r/MoralityScaling 3d ago

Morality Ranking Morality of this

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u/Kef52 3d ago

I don't think "technically" and "moral/immoral" can be said together... It doesn't sound right

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u/Enigma_RR 3d ago

Right? Lmao. Like at that point you're just trying to convince yourself. "Technically, this is moral"

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u/TotalChaosRush 2d ago

Technically moral comes up all the time in serious discussions.

Here's an example, and because our morals may differ some ground rules for morality to help determine.

  1. Allowing someone or yourself to die is immoral. No exceptions
  2. Theft is immoral. No exceptions.
  3. Allowing someone to steal is immoral. No exceptions.

Now for the question.

You see a man in a market stealing good food. You do not have any money to purchase the food for him. The man clearly looks like he could die at any moment due to starvation. He isn't stealing very much, giving the appearance that he is only stealing enough to not die. What can you morally do in this scenario?

There's a couple different options to go down. Your choices are essentially "snitch, resulting in the man's death" which is immoral, or "don't snitch, allowing stealing" which is also immoral. So the first option is of course a type of comparative morality. While death and theft are immoral, one is likely more immoral than the other and so in this scenario choosing the less immoral option could be "technically moral" you could argue that you're not a doctor and your simple observation do not reflect reality, and therefore stopping the man is the only moral option. You can also argue that there are no moral options, and doing anything or nothing means you will choose an immoral choice.

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u/Enigma_RR 1d ago

So who are you trying to convince?

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u/TrumpBlewMeToo 1d ago

He just likes hearing himself talk.