English

Instruction

 

Spring 2023 Final Exam Essay Read the case given below and then write an essay in response to the prompts at the end of the case. You may work alone, in pairs, or in groups to discuss the case and how the various moral theories we discussed in class would apply to this case. However, your essay should be composed by you alone. That is, no essays should be identical to any other person’s essay.

Your essay should have the following info in the top left-hand side of the essay. Your name (first & last) PHIL 1301 and your section number (41007, 41006, 41003, or 41001) Spring 2023 Final Exam Essay Your responses should be typed and single-spaced.

Sailors & Cannibalism

In the summer of 1884, four English sailors were stranded at sea in a small lifeboat in the South Atlantic, over a thousand miles from land. Their ship, the Mignonette, had gone down in a storm, and they had escaped to the lifeboat, with only two cans of preserved turnips and no fresh water. Thomas Dudley was the captain, Edwin Stephens, was the first mate, and Edmund Brooks was a sailor – “all men of excellent character.” The fourth member of the crew was a cabin boy, Richard Parker, age seventeen. He was an orphan, on his first long voyage at sea. He had signed up against the advice of his friends, “in the hopefulness of youthful ambition,” thinking the journey would make a man of him. Sadly, it was not to be. From the lifeboat, the four stranded sailors watched the horizon, hoping a ship might pass and rescue them. For the first three days, they ate small rations of turnips. On the fourth day, they caught a turtle. They subsisted on the turtle and the remaining turnips for the next few days. And then for eight days, they ate nothing. By now Parker, the cabin boy, was lying in the corner of the lifeboat. He had drunk seawater, against the advice of the others, and become ill. He appeared to be dying. On the nineteenth day of their ordeal, Dudley, the captain, suggested drawing lots to determine who would die so that the others might live. But Brooks refused, and no lots were drawn. The next day came, and still no ship was in sight. Dudley told Brooks to avert his gaze and motioned to Stephens that Parker had to be killed. Dudley offered a prayer, told the boy his time had come, and then killed him with a penknife, stabbing him in the jugular vein. Brooks emerged from his conscientious objection to share in the gruesome bounty. For four days, the three men fed on the body and blood of the cabin boy. And then help came. Dudley describes their rescue in his diary, with staggering euphemism: “On the 24th day, as we were having our breakfast,” a ship appeared at last. The three survivors were picked up. Upon their return to England, they were arrested and tried. Brook turned state’s witness. Dudley and Stephens went to trial. They freely confessed that they had killed and eaten Parker. They claimed they had done so out of necessity.

Essay Assignment:

Suppose you were the judge. A.) How would you rule? To simplify things, put aside the question of law and assume that you were asked to decide whether killing the cabin boy was morally permissible. B.) How would Aristotle rule? C.) How would Mill rule? D.) How would Kant rule? E.) How would Rand rule? F.) How would Held rule?

Be sure to explain the principle(s) of moral reasoning used in your decision and those attributed to Aristotle, Mill, Kant, Rand, and Held. In other words, how do we come to know what the right thing to do is in a particular situation, according to Aristotle’s virtue ethics? How do we know what the right thing to do is in a particular situation, according to Mill’s utilitarianism? How do we know what the right thing to do is in a particular situation, according to Kant’s deontology (categorical imperative)? How do we know what the right thing to do is in a particular situation, according to Rand’s ethical egoism? How do we know what the right thing to do is in a particular situation, according to Held’s ethic of care?