant. The child is uninsured, and the famil y is much too poor to pay for the procedure. The hospital-director, struggling to allocate scarce resources, must decide whether to absorb the $100,000 cost of the transplant, without which the child will die, or instead to fund a new neonatal intensive care unit that could prevent up to 30 infants from dying within the next year. ( This case was shown on videotape in class.)
In 1944, a group of German military officers, led by Colonel Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, attempted to assassinate Adolph Hitler. The attempt failed, and the conspirators were rounded up and executed by the Gestapo. The officers believed that the war (World War II) was lost for the Germans and that removing Hitler from power was the only way to bring the war to an early end and to avoid the massive killing and destruction that would occur if Germany fought to the bitter end.
The following article appeared in The Daily Mining Gazette several months ago:
By BRADY Walters
MARQUETTE--A former tobacco industry researcher who was fired after
finding a substitute for nicotine maintained here this week that he's not
on an anti-smoking crusade.
At a newly constructed laboratory at Phillip Morris' Virginia
headquarters, DeNoble conducted secret research to find a drug that would
not affect the human cardiovascular system, but would mimic nicotine's
effects on the brain.
The cigarette maker subsequently suppressed attempts to publish his
findings, he said.
Thomson News Service
"I don't have the right to tell anyone not to smoke," Victor DeNoble told
area young people involved in the Marquette County Tobacco or Health
Coalition. But how can you make that decision if the company is
withholding the information you need to decide."
In 1984, cigarette manufacturer Phillip Morris fired DeNoble and abandoned
his research project to find an alternative to nicotine. He had worked
for the company, which makes Marlboro, Merit and Virginia Slims
cigarettes, from 1980 to 1984.
"I thought it was wonderful," DeNoble said. "They were cleaning up their
product."
In 1982, DeNoble found such a chemical, known as methylnicotine, and
presented it to the company. The 47-year-old DeNoble, with degrees in
experimental and physiological psychology, said methl-nicotine does not
affect the heart, but is more addictive than nicotine.
At the same time, however, Phillip Morris was fending off a lawsuit filed
by the family of a deceased woman smoker. The family, claiming that
cigarettes are a defective product, argued the company was responsible for
the woman's death. The mere existence of his research, DeNoble believes,
might have compromised Phillip Morris' case by suggesting company
officials knew their product is harmful.
"They would have been admitting that there was a problem and that it could
have been corrected," DeNoble said.
And in 1984, his lab was closed, data and personal items confiscated, and
he and his associate, Paul Mele, were fired.
"The lab basically disappeared in a day," DeNoble said.
Finally, some 10 years later, DeNoble was released from his secrecy
agreement with Phillip Morris and allowed to speak about his research at
Congressional hearings on the tobacco industry.
Now a senior behavior analyst with the state of Delaware's Department of
Retardation, DeNoble makes about 10 trips every year to discuss the
tobacco industry. On the road, he tries to teach others about the ethical
and moral problems behind the management of tobacco companies.
DeNoble concedes that Phillip Morris had every legal right to hold back
information and suppress his work. He argues, however, that the company
did have an ethical obligation to make public his findings on
nicotine.
Still, he defends part of the industry.
"There are honest, good people making money in the tobacco industry__the
farmers and others," he said. "But is the management bad? Yes,
absolutely."