{"id":46017,"date":"2015-08-12T06:02:27","date_gmt":"2015-08-12T06:02:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=46017"},"modified":"2015-08-12T06:05:04","modified_gmt":"2015-08-12T06:05:04","slug":"the-quantity-of-mercy-is-not-straind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=46017","title":{"rendered":"The quantity of mercy is not strain&#8217;d?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[by <strong>Charles Cameron<\/strong> &#8212; some remedial philosophy at age 71 ]<br \/>\n.<\/p>\n<p>I seem to be doing remedial political philosophy this week. As it happens, I read a Chinese comedian in my youth and was admonished against &#8220;sitting down while running round in circles&#8221; and have been aerating my brain with too much conscious breathing ever since &#8212; neither leaving me much time or interest for what in Oxford in my day was known, somewhat dismissively, PPE &#8212; Philosophy, Politics and Economics.<\/p>\n<p>Which brings me today, and to grabbing lectures in just that sort of thing from Harvard&#8217;s <strong>Michael Sandel<\/strong>, courtesy of YouTube:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0O2Rq4HJBxw\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The video shows Sandel&#8217;s lectures, &#8220;Justice: Putting a Price Tag on Life&#8221;, and &#8220;How to Measure Pleasure&#8221; &#8212; salted with some <em>dark <\/em>humor:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Back in ancient Rome, they threw Christians to the lions in the Coliseum for sport. If you think how the utilitarian calculus would go, yes, the Christian thrown to the lion suffers enormous, excruciating pain, but look at the collective ecstasy of the Romans. .. you have to admit that if there were enough Romans delirious with happiness, it would outweigh even the most excruciating pain of a handful of Christians thrown to the lion.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I enjoyed the two lectures <em>immensely<\/em> &#8212; maybe I should rewind fifty years, and try PPE at Harcard?.<\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p><strong>All of which caused me to wonder:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-pinto-and-lincoln-continental.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-pinto-and-lincoln-continental.png\" alt=\"SPEC pinto and lincoln continental\" width=\"592\" height=\"621\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-46018\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-pinto-and-lincoln-continental.png 592w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-pinto-and-lincoln-continental-286x300.png 286w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 592px) 100vw, 592px\" \/><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>Mark Dowie<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/politics\/1977\/09\/pinto-madness\">Pinto Madness<\/a>\n<li><strong>W Michael Hoffman<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/ridgepoinths.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/Pinto-Case1.pdf\">Case Study: The Ford Pinto<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>See also:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>ES Grush<\/strong> and <strong>CS Saunby<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.autosafety.org\/uploads\/phpq3mJ7F_FordMemo.pdf\">Fatalities Associated with Crash-Induced Fuel Leakage and Fires<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>I mean, all of which made me wonder about <strong>Jeremy Bentham<\/strong>, I suppose.<\/p>\n<p>We had <strong>Locke <\/strong>at Christ Church, staring disdainfully from his portrait during dinners in the Great Hall &#8212; but Bentham? I don&#8217;t think I saw any utility in utilitarianism.<\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p><strong>But then I also wondered:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-trolley-problem-torture.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-trolley-problem-torture.png\" alt=\"SPEC trolley problem torture\" width=\"592\" height=\"621\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-46019\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-trolley-problem-torture.png 592w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/SPEC-trolley-problem-torture-286x300.png 286w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 592px) 100vw, 592px\" \/><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I wondered: how close is the analogy between the <strong>trolly problem<\/strong> and the <strong>ticking bomb torture questionn<\/strong>? Do we start from numbers of likely victims in each case and decide from there, or should we instead start by contemplating torture &#8212; and recognize the abyss staring back at us?<\/p>\n<p><strong>Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>Wikipedia<\/strong>, <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Trolley_problem\">Trolly problem<\/a>\n<li><strong>Michael Sandel<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.openculture.com\/2009\/09\/justice_putting_a_price_tag_on_life_how_to_measure_pleasure.html\">Justice: Putting a Price Tag on Life &#038; How to Measure Pleasure<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>See also:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li><strong>Kyle York<\/strong>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mcsweeneys.net\/articles\/lesser-known-trolley-problem-variations\">Lesser-Known Trolley Problem Variations<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>What <strong>Shakespeare <\/strong>said, though &#8212; getting back to my title &#8212; was &#8220;The quality of mercy is not strain&#8217;d&#8221; &#8212; not the quantity, the <em>quality<\/em> &#8212; unquantifiable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[by Charles Cameron &#8212; some remedial philosophy at age 71 ] . I seem to be doing remedial political philosophy this week. As it happens, I read a Chinese comedian in my youth and was admonished against &#8220;sitting down while running round in circles&#8221; and have been aerating my brain with too much conscious breathing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[526,144,627,332,81,371,1219,218,741,758,522,1095,752,1,259],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-charles-cameron","category-china","category-doublequotes","category-economics","category-harvard","category-humor","category-oxford","category-philosophy","category-poetry","category-quant-qualit","category-questions","category-shakespeare","category-torture","category-uncategorized","category-youtube"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46017"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46017\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46044,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46017\/revisions\/46044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}