Geshtinnanna

Depending on the time of month and my need for dr pepper and the world to shut up...that could drive me to murder.
Also the people that don't use their turn signals.
And people who pop their gums.
All have driven me pretty close to the unlawful killing of another.

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digitalMedia

Dr. Pepper... That was funny!

Do you all keep firearms in your houses? Is it legal where you live?

I don't have a gun in my house. I do have a 3 foot aluminium tube under my bed, though. If someone enters my house with a gun and bad intentions, they'd better shoot first and shoot accurately. Otherwise, pain will have a whole new definition for them.

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"Ubi re vera..."

silent_enigma

To kill a random person for riches and good fortune - no. The guilt of doing it would outweigh any pleasure from it.

In other situations depending on my state of mind at the time and my likelihood of getting away with it, I wouldn't mind killing evil people. To go back in a time machine and kill all sorts of evil people, sniper style (no having to face actual combat) would be a gas. I'd feel like I'd accomplished all sorts of great deeds.

liviussteven

murder...vs...killing!!
killing is the taking of a human life... murder is the illegal taking of a human life. Most humans are capable of killing... but most of us are not capable of murder... or are we!!! What seperates killing from murder.. a law!!! laws can change... as an example... the death penalty! If we change our death penalty laws and say it is no longer legal for the state to execute prisoners it becomes murder for the state to execute someone... so when the law changes on Jan 1st of a certain year... the guy executed on Dec 31st was killed by the state... if it had happened on Jan 2nd.. it would have been murder... but what has changed other than a date??? What has changed is our collective idea about what is and what isn't murder... the acts reamin the same! What is murder today.. may not be murder tomorrow.. but killing is always killing! If we change a law as in the death penalty... does that make all the killing by the state in past years murder???? why not? If it is murder today... will it not be murder tomorrow... and wouldn't it be murder yesterday.
I think the real question isn't if you would murder someone... because under the right circumstance we all would... the question is how we fool ourselves into thinking we are just in what we do.... how we justify our actions!

Just my thoughts... something to think about!!

liviussteven

what i'm trying to say in my other post is... killing is the justification of murder!

neverforever

I could and would kill someone in a heart beat. But right now being in the military its kind of pounded in my head.

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If i talk to god i don't know if he is listening ...
I'm talking to myself because no one else is listening..

Requiem

I think this is a very good point, murdering is killing with a personally justifiable reason, for example "it's the job", or "the person is evil" etc., but who is anyone to say they can kill someone planning to kill another person? Their reason is just as good as yours in their eyes. Just my thinking of this.

neverforever

OK so we have come to the conclusion that most wont murder someone but could kill someone out of self defense. Ive got a possible situation what is your first response to it.
You are in a room and you have a 9mm pistol in this room you see a kid lets say 11 years old holding what appears to be his sister at gunpoint. Could you shoot to kill him or not. Its defense for the little girl.

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If i talk to god i don't know if he is listening ...
I'm talking to myself because no one else is listening..

NotConvinced

So are we going by the law as it exists today in December 2007 or a "relative" version of the law? It can and does change especially regarding unforeseen circumstances. If we are going by todays version, is it the US version? If so could you recite it here so we're all clear....cuz so far we've said self defense isn't murder and killing in anger is, what if you did both at the same time? We've also said killing in defense of other people isn't murder but how about the killing in defense of 200 polar bears?

More to the point of the question though, is "Under what conditions would you consider it morally acceptable to kill someone?"

If you subscribe to the basic moral premise of utilitarianism, which I do and I believe most people do whether they know it or not, then any number of circumstances would deem killing someone moral.

More simply, the consequences of me killing someone = A, and the consequences of me not killing said someone = B. If A > B go for it man.

Build a law around that, and I'd be impressed.

Requiem

No I could not, first of all you said he "appears to be" so he is not definitively holding his sister at gunpoint, He is also 11, so he probably isn't understanding what exactly he's doing, and I would have no way to know the true circumstances of the situation (i.e. he is just showing her the gun, or he just happened to be "appearing" to point it at her when i looked, but what was actually doing something else)

I do think this hypo raises another interesting question however, say that the circumstances were a little more defined, and the boy is 16, pointing a gun at his girlfriend and he himself tells you he is going to kill her, you have the chance to kill him but don't.He then kills his girlfriend. Is this viewed as murder in your eyes? In the eyes of the court? Just wondering

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"He who has a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'."
- Friedrich Nietzsche

"I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter."
- Sir Winston Churchill