That would be part of the consideration, the number of civilians affected. It's actually hard to define a distinction for Borgs.True, but not applicable here. There were no civilian noncombatants among the Borg.
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That would be part of the consideration, the number of civilians affected. It's actually hard to define a distinction for Borgs.True, but not applicable here. There were no civilian noncombatants among the Borg.
The Borg are like the Undead, would that even be considered genocide? It's like killing off a virus that feeds off the population.Is genocide ever right or justifiable...?
For most of us it unfathomable that genocide would ever be right or correct or the right thing to do, but is it ever...?
I'm a fan of Star Trek TNG, and in one of the episodes, and even in a perfect Star Trek world, or even as advanced as that society was or is, in one episode "I, Borg" they come up with a plan to genocide the Borg, but later decide not to do it, (or Picard doesn't go through with it, in the end)...
But in a later episode, when they (starfleet) are having some further problems later on with the Borg, Picard is pretty severely chastised by and admiral for his decision, and told Him he was not here to wrestle with his conscience, and if he has any further opportunities like this or the one he had in the future, that he was under orders to take full advantage of it, and even said to Picard, "Is that understood?"...
Then Picard talks with Riker about it, and talks about how he had the chance to rid the federation of a mortal threat, but he did not do it... Then Riker said he did the moral thing, and Picard says something very interesting, he says that "It may turn out that the moral thing to do, was not the right thing to do..."
So, is genocide ever justifiable...? And if so, when or under what conditions or circumstances or whatever is it so...?
Even in an advanced Star Trek world/reality, they ran into a circumstance or whatever, where it very well might have been very right, and fully justifiable (genocide of another people or race)...
Comments...?
God Bless!
But they aren't undead. They are alive. They are in some sense victims, because they're forced into an overpowering hive mind. But at least two people escaped, Capt. Picard and Seven of Nine. Both became fine people.The Borg are like the Undead, would that even be considered genocide? It's like killing off a virus that feeds off the population.
That's a good point. I tend to find the balance by exploring the extremes.But they aren't undead. They are alive. They are in some sense victims, because they're forced into an overpowering hive mind. But at least two people escaped, Capt. Picard and Seven of Nine. Both became fine people.
The same may be true in more realistic scenarios. A nation or group can be evil, but once they are defeated, the individuals involved can understand that they were sucked up into an evil culture, and they can repent. There have been several examples. This includes members of the military, many of whom may not want to be there.
We may still have to defend ourselves against them, but just because a group seems to have no innocent members doesn't mean we can treat them as soulless.
In the case of "you can't arrest them all" them needing to live with what they've done will need to be prison enough.Desmond Tutu gave an interesting speech (which I'm too lazy to look up) talking about how you deal with the aftermath of a situation where most of the population turned murderous. The best example was Rwanda, but he also used South Africa. You can't put half the population in prison, but you also can't ignore the offenses.
In those two cases they chose to use formal processes where most people would be forgiven if they took public responsibility for what they did. Nurenberg was an attempt at that, but had some defects.
It's an interesting theory, but I still think it makes God out to be the Great Utilitarian. He's optimizing human pleasure vs. human pain. And then the issues raised in my previous post still seem to apply.
Agree, God is good and just. And is it just to use people as means to an end? Is it just to sacrifice some people for the benefit of others?
I can understand why Picard took that stand. He was a victim of the Borg; therefore, he felt that the total eradication of the enemy is the right answer. He was responding from experience while Riker responded from his moral conscience. My people were also once victims of genocide, and those who experienced the horrors of the Japanese occupation would most likely responded in the same way as Picard did. However, I have never experienced genocide. My response would be the same as Riker’s response. Every race has a right to live. And just because their government leader gave the order to commit genocide on another group of people doesn’t mean that every single Japanese was in agreement with their imperialistic government leader at that time. In this sense, Riker did the right thing because they were innocent victims who were assimilated into the Borg as Picard was, but were unable to fight the assimilation as Picard had done.Is genocide ever right or justifiable...?
For most of us it unfathomable that genocide would ever be right or correct or the right thing to do, but is it ever...?
I'm a fan of Star Trek TNG, and in one of the episodes, and even in a perfect Star Trek world, or even as advanced as that society was or is, in one episode "I, Borg" they come up with a plan to genocide the Borg, but later decide not to do it, (or Picard doesn't go through with it, in the end)...
But in a later episode, when they (starfleet) are having some further problems later on with the Borg, Picard is pretty severely chastised by and admiral for his decision, and told Him he was not here to wrestle with his conscience, and if he has any further opportunities like this or the one he had in the future, that he was under orders to take full advantage of it, and even said to Picard, "Is that understood?"...
Then Picard talks with Riker about it, and talks about how he had the chance to rid the federation of a mortal threat, but he did not do it... Then Riker said he did the moral thing, and Picard says something very interesting, he says that "It may turn out that the moral thing to do, was not the right thing to do..."
So, is genocide ever justifiable...? And if so, when or under what conditions or circumstances or whatever is it so...?
Even in an advanced Star Trek world/reality, they ran into a circumstance or whatever, where it very well might have been very right, and fully justifiable (genocide of another people or race)...
Comments...?
God Bless!
Do you believe the Borg, as an entity itself, has just as much right to be here, or be alive, or exist (here) or "whatever", as we do, or have, or are...?I can understand why Picard took that stand. He was a victim of the Borg; therefore, he felt that the total eradication of the enemy is the right answer. He was responding from experience while Riker responded from his moral conscience. My people were also once victims of genocide, and those who experienced the horrors of the Japanese occupation would most likely responded in the same way as Picard did. However, I have never experienced genocide. My response would be the same as Riker’s response. Every race has a right to live. And just because their government leader gave the order to commit genocide on another group of people doesn’t mean that every single Japanese was in agreement with their imperialistic government leader at that time. In this sense, Riker did the right thing because they were innocent victims who were assimilated into the Borg as Picard was, but were unable to fight the assimilation as Picard had done.
The Borg is probably an entity different from its unwilling victims. What assimilates them is the Borg itself. Once they are assimilated, they do whatever the Borg commands them, and they become a single unit. It has a right to live because it is a life....an intelligent life, despite that it doesn’t believe in individual freedom. With that said, because of its criminal behavior of preying on unwilling victims, it’s action should be restricted.Do you believe the Borg, as an entity itself, has just as much right to be here, or be alive, or exist (here) or "whatever", as we do, or have, or are...?
God Bless!
Have you heard of the Crystaline Entity...? Anyway, it's and entity that just does what it does by nature kind of, but, unfortunately it happens to feed off of devouring and scavenging and stripping entire worlds of all life, leaving the planet dead entirely...The Borg is probably an entity different from its unwilling victims. What assimilates them is the Borg itself. Once they are assimilated, they do whatever the Borg commands them, and they become a single unit. It has a right to live because it is a life....an intelligent life, despite that it doesn’t believe in individual freedom. With that said, because of its criminal behavior of preying on unwilling victims, it’s action should be restricted.
I haven’t seen the second Star Trek with the Borg Queen. But from what I gathered, the Borg feels that assimilating everyone into one where everyone acts and thinks as one is not raising the quality of life. It strips everyone of their uniqueness, character, individuality and distinction as an individual. They all turned into Borg and forced to follow whatever is commanded of them by the Borg. Their freedom to choose is taken away as they force their quality of life on everyone.Have you heard of the Crystaline Entity...? Anyway, it's and entity that just does what it does by nature kind of, but, unfortunately it happens to feed off of devouring and scavenging and stripping entire worlds of all life, leaving the planet dead entirely...
But, do, or are, or would, or could the same argument ever be made about the Borg maybe...? Like a whale that devours cuttlefish, as Picard put it with the Crystaline Entity anyway...
And have you seen the second Star Trek TNG movie with the Borg queen...? "We seek to raise quality of life for all species..." "The biological and the synthetic"...
Some of the Borgs arguments are pretty difficult to deny, if you can see it through, or if you are looking at them through a completely objective lens maybe...?
God Bless!
Possibly, but not necessarily. Salvation and a means of Salvation are goods in of themselves, even if nobody chooses to be saved, even if they are able to, and nobody is saved.[
If you consider the death of a rapist in my scenario a “sacrifice,” based on this logic, then yes, absolutely.
Because you are technically using the death of a rapist as a means to protect your wife.
But if those people weren’t “sacrificed,” then the Israelites would not survive and salvation, as something more important than the death of the body, would be lost.But I think in this scenario that salvation is the ends and some people, namely the Canaanites, are sacrificed so that other people can achieve these ends. In this case, yes, salvation is a good in and of itself, as it's the end goal, but the humans aren't.
I would think that it's in fact the rapist who would be treating my wife as a means to an end and thus violating my wife's intrinsic value. I would only be preventing him from using my wife as a means to his ends. Every individual has intrinsic value in-and-of themselves and everyone's lives are not just means to an end, but also ends themselves. So, I would simply be protecting my wife's intrinsic value, and respecting her moral value as a means and ends to herself, against someone violating those principles.
But if those people weren’t “sacrificed,” then the Israelites would not survive and salvation, as something more important than the death of the body, would be lost.
Another thing too - it seems there is a conflation between eternal death and physical death, and it’s a fact that you don’t know the state of each Canaanite post Resurrection.
But doesn’t the rapist still have intrinsic value? You are ultimately using his death as a means to protect somebody else’s intrinsic value.
The Borg represented a special case in that their collective consciousness allowed all Borg to be equally dangerous. The way they're presented in TNG and First Contact, genocide may very well have been the only way to protect the quadrant from them. Their catchphrase is "Resistance is futile". And they go to great lengths to show how futile resistance actually is. So based on those things, it would seem morally justified to wipe them all out.Is genocide ever right or justifiable...?
For most of us it unfathomable that genocide would ever be right or correct or the right thing to do, but is it ever...?
I'm a fan of Star Trek TNG, and in one of the episodes, and even in a perfect Star Trek world, or even as advanced as that society was or is, in one episode "I, Borg" they come up with a plan to genocide the Borg, but later decide not to do it, (or Picard doesn't go through with it, in the end)...
But in a later episode, when they (starfleet) are having some further problems later on with the Borg, Picard is pretty severely chastised by and admiral for his decision, and told Him he was not here to wrestle with his conscience, and if he has any further opportunities like this or the one he had in the future, that he was under orders to take full advantage of it, and even said to Picard, "Is that understood?"...
Then Picard talks with Riker about it, and talks about how he had the chance to rid the federation of a mortal threat, but he did not do it... Then Riker said he did the moral thing, and Picard says something very interesting, he says that "It may turn out that the moral thing to do, was not the right thing to do..."
So, is genocide ever justifiable...? And if so, when or under what conditions or circumstances or whatever is it so...?
Even in an advanced Star Trek world/reality, they ran into a circumstance or whatever, where it very well might have been very right, and fully justifiable (genocide of another people or race)...
Comments...?
God Bless!