Ethics of Mass Effect #1 - The Rachni

I'm going to propose a framework for evaluating the round under, and then extrapolate two arguments for sparing the Rachni Queen rather than killing the Rachni Queen. Framework:I propose a framework of evaluating the resolution under the guise of Kantian deontology. What Kant argues, among other things, is that we ought to act in two ways: the first in that we can will our action to be taken by every other rational actor, and that we treat others as ends in themselves and not as means to a different end. What do I mean by these? To act in a way that you can will your action to every other rational actor means that your action must be universizable. And what I mean by universizable is that in the grand context of every other situation of similar context, were any other rational actor in your place, that they would rationally make the same decision that you made. And to treat others as ends in themselves rather than as a means to another end is to respect the individual worth of everyone to not be treated as tools for other people's use. To use someone as a means to another end is to say that they aren't valuable in themselves, but rather that they are only valuable to achieve some other sort of end, which demeans their individual worth. So it's my job to show that sparing the Rachni Queen better meets Kant's views of morality than killing the queen does. Argument One: Right to Self-Determination:I argue that all forms of intelligent life, human or otherwise, have a right to self-determination of themselves and their race. By self-determination I don't mean that I make decisions for all the white people in existence (i. e. I don't say that all white people have to wear red shirts and blue jeans). What I mean is that I ought to be in charge of all the decisions directly responsible to my own person, and humanity ought to be responsible for all the decisions directily responsible to their own persons. No other person should make decisions about what happens to me, and no other race should make decisions about what happens to humanity. Two reasons this is true:1. To determine someone else's decisions is to treat them not as an end within themselves, but as a mean to some other kind of end. To say that my opponent only should wear red shirts is to say that "my opponent is only useful/relevant/moral when he's wearing red shirts", which uses my opponent for the ultimate end of red shirt wearing, not as an end in himself. Only through self-determination can we say that I have the right to act as I'm an end within myself and not someone else using me for some different end.2. To determine someone else's decisions isn't something that we can will upon all other rational actors. I may decide that my opponent should only wear red shirts, but another person might think that red looks bad on him and that he should only wear blue shirts. A third person might think we're both wrong and that he should wear black shirts. Making decisions for others can never be truly universalized, meaning that we ought not make decisions about the fate of others. This has two implications on the round as it pertains to the Rachni Queen. First, killing the Rachi Queen violates both of these principles. It violates the principle of treating others as ends in themselves as we're killing the Rachni to secure future safety for us and to prevent another Rachni Wars from occuring. This uses the death of the Rachni for the end of our safety, which uses the Rachni as a means to another end rather than as an end in itself. And it violates the principle of universizability because not everyone else can be willed to make the same decision. Even members of Shepard's own party don't come to the conclusion of killing, ranging from various degrees of unwillingness. To quote from the wikia[1]: "Liara T'Soni and Tali'Zorah nar Rayya favor releasing the rachni, claiming the krogan went too far while Garrus Vakarian advocates alerting the Council and is against committing wholesale genocide, and Kaidan Alenko favors releasing the rachni only because he thinks killing a whole race is counterproductive to humans staying out of old galactic grudges. " Killing the queen isn't an action that can be universalized upon all other rational actors, and, therefore, violates Kant's vision of ethics. Second, Garrus is correct in that killing the queen constitutes the genocide of the Rachni species. If genocide is defined as the deliberate killing of a particular ethic group of people, then by killing off the last survivng Rachni, we're commiting genocide of an entire species and creating the extinction of an entire race. I shouldn't have to explain why these are in violation of both of Kant's principles, but genocide is most certainly not using the Rachni as a end in themselves, nor is genocide a universizable option. So, to summarize, not only is killing this individual Rachni Queen in violation of Kant's principles, but killing the Rachni as a race is in violation of Kant's principles, which is two reasons why the Rachni Queen ought to be spared. Argument Two: Con's Flawed Premise:I expect Con to make the argument that the killing of the Queen is justified to prevent the possibility of another Rachni Wars. The Rachni Wars were particularly bloody and brutal and almsot lead to the extinction of all other Council Races before the introduction of the Krogan, and seemlingly the only solution then was to "kill or be killed". Letting the Rachni Queen live opens the possibility of her creating another army of Rachni and coming back to finish the job. To prevent future extermination of all life, rather than just the Rachni, the killing of the last Queen would seem justified. There's a few problems with this premise though. The first is that this isn't how Rachni work culturally. To quote from the wikia[1]: "The rachni are a territorial race, determined to remain isolated from the rest of the galaxy. They normally inhabit extremely hazardous worlds, able to survive environments that would kill most sentient species. Should their territory be invaded on purpose or even by accident, they respond with swift and brutal force. " This shows that by nature of thought, the Rachni aren't inherently expansionistic and looking for conflict. They prefer to stay isolated and out of the way of other races and forms of life, and only retaliate if they feel their land and homes have been invaded. This should tell us that if we let them go, and leave them alone, that there's no reason they'll ever come picking a fight against us again. The second is that this queen is innocent of the atrocities of the war. We can tell from the dialogue of the situation at hand from conversing with the Queen that this Queen in particular was still in her egg, yet to be birthed into existence, while the Rachni Wars were being waged. And the Queen promises to "not attack other races again but find somewhere to live in peace, and teach her children about Shepard's forgiveness. " should she be spared from death. This means we have a verbal guarantee that the Rachni Wars won't be replicated. And, we should trust this verbal guarantee because a) of the cultural reasons why the Rachni don't like looking for fights, and b) because among the Rachni, the Queens are responsible for controlling the thinking of all other Rachni. The Rachni as a race operate under a form of hive-mind intelligence, meaning that the leaders control the thralls. And the Queens are the ones responsible for controlling the thoughts and actions of their thralls. With Queens having complete control over the thoughts and actions of the warriros under them, and this Queen in particular pledging to stay the hell away from everyone else, there's no reason not to believe that the Rachni will stay gone for good. Conclusion:Through looking at Kant and his principles of moral decision making, we can see that killing the Rachni Queen isn't a universizable action and it uses not only the queen as a means to an end, but the race as a whole as a means to an end. Sparing the queen is the only option that is consistent with Kant's principles. Source:[1] - . http://masseffect.wikia.com...;