Janeway is a murderer

Should you think about your duty, or about the consequences of your actions? Or should you concentrate on becoming a good person?

Moderators: AMod, iMod

Post Reply
Advocate
Posts: 3467
Joined: Tue Sep 12, 2017 9:27 am
Contact:

Janeway is a murderer

Post by Advocate »

Neelix and Tuvok died in a transporter accident. Tuvix was murdered.
User avatar
Agent Smith
Posts: 1442
Joined: Fri Aug 12, 2022 12:23 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Agent Smith »

🤔

Interesting! No, no, I mean tragic, tragic!!

The TV was on - CN. The tap was running, a bottle of scotch, half-drunk on the round table, two, no, 3 glasses, empty save for a thin layer of booze hugging the bottom, an ashtray, shaped liked a fish, overflowing with butts, ash, and butts. Someone had died, obviously, duh!

He ate the most, I can tell, I know this kinda stuff!

Yes, yes, he ate the most! So?

Please, please, let's not get into a fight over such a small issue!

🙂
Impenitent
Posts: 4305
Joined: Wed Feb 10, 2010 2:04 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Impenitent »

at least they were more than numbers

-Imp
Clinton
Posts: 42
Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2023 9:36 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Clinton »

Advocate wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 11:32 am Neelix and Tuvok died in a transporter accident. Tuvix was murdered.
I saw that episode...a good one. Neelix and Tuvok were merged together. Janeway chose to have the resulting combined being destroyed to bring back the two previous lives, against the will of the new being.

One thing I didn't like about this though, is that realistically, if you can transport someone or reassemble Neelix and Tuvok back into their original forms...she would have been able to re-create Neelix and Tuvok without destroying Tuvix. Oh well...ignoring that :x and moving on to pretend that somehow makes sense....

As a utilitarian, I think calling Janeway's decision to destroy Tuvix to revive Neelix and Tuvok morally wrong is at least potentially a good solution. As you stated, Neelix and Tuvok are currently dead. Them remaining dead is not causing them any more suffering. Destroying Tuvix, however, likely caused Tuvix immense amounts of fear. More importantly, if we normalize the taking of life against one's will that's not done due to some major crime...we risk severing the bonds of trust holding society together a little more.

So, one pretty valid way to look at this to say...if I can kill 100 people to bring back 1000 people from a century ago who'd died, when they were in their early twenties, should I do it? Well, I'd probably say no, largely because the new members of society that would be revived weren't losing anything from being deceased, because I don't think we can say that death is either inherently better or worse than being alive. It's just a different state entirely - too different to compare in many ways. The people we'd be killing, however, would experience great terror...and even more importantly, because of that theft of bodily autonomy, the people who remain alive would likely start to wonder if the same thing could happen to them...and then we have the plausible breakdown of society, or at least a much more nihilistic society who might not care as much about the future because they know that it might be stolen from them at any moment.

I do think that two crew members would be more useful than one though...and so, on a military vessel, where people are killed regularly, especially a military vessel lost in the outskirts of the galaxy and struggling to survive as Voyager was. For this reason, you could argue that two crew members would save more lives than 1 and so Janeway made the right decision. I don't think that would work in any more civilian/non-wartime type of scenario though. I think it can only work in a scenario in which there is already a realistic possibility you'll be killed on any given day, in which people are routinely giving their lives to save each other. In this scenario, self-sacrifice for the greater good, even at the cost of one's life, is the norm, and so I don't think that would break down the bonds of trust holding society together to nearly the degree it would in a more civilian-oriented, safer environment.

So...I think Janeway quite possibly made the right decision, because of the dangerous wartime environment Voyager was in. I think Janeway would have made the wrong decision were she some governor ruling a peacetime nation though.
User avatar
Sculptor
Posts: 8477
Joined: Wed Jun 26, 2019 11:32 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Sculptor »

Advocate wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 11:32 am Neelix and Tuvok died in a transporter accident. Tuvix was murdered.
Do you have an episode reference?
Clinton
Posts: 42
Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2023 9:36 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Clinton »

Sculptor wrote: Fri Jun 02, 2023 10:47 pm
Advocate wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 11:32 am Neelix and Tuvok died in a transporter accident. Tuvix was murdered.
Do you have an episode reference?
Tuvix" is the 40th episode (24th in the second season) of the science fiction television program Star Trek: Voyager.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuvix
User avatar
vegetariantaxidermy
Posts: 13983
Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:45 am
Location: Narniabiznus

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by vegetariantaxidermy »

I thought so too. Poor Tuvix. What a brilliant and thought-provoking series that was. 'Course Oblivion', probably the most brilliant but disturbing Star Trek episode, was wrtten by Nick Sagan, back when intelligence mattered in screen writing.
Atla
Posts: 6607
Joined: Fri Dec 15, 2017 8:27 am

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Atla »

But she brought back two from the dead. Archer let an entire species die in Dear Doctor though, and the episode even pat itself on the back for it. :?
Clinton
Posts: 42
Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2023 9:36 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Clinton »

Atla wrote: Sat Jun 03, 2023 4:05 am But she brought back two from the dead. Archer let an entire species die in Dear Doctor though, and the episode even pat itself on the back for it. :?
Yeah...Janeway, I'm still of the opinion you could go either way. That alone means I wouldn't call her a murderer. She made a tough choice. The reason why we punish "murderers" is, I'd say, rooted in a very healthy societal norm that goes: "We're going to think up the most harmful acts to society possible, and we're going to make it so society understands what these acts are well in advance, and we're going to punish you for engaging in those acts."

Society needs that advance notice that certain things we call "murder" is wrong. That's, I'd say, one of the most important aspects of law. Without that, we have no way of knowing what we'll be punished for, and if that's allowed it results in many of the same harms legalizing murder would - the same lack of sense of security.

Archer though? Unlike Tuvok and Neelix, those people were still alive when he let them die...and all the new members of the rising species that would replace them were not yet. The reasoning was rooted in the view that we should just let nature take its course. If that's the case...why are we even bothering to cure diseases?

Also, Archer's circumstance took place before the adoption of the Prime Directive that says to not interfere in primitive civilizations...so unlike if that happened in the future, that wouldn't be an excuse.

The closer-to-civilized plan to a similar route would be Margaret Sanger's way of thinking, and her view that some people with bad genetics should be forcefully sterilized for the long term benefit of humanity, which I'd guess most people would perceive as uncivilized now. With her system, nobody would have to actually die and also there'd be a lot of people who wouldn't have children who'd be greatly harmed by having those children...such as adults with tons of genetic mental illnesses that would make it very difficult for them to be parents. We don't to like her way of thinking now, because we see it as being too much of a violation of bodily autonomy.

With Archer's plan...we didn't even know that the rising species would lead better lives than the old species they were replacing who Archer let die. There was literally no clear purpose to that act...and I remember Flox inventing something that would have made their deaths less unpleasant...but it still wasn't something that would be quick and painless.

I figure Archer's decision to let that species die so that the newer species could rise to replace them would be comparable to Albert Einstein, in his early 30s, getting cancer, and us choosing not to cure Einstein's cancer so that a mother could receive in vitro fertilization and have a child who could end up being another Einstein...or could wind up being having a career of conning people with Alzheimer's disease out of their credit card information. We don't know yet. We already had the Einstein though. There is no advantage to that kind of replacement according to any moral code I've heard of.
Advocate
Posts: 3467
Joined: Tue Sep 12, 2017 9:27 am
Contact:

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Advocate »

[quote=Sculptor post_id=646048 time=1685742466 user_id=17400]
[quote=Advocate post_id=641258 time=1683887547 user_id=15238]
Neelix and Tuvok died in a transporter accident. Tuvix was murdered.
[/quote]

Do you have an episode reference?
[/quote]

https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0709000/
User avatar
Sculptor
Posts: 8477
Joined: Wed Jun 26, 2019 11:32 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Sculptor »

I have skipped ahead to watch the episode.
The jury has considered their decision.

And the verdict is not guilty for reason of Habeus Corpus.

This ancient legal precedent requires that any murder can only be committed if there is evidence of a body. Since the Body of Tuvix is not evident then there can never have been a murder.

Case dismissed!
promethean75
Posts: 4881
Joined: Sun Nov 04, 2018 10:29 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by promethean75 »

I object, your honor. I bring to the court's attention 1957 the state of California vs. Leonard Ewing for killing his wife. A conviction wuz obtained without the discovery of the victim's body.
User avatar
vegetariantaxidermy
Posts: 13983
Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:45 am
Location: Narniabiznus

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by vegetariantaxidermy »

When you have a person standing there, begging for his life and you purposely go ahead and end his life anyway then yes, that qualifies as murder.
Clinton
Posts: 42
Joined: Mon Mar 06, 2023 9:36 pm

Re: Janeway is a murderer

Post by Clinton »

vegetariantaxidermy wrote: Tue Jun 06, 2023 1:17 am When you have a person standing there, begging for his life and you purposely go ahead and end his life anyway then yes, that qualifies as murder.
He's pleading for something that would lead to the continued lack of existence of two recently existent people though. That's what makes this an unusual circumstance. That, without question, means this is a different circumstance from the ordinary sorts of circumstances you described.

That, without question, means the right path is fairly unclear and up for debate. That, without question, at least means Janeway should not be classified under the law as a murderer.

We need to accept that it is entirely reasonable for someone to perceive this situation like Janeway was killing someone who was about to unintentionally kill two other people if she did not kill them. That's not the only way to look at this situation. You could also look at it like Tuvok and Neelix were already dead...but regardless of which side we go with, the worst of all sides of this argument is to claim that only one path is clearly correct. That dehumanizes people who prefer the other side, and ignores the truth that they're inevitably going to be more or less reasonable as well...and could result in innocent people (like Janeway) being depicted as morally corrupt...and if Janeway had not destroyed Tuvix to save Neelix and Tuvoc, she'd not have been morally corrupt either, I'd argue.
Post Reply