I can believe no one's pointed out how much of an oversimplification this is.
Look, most people are going to agree that the moral decision is to use your power to help. But how you go about that is important, and the degree to which you get involved can determine if you're actually a help or if you just end up making things worse. You're trying to create a vastly generic question out of something that can have hundreds of different scenarios. Depending on the threat, the "power" you have, and all sorts of other factors, getting involved directly in a way that threatens your life might not even be the best way to help! In fact, this may surprise you to hear but it usually isn't.
But I'll assume for the moment that this isn't as much of a general question as it looks like. Because frankly, if you'd never been in a situation like this you probably wouldn't even think to be asking this question. So let's assume for the moment that the scenario is one where your question makes sense. Say... there's an invading army, you have war training and those around you don't. You consider staying back to hold off the enemy while the others try to get their way to safety. You think that's the moral choice, and trying to keep yourself alive is selfish.
It's not. You have valuable knowledge and skills, and if you die they are lost. If at all possible, you want to keep yourself alive, because that could mean the difference between a few lives saved today and a lot of lives saved down the line. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't get involved at all! Using your knowledge and combat ability to help as many people as you can get away, then falling back to guide them personally, is probably the best use of your skills in that scenario. It's still a sacrifice, because we're going with your original assumption that you'd be safe if you didn't get involved, but it's not a sacrifice of your life.
Honestly... those are usually more foolish than noble.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
carisma_sensei
no subject
Date: 2015-01-19 08:20 am (UTC)Look, most people are going to agree that the moral decision is to use your power to help. But how you go about that is important, and the degree to which you get involved can determine if you're actually a help or if you just end up making things worse. You're trying to create a vastly generic question out of something that can have hundreds of different scenarios. Depending on the threat, the "power" you have, and all sorts of other factors, getting involved directly in a way that threatens your life might not even be the best way to help! In fact, this may surprise you to hear but it usually isn't.
But I'll assume for the moment that this isn't as much of a general question as it looks like. Because frankly, if you'd never been in a situation like this you probably wouldn't even think to be asking this question. So let's assume for the moment that the scenario is one where your question makes sense. Say... there's an invading army, you have war training and those around you don't. You consider staying back to hold off the enemy while the others try to get their way to safety. You think that's the moral choice, and trying to keep yourself alive is selfish.
It's not. You have valuable knowledge and skills, and if you die they are lost. If at all possible, you want to keep yourself alive, because that could mean the difference between a few lives saved today and a lot of lives saved down the line. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't get involved at all! Using your knowledge and combat ability to help as many people as you can get away, then falling back to guide them personally, is probably the best use of your skills in that scenario. It's still a sacrifice, because we're going with your original assumption that you'd be safe if you didn't get involved, but it's not a sacrifice of your life.
Honestly... those are usually more foolish than noble.