![]() ![]() Having gone through the necessary philosophy background and basics, Proios could finally speak on what he would do, based on his own values and expertise. It’s never okay to kill someone for the sake of a greater good, because people have inalienable value.” That is, in strict terms, a Kantian could not take it upon herself to decide another human being’s value - even one who’s so obviously lost his value. As Proios says, “There are other theories, Kantian theories, that human beings have rights and it’s never OK to use them as means. The flip side to utilitarianism is something closer to deontology, a philosophy notably celebrated by Immanuel Kant. The Baby Hitler question - taking history and physics entirely out of the equation - is the same as the trolley question, but expanded to the millions of victims of the Holocaust. Some people say this is what’s wrong with utilitarianism.” Do you pull the lever and save the 20 people, but kill the one person? Utilitarianism says yes. You have to hit one of them and right now you’re going to hit the 20 people, but if you pull a lever you kill the one person. The most well known paradigm is the trolley problem, which Proios explains: “You’re on a train and you’re driving down the road and there’s 20 people on the right track and there’s one person on the left track. A strict utilitarian believes that you always have to maximize the good. The first thing to understand about the Baby Hitler question is that it’s essentially a test case in utilitarianism. As someone whose specialty is considering things logically, philosophically, and morally, he wasn’t ready to render judgement on Baby Hitler. Proios studies ancient philosophy (“especially Plato”), metaethics, and epistemology. “And people don’t face these kinds of situations in real life, so we actually can’t answer the question because we can only answer questions that we actually have to face.” “This wouldn’t happen in real life,” he says. student at the University of Arizona’s College of Social & Behavioral Sciences, tells Inverse the answer to the magazine’s poll “really depends on how we interpret the question because … it’s a really poorly formed question.” It’s also a “dramatically under-described” case. John Proios, a graduate teaching assistant and Ph.D. Spending considerable energy on the question, however, could ultimately be fruitless. Many took a rational approach and argued that removing Hitler from history would not necessarily prevent the evils wrought by metastasizing nationalism in a depressed Germany. Others couldn’t imagine killing any baby - full stop. ![]() Some questioned the time-travel physics of the endeavor. Of course you should do it! He was the leader of the group responsible for modern history’s most infamous genocide. At first glance, that number seems astoundingly low. ![]()
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