RES: It is morally permissible to kill one innocent person to save the lives of more innocent people

I'll start with my case, then move on to my opponents. My value for this debate is moral permissibility. This is clearly the inherent value indicated by the resolution, as the resolution asks for a morally permissible action in the face of a moral dilemma. This is different from morality, in that we have a dilemma here, and thus morality for this dilemma is circumstantial. The affirmative does not have to prove that the action is completely moral, but that it is morally permissible, or allowable by morality. The value criterion for the debate will be of Act Utilitarianism. Act Utilitarianism can best be defined as the greatest good for the greatest number, when you are faced with a limited amount of options. The resolution refers to a moral calculus involving life, in that either you kill one person, and save more people, or you don't kill one person, and more people die. Utilitarianism upholds moral permissibility because as free, rational, and moral agents, we have a moral responsibility to maximize the most amount of good that can be achieved from a moral dilemma. Since good is an intrinsic value of morality, then as agents we must understand that a morally permissible action is one that reaps good results. Contention 1) The affirmative clearly results in better consequences, and more good. If we look to the affirmative world, more lives are saved and more rights are protected. Protecting life is essential in all cases, as life is the most important thing one can protect due to the fact that without life, a person has nothing. In this case, either side will result in a loss of life. By killing one innocent, more innocents may be saved, thus resulting in the most protection of life. In order for morality to be achieved, protecting life is pinnacle. A moral action should not result in a massive loss of life; rather, it should do everything to prevent death. The negative is allowing more innocents to die, condemning them to death and minimizing the protection of life in this case. This is acting immorally, whereas the affirmative is acting morally by saving lives. Contention 2) Action and inaction are the same thing in this resolution. Simply put we have two options here, we can kill one person and save lives, or chose not to kill one person and condemn those many innocents to death. The latter option is, in and of itself, a choice and thus an action. By not acting, you are making a conscious decision to allow those people to die and are basically killing them. For example, if person A watches as person B places poison into person C's coffee, and then says nothing, he is making the decision not to save that person's life and is acting to kill him. His inaction is an action and thus for this resolution action and inaction are the same thing. (((((((((((((((((((((((((((((REFUTE)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) >>V: Morality. First off, as i have shown, the intrinsic value of the resolution is moral permissibility. This is circumstantial, as this is a moral dilemma, and we must clearly look at the entire picture. Second, my opponent is correct that we all have moral obligations, or "moral duties to others." However, this is a clear contradiction of my opponents case. Do we not have a moral duty to save lives? We clearly have contrasting obligations here, and I will show later why my opponent's obligation is flawed. >>VC: Categorical Imperative. This is a flawed VC for the following reasons. 1) Kant, when developing his ideas, placed them in the context of a perfect world, and never took into account different situations. 2) The idea of the Categorical Imperative should be ignored in this round simply because, as I have show, action and inaction are the same thing in this resolution. Therefore, whatever my opponent claims that the affirmative does to violate the CI, she does to all those she is essentially killing. >>"Contention One: the killing of an innocent person in itself is a contradictory idea, conflicting with the first formulation of the Categorical Imperative........" My opponent seems to be claiming that since the affirmative kills one innocent person, it is inherently evil. First tie this back to what I said earlier about the resolution asking for what is allowed by morality. Clearly the affirmative is allowed because it will result in a net gain of life. Second, if the idea of killing an innocent person is contradictory, then this second contention is contradictory, as the negative is essentially killing more innocent people. Third, my opponent is looking for a perfect duty. This simply cannot be found where the only two options are killing, or killing more people. >>"Contention Two: The affirmative world doesn't fit under the third formulation of the Categorical Imperative of autonomy" This contention is completely contradictory. Simply put, my opponent is arguing that we cannot affirm because we cannot state as to if we will be the person killed or the person killing, or in the equation at all. However, this also applies to the negative world. My opponent, who is killing those other people, must apply this to her action as well. Therefore the "veil of ignorance" also states that she is acting immorally because she cannot say as to if she will be the person killed in the affirmative world, or one of the many people killed in the negative world. End thesis: My opponent's case, in the end, would conclude that both the affirmative and negative are immoral. However, as the resolution states, we are looking for a morally permissible action, or an action allowed by morality, and thus we look for which outcome is better in this dilemma. Therefore we look to the affirmative case, which clearly shows that the affirmative results in a much better outcome and thus is allowed.