Do you have the right to hurt someone?

[ThunderPeel2001]

Following on from Rodi's "Is eating children immoral?" thread, I thought I'd pose another Big Question:

Do you have the right to hurt someone?

I'm speaking not just physically, but also emotionally. For example: If someone has hurt you, do you have the right to hurt them back?

I have formulated my own opinion on this, but I'm interested in hearing others.

[Orv]

[elmuerte]

I'm pretty sure Rodi's post was about having children, not eating them.

Also, hurting people is not a right, it's a privilege

[Nappi]

Haha.. Now, that could have turned into a heated debate.

[ThunderPeel2001]

I'm pretty sure Rodi's post was about having children, not eating them.

Sure it was...

[ThunderPeel2001]

That guy has hypnotic fingers.

[Orv]

That guy? For shame.

[ThunderPeel2001]

That guy? For shame.

I forget his name...

[ThunderPeel2001]

As no-one (seemingly) wants to tackle this particular hot potato, I'll try and get the ball rolling by injecting a bit of grey...

What if someone was physically attacking you in a life-threatening way?

[Orv]

You disable or kill them.

Why is that a question?

(Neil DeGrasse Tyson.)

[toblix]

Depends on their motivation, I guess. If it's an evil laughing killer I'd try to kill them. If someone mentally unstable came at me, or I was unclear about their motivation (maybe they're thinking I'm out to kill them, and are acting in self defence, or they're being forced to attack me) I'd probably go for a crippling attack.

This is, of course, in a fantasy world where I'm able to read people's intentions, quickly analyse their mental state (and being "mentally unstable" is a clear-cut and absolute thing) and kill or cripple anyone or anything.

[TychoCelchuuu]

Yeah obviously there are circumstances where you have a right to hurt someone emotionally. If someone is in love with you and wants to get married, you can refuse, even if that hurts them emotionally. You have a right to refuse marriage to anyone.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Yeah obviously there are circumstances where you have a right to hurt someone emotionally. If someone is in love with you and wants to get married, you can refuse, even if that hurts them emotionally. You have a right to refuse marriage to anyone.

Nice answer! I hadn't thought of that. I've revised my personal answer to my original question accordingly:

Unless someone is in mortal danger, you don't have the right to maliciously emotionally or physically hurt someone.

And we, as human beings, do it all the time.

[TychoCelchuuu]

Well, now things get confusing, because "maliciously" is a very loaded word. For something to be malicious, at least the way I think about it, you have to intend to harm someone for no reason other to harm them, and that's almost tautologically wrong. Whether you can have a right to do something that is always wrong is a complicated question and turns as much on what you think rights are as it does on the question I think you're asking here, which is whether it's OK to harm someone in certain circumstances. The answer to THAT question is "sometimes," but certainly not maliciously, because malice implies that you are only doing it in order to do something wrong. And it's never right to do something wrong.

What you likely have in mind are things like "an eye for an eye" where if someone does something wrong to me I can do something wrong to them in return. If I did this, though, I don't think that would be malicious, or at least not malicious in a bad way - I intend to harm them, but not for no reason other than to harm them. I only intend to harm them as payback. So this is not a question about whether it's OK to harm someone maliciously - it's a question of whether certain actions (harming someone maliciously) provide an opportunity for other certain actions (harming someone retributively). This is a tough question but it's much more specific than the more general "is it ever OK to harm anyone" question.

There are as many kinds of harm in the world as there are things you can do to people, so you're never going to answer the general question. For each specific harm, there are questions about whether they can be justified, for example through a principle like "an eye for an eye," but this won't give us a general answer. You might be better served by choosing one of these principles and asking whether they can be justified. For instance, is it OK to send someone to jail for something they've done even if we're almost certain (or even 100% certain) they will never do it again? It harms someone to go to jail, but some people say that criminals DESERVE this harm. If we send someone to jail, I don't think we do it maliciously: we do it because they deserve it. But maybe that is indefensible. Others say that nobody deserves any harm, ever (and thus the only time we're allowed to harm someone is in a case like my refusal to marry or self-defense when some other value trumps the harm we are doing).

To answer your more specific question, though, I would say "yes, people have a right to harm others maliciously - I have a right to refuse to marry you solely in order to make you sad, because even though I don't care about whether we're married or not, I DO care that you suffer because you are in love with me." Otherwise we would have to say that I have no right to refuse to marry you as long as I wouldn't mind being married. That strikes me as odd. Another possible place to attack my position would be by arguing that nobody can ever have a right to do something that is wrong, but that is an argument about rights and duties and permissions and so on that I think gets far afield of your topic, as I mentioned above.

Also, your statement being qualified with "unless someone is in mortal danger" strikes me as odd. Why would I have a right to maliciously harm someone just because mortal danger is involved? Surely it would be OK for me to harm someone to avert mortal danger, but then I wouldn't be acting maliciously. In fact, I am probably acting permissibly or even virtuously, if harming someone is the only option, right? If I did so not in order to avert mortal danger but just to be a jerk, this doesn't seem to make it OK - I might luck out and cause a good outcome, but I'm still an evil person by maliciously harming someone. I just got lucky that my malice happened to avert mortal danger, accidentally (from my point of view).

[ThunderPeel2001]

Malicious = "Out of spite, without good reason."

"Payback" is not good reason in my books. The desire for revenge is driven by spite. It will not actually undo the hurt they've caused you.

Sending people to prison for a crime they've commited, even if they will never do it again (can you think of any crime you could only ever commit once...?), is not punishing them out of spite. The decision is being made by people who are not emotionally involved in the case. And even if you could think of a crime that can only be commited once, people may be punished in order to serve the greater good: For example, to send a signal to others who may be considering committing that crime and getting away with it because they can only do it once.

I can't say I understand your marriage example. If you don't wish to marry someone, it's not spiteful to say "no". If you want to marry someone, but you say "no" just because you want to hurt them (and I'm sure people have actually been that silly and childish -- love does strange things to people), then that's out of spite. I just cannot imagine a scenario where someone wouldn't care if they were to spend the rest of their lives married to someone...?

Finally, yep, you're right. What I said needs serious re-wording. It doesn't make sense to harm someone out of spite if you're actually trying to advert permanent disaster. Let me try again:

I don't think you have the right to hurt anyone, emotionally or physically, under any circumstances, unless you really dislike them unless it's not done out of spite.

Does that cover it?

[Orv]

I think you can further par it down to "do not do harm except out of necessity."

Of course then you have to line out what is necessity and oh god stop having meaningful conversations on my internet.

[Forbin]

I think physical and emotional harm both have thresholds for what is allowed. Physical is pretty severely limited, slapping someone is technically enough to get charged for assault. Emotional harm is a bit harder to see where the line is, but you can definitely cross it. People have been convicted for crimes relating to causing other people to do something like hurt themselves or other people. For example, that woman that cyber-bullied the neighbors daughter to the point that she committed suicide.

I'm not sure if there's a proper definition of rights outside a legal system. I guess they also fit into moral or religious systems as well, but those are different for everyone. "Basic human rights" aren't even universally accepted. The Golden Rule is accepted by most cultures, and "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" I think suggests that most people don't believe you have the moral right to purposefully harm someone, physically or emotionally.

[ThunderPeel2001]

The Golden Rule is accepted by most cultures, and "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" I think suggests that most people don't believe you have the moral right to purposefully harm someone, physically or emotionally.

[tangent]I like the Golden Rule. I don't understand why the 10 Commandments weren't just reduced to that. Surely The One Commandment! works better and is easier to remember?[/tangent]

[ThunderPeel2001]

oh god stop having meaningful conversations on my internet.

Sorree! Rodi started it!

[TychoCelchuuu]

Okay, ThunderPeel, you defined maliciousness as doing something out of "spite" but this just pushes the problem back - what is "spite," and can you give a definition of spite that doesn't render "it is wrong to act out of spite" basically tautological?

You're misunderstanding the idea behind punishment. There are two classic defenses of putting people in jail - deterrence and retribution. Deterrence, which you mention for some reason, has nothing to do with maliciousness or spite or the conversation at all, really, because it's just an example of "do something wrong in service of the greater good" but I take it you're not really asking about those cases. Unless you ARE asking about those cases, which brings me back to the obvious answer which is YES you have a right to do these sorts of things. Self-defense is the most obvious example.

The other defense of putting people in jail is retribution. This is the idea that the world is a better place if people are punished for their crimes. Thus, if someone does something wrong but putting them in jail would not prevent ANY further wrong, by ANYONE, it would STILL be good to put them in jail because they deserve it. Would this be done out of spite? No, probably not, but it sounds like you want to rule out this kind of punishment as being impermissible. It's revenge, but not out of spite. So, is this sort of thing OK?

You say it's not spiteful to refuse to marry someone. But in the example I gave, it totally is. So if it's never OK to hurt someone out of spite, should I be forced to marry you? I won't mind the marriage. I'll mostly ignore you. Do we have a shotgun wedding in the offing? Or do I still have the right not to be your betrothed?

So I think I've provided at least one counterexample to your principle. I think I have a right not to marry you out of spite. I think it would be wrong to force me to marry you even if I wouldn't mind the marriage. I think I could provide other counterexamples to your principle too, but let's keep this simple for now.

The point about punishment has brought up another problem with your principle - it's under-inclusive for your purposes, I think. It seems like you want to rule out retributive punishment, but that is not done out of spite. It is done for retributive purposes ideally by uninterested parties.

[TychoCelchuuu]

I think physical and emotional harm both have thresholds for what is allowed. Physical is pretty severely limited, slapping someone is technically enough to get charged for assault. Emotional harm is a bit harder to see where the line is, but you can definitely cross it. People have been convicted for crimes relating to causing other people to do something like hurt themselves or other people. For example, that woman that cyber-bullied the neighbors daughter to the point that she committed suicide.

The original question was whether it was ever okay to hurt someone, physically and/or emotionally, and it seems like you are implying the answer is "yes, definitely." You give examples of when it isn't okay, but I take this to imply that there are examples where it IS okay. A slap isn't alright, but how about a pinch? Can I pinch someone without their permission? What about a poke with my finger? Is it alright for me to poke someone? It seems to me that it's never okay to hurt someone even a little bit unless they agree to it, or it's for their own good, or for someone else's greater good, or something like this. Just straight up physically harming someone strikes me as always wrong. There isn't any "threshold." It's just wrong, period.

Emotional harm strikes me as the same. There's no line you can cross, below which it's fine to emotionally harm someone. Unless you have a nobler purpose in mind and the harm is necessary to accomplish that purpose, then it's off the table and impermissible no matter how small the harm is. Just because you won't commit suicide if I insult you doesn't make it okay for me to insult you.

Now of course almost nobody walks around physically or emotionally harming others without at least thinking that this is in service of some greater good. But that is my point. There's no threshold under which it's fine to harm people. Someone who walked around harming people saying "well it's okay, I'm only harming them a bit, it's under the threshold" would be a horrendous asshole.

I'm not sure if there's a proper definition of rights outside a legal system. I guess they also fit into moral or religious systems as well, but those are different for everyone. "Basic human rights" aren't even universally accepted. The Golden Rule is accepted by most cultures, and "do unto others as you would have them do unto you" I think suggests that most people don't believe you have the moral right to purposefully harm someone, physically or emotionally.

I find it odd that the idea that moral systems are different for everyone would be a problem for defining what rights are. Maybe we just need to resolve the confusion. People have all sorts of different ideas of how physics works (does a heavy object fall faster than a light object?) and of how many gods exist (one? zero? twelve?) and so on but that doesn't mean there's no right answer. Couldn't all the different ideas about what sorts of rights people have just be a similar kind of confusion? Some decades ago, most people in America took it for granted that African Americans had basically no moral rights and women had a lot fewer moral rights. Surely they weren't just of a different opinion than us - they were WRONG, right?

[ThunderPeel2001]

Okay, ThunderPeel, you defined maliciousness as doing something out of "spite" but this just pushes the problem back - what is "spite," and can you give a definition of spite that doesn't render "it is wrong to act out of spite" basically tautological?

This really doesn't read well, but I think I gather what you mean. Yes, it's quite possible that since you made the distinction between hurting someone out of necessity, and hurting them out of spite, it seems quite obvious that doing anything out of spite is morally reprehensible. Which means I'm agreeing with you, which also means I have no idea what you're asking me to say.

You're misunderstanding the idea behind punishment. There are two classic defenses of putting people in jail - deterrence and retribution. Deterrence, which you mention for some reason, has nothing to do with maliciousness or spite or the conversation at all, really, because it's just an example of "do something wrong in service of the greater good" but I take it you're not really asking about those cases. Unless you ARE asking about those cases, which brings me back to the obvious answer which is YES you have a right to do these sorts of things. Self-defense is the most obvious example.

I'm not misunderstanding anything here. I think you completely missed what I'm saying, so again, I have no idea how to respond :-/ Obviously I was referring to your notion of sending someone to jail EVEN THOUGH they could never commit 'X' crime again. As you wrote:

For instance, is it OK to send someone to jail for something they've done even if we're almost certain (or even 100% certain) they will never do it again? It harms someone to go to jail, but some people say that criminals DESERVE this harm. If we send someone to jail, I don't think we do it maliciously: we do it because they deserve it.

I was merely pointing out that we don't just send people to prison "because they deserve it", even if they could "never commit the crime again": Another reason is deterrence.

The other defense of putting people in jail is retribution. This is the idea that the world is a better place if people are punished for their crimes. Thus, if someone does something wrong but putting them in jail would not prevent ANY further wrong, by ANYONE, it would STILL be good to put them in jail because they deserve it. Would this be done out of spite? No, probably not, but it sounds like you want to rule out this kind of punishment as being impermissible. It's revenge, but not out of spite. So, is this sort of thing OK?

I'm not sure you understand the definition of "revenge". Courts, and the society they represent, are not acting out of revenge.

Also, as we both agree courts are not acting out of spite, I'm not sure why you expect me to consider Retribution to be a bad thing?

(I should probably point out that there are MANY justifications for Criminal Justice, not just Deterrence and Retribution. Incapacitation (keeping the streets free of criminals) is one. Rehabilitation is yet another. I have studied this in the years gone by.)

You say it's not spiteful to refuse to marry someone. But in the example I gave, it totally is. So if it's never OK to hurt someone out of spite, should I be forced to marry you? I won't mind the marriage. I'll mostly ignore you. Do we have a shotgun wedding in the offing? Or do I still have the right not to be your betrothed?

Your example is so bizarre and unlikely that it's meaningless.

The point about punishment has brought up another problem with your principle - it's under-inclusive for your purposes, I think. It seems like you want to rule out retributive punishment, but that is not done out of spite. It is done for retributive purposes ideally by uninterested parties.

I don't know where you've gotten the idea I wish to rule out retributive punishment...? Punishment != Revenge. With that in mind, I guess my principle still stands?

[Forbin]

I find it odd that the idea that moral systems are different for everyone would be a problem for defining what rights are. Maybe we just need to resolve the confusion. People have all sorts of different ideas of how physics works (does a heavy object fall faster than a light object?) and of how many gods exist (one? zero? twelve?) and so on but that doesn't mean there's no right answer. Couldn't all the different ideas about what sorts of rights people have just be a similar kind of confusion? Some decades ago, most people in America took it for granted that African Americans had basically no moral rights and women had a lot fewer moral rights. Surely they weren't just of a different opinion than us - they were WRONG, right?

I wish I could remember where I saw this before. But a group of people were trying to study the principles and morals of different societies and try to tie them to large scale data to see their impact. The goal was to come up with objective answers to what seemed like subjective opinions. It was interesting, but a bit like Freakanomics in the way that they would probably never be able to definitively prove something, but they could wave their hands at some interesting correlations.

[TychoCelchuuu]

This really doesn't read well, but I think I gather what you mean. Yes, it's quite possible that since you made the distinction between hurting someone out of necessity, and hurting them out of spite, it seems quite obvious that doing anything out of spite is morally reprehensible. Which means I'm agreeing with you, which also means I have no idea what you're asking me to say.

I'm asking you to give a different answer to the question. Your current answer says "it's wrong to hurt people when it's wrong to hurt them," basically. You don't seem to have answered the question of WHEN it's wrong to hurt others. Is it ALWAYS wrong? SOMETIMES wrong? In what circumstances? Etc.

I was merely pointing out that we don't just send people to prison "because they deserve it", even if they could "never commit the crime again": Another reason is deterrence.

Deterrence is another POSSIBLE reason. In reality we don't have ONE justification - people are split. I have spoken with a former chief prosecutor of like Missouri or something (can't remember) and asked him whether he sent people to fry in the electric chair for deterrence, retribution, or both. He said he does not believe that punishing people deters any criminal behavior. He thinks the only reason to punish people, even to execute them, is retribution. Is he wrong?

I'm not sure you understand the definition of "revenge". Courts, and the society they represent, are not acting out of revenge.

Also, as we both agree courts are not acting out of spite, I'm not sure why you expect me to consider Retribution to be a bad thing?

Well, if you aren't, then I misread what you're saying.

(I should probably point out that there are MANY justifications for Criminal Justice, not just Deterrence and Retribution. Incapacitation (keeping the streets free of criminals) is one. Rehabilitation is yet another. I have studied this in the years gone by.)

These aren't great arguments for hurting someone via punishment. Incapacitation isn't great because I specified in my example that the people in question won't commit crime again. Rehabilitation is an argument for hutting someone with punishment only because the hurt is a necessary evil in service of a greater good, and then we're back to square one. I'm looking for a justification for hurting someone JUST TO HURT THEM. This is the only case that can answer your original question, which is "do you have the right to hurt someone?" I take it basically everyone on EARTH would answer "yes" if the question is "is it okay ever to hurt someone for the greater good, including their own greater good." The more interesting question is "do you have a right to hurt someone in other cases" because that's the ones about which there can be dispute.

Your example is so bizarre and unlikely that it's meaningless.

This is really unproductive. You've asked a broad, sweeping question about moral justification and proposed one simple way of solving it. I've given a thought experiment that isolates the relevant variables and argued that your principle gives us the wrong answer in the thought experiment, with the implication that your principle fails in the relevant real life situations that are much more complicated (and realistic, of course).

Since you insist on a realistic example rather than a thought experiment, though, how about this: throughout most of history in western civilization, people have married largely for economic reasons and for other reasons that have nothing to do with love. Your parents want you to marry some dude you don't like because your older brother will get to work in the dude's business and eventually take it over when the dude dies. Is it OK for you not to marry the dude? He'll be crushed - he's totally smitten with you. You won't really mind the marriage - all of your siblings, your parents, your friends, etc. are pretty much all married for economic reasons, and that's totally normal. You know you'd have a fine life with this guy, and it would be sweet for your brother's business prospects. You still have the right to refuse marriage, right? Even though you do it just out of spite because you are a jerk and hate this guy.

I don't know where you've gotten the idea I wish to rule out retributive punishment...? Punishment != Revenge. With that in mind, I guess my principle still stands?

Again, I misread you or something. It doesn't really matter.

[Orv]

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