From: andrew@rentec.com (Andrew Mullhaupt)
Newsgroups: talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Re: Assasination
Date: 26 Aug 92 16:49:29 GMT
Organization: Renaissance Technologies Corp., Setauket, NY.

In article <1992Aug25.002323.29686@ccu.umanitoba.ca> feld@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Michael Feld) writes:
>>There is _no_ distinction among premeditated murders for the good of some
>>group other than if it is self defense or not. 'Morally licit' to who? There
>>are very precise traditional senses in which the Tienanmen murders can be
>>seen as morally licit.

>Look what you are doing:
>	1) if you equate "assassination" with murder, then, using
>standard speech, of course assassination is immoral, because "murder"
>just means "wrongful homicide"; our issue is, under what
>circumstances, if any, is homicide morally acceptable?

I've made allusion to the notion of self-defense as the only possible
avenue here, and I am not convinced of a very wide idea of self-defense
justifying homicide.

But there are some questions about whether wrongful homicide is always
murder. It isn't always premeditated. Assassination, (as far as I can see)
_is_ always premeditated. Then there is the improbable question of consent.
There are recorded cases where weak people in overcrowded lifeboats have
consented to be abandoned to conserve water for the remaining, etc. Surely
this is premeditated homicide, but is it self defense? Assassination does
not seem to involve consent. So Assassination is a special kind of homicide,
and it does not have access to some of the justifications that homicide
might have. The only possible justification is self-defense, (including the
notion of collective defense) which includes the idea that it is possible
to justify shooting down enemy bombers even though you may know you are not
the intended target.

>	2) you drift into the most dangerous (from YOUR point of view)
>sort of moral relativism.  Whose standard of morality are we to use?

In the case of homicide, you should use the broadest possible standard,
which forces you to confront the possibility that since there is limited
agreement as to the justification of assassination, there may be very
few cases (if any) where it can be justified.

>What we are trying to find
>is some common standard, whether by the book ("deontological",
>"utile"), or intuitive (by example), according to which it might be
>possible to judge this real dispute.

I am clear on that. But what you seem to be missing in my argument is the
idea that because there is a lack of agreement, you have to avoid taking
lethal actions which are possibly wrong, or else be irresponsible. In
other words, I am claiming that unless the argument is in fact clearly
settled (and it isn't going to be any time soon) you have to look for other
means to accomplish the purposes which assassination may have served.

Now there is relativism here - the lack of agreement. But there is also an
overcoming of relativism - the universal dubiousness of justification. I don't
(personally) need this point to fit into my philosophy - I take it as a datum.
This attitude towards homicide is merely a reflection of my _fundamental
trust_, and I take it as a _datum_ more than as a corollary to other beliefs.

(Just like Kant, I have to start somewhere. But as Adler points out, the
goal of philosophy is to render clear things which we _already know_. The
philosophy which you can conjure out of thin air is somewhat of a museum
curiosity.)

Later,
Andrew Mullhaupt