The Heinz dilemma is a frequently used example in many ethics and morality classes. One well-known version of the dilemma, used in Lawrence Kohlberg’s stages of moral development, is stated as follows: A woman was on her deathbed. There was one drug that the doctors said would save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman’s husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: “No, I discovered the drug and I’m going to make money from it.” So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man’s laboratory…
Not who you replied to, but your arguments remind me of Peter Singer. Basically, that none of us live ethical lives because of exactly the first problem you mentioned. If we CAN donate to a cause we know will do good with the money, more good than we could do ourselves, then we MUST do so. Failing to do so is a moral failing.
It’s definitely an appealing argument, and I enjoy exploring the limits of such philosophies. To me, it’s about immediacy, guarantee, and proximity. I see something that has a shorter timeline as something that must be acted on with higher priority. Something that’s guaranteed is higher priority than a slim chance. And I’m more likely to help those closer to me than across the world.
We’re all limited in our capacity to know and to do. I don’t have to be perfect, I can accept that some of my actions are less moral than they could be. I just aim to be as above the line, so to speak, trying to bring more positive than negative. I think the comment you initially replied to is a pretty good heuristic to follow to do so.
Is there a name for the concept that
One individual doing that is a tiny drop in a huge bucket- It would be a drastic change for the giver, and a tiny incremental change for the ones in need? Like, you’re fighting a systemic problem that you alone can never solve.
I use “fighting the long defeat”:
“I have fought the long defeat and brought other people on to fight the long defeat, and I’m not going to stop because we keep losing. Now I actually think sometimes we may win.” ~Paul Farmer
Do what you must, but don’t expect results. Expect defeat, embrace it, and then persist through it.
starfish parable
Ok but I feel like instead of throwing a dozen starfish into the ocean, I’m moving a thousand of them two inches. Sure, some on the margin might survive now, but I’ve wasted a lot of time.
I had to look it up. Thank you! I learned something new
https://youtu.be/8bps_PMmJ6k
By the way, I think it’s quite different than what that other commenter was asking.