PHIL-386 Chapter 16: Morality by Glover
3 Jun 2020
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
Those of us who feel that in this case we cannot accept that killing the man would be either morally right or morally neutral must hold that killing is at least sometimes wrong for reasons independent of side effects. One version of this view that killing is directly wrong is the doctrine of the sanctity of life. To state this doctrine in an acceptable way is harder than it might at first seem. We do not want to state the principle in such a way that it must have overriding authority over other considerations. To say taking life is always wrong" commits us to absolute pacifism. But clearly a pacifist and a non pacifist can share the view that killing is in itself an evil. They need only differ over when, if ever, killing is permissible to avoid other evils.
