Preparation

Name: -
Class: -
Native language: -
Theme: 3. The problem is choice
Subject: Ethics
Thinker: Immanuel Kant
Movie: Minority Report

Ethics in Minority Report

In the film Minority Report (Spielberg, 2002), all the murders in Washington DC have been prevented for the last six years by PreCrime, a system based on stopping the murders before they happen, with the help of “precogs”, three mutated humans with precognitive abilities. The to-be-murderers are caught and sentenced without a chance to defend themselves. All seems to go well until the chief of PreCrime police force is accused of murdering a person he doesn’t even know. He begins to investigate the PreCrime system and hears that sometimes one of the precogs sees different future than the others, in which case the “minority report” is discarded and only the two similar visions are recorded. It’s not always a hundred percent sure if they would have committed the murder after all. Also, the events in the film suggest that a person is able to change their future if they know it. In the end of the film, the PreCrime system is discontinued because of that flaw, and all the prisoners are pardoned unconditionally. The ending is rising a big question: Is it really worth it to get stuck in a minor detail if the alternative would be to have no murders at all? If one in hundred people would end up not killing after all, what about the 99 murders nobody was preventing anymore?

German philosopher Immanuel Kant believed that certain types of actions were absolutely prohibited, even if they could do more good than the alternative. (Johnson, 2008) In Kant’s point of view, people should only act on a thing, which they thought should be a universal law. In Minority Report’s case, there would be a universal law that “people can be imprisoned if there’s a strong suspicion that they will murder someone”. Also, as the precogs were exploited for the greater good, there would be a universal law that “anyone who is crucially important to the welfare of people, can be forced to work for a good cause”. When put like this, both sentences sound pretty harsh. The first law could mean that it would be easy to frame people and get them imprisoned just by stating that there is a “strong suspicion” against them. It could mean that it’s okay to capture people who “look like terrorists”, or people who secretly dream of violence but would never do it in real life. The latter law would force talented people to work around the clock and throw away their own hopes and lives, because it’s more important to invent things for the greater good. Or maybe it would make all the talented people hide their abilities and the humankind to regress.

On the other hand, in utilitarian point of view, it would be better to continue using PreCrime, because it gives the greatest happiness to the greatest number. Jeremy Bentham, the founder of modern Utilitarianism suggested that we should always act to produce greatest happiness among all sentient beings (Sweet). English philosopher John Stuart Mill developed the theory further, saying that there is a qualitative separation of pleasures, and intellectual and moral pleasures are more important than physical forms of pleasure (Heydt). In the Minority Report’s situation, this would mean that the happiness caused by the end of murders is more important than the despair of few individuals who could have possibly changed their minds about murdering someone. For the city of Washington DC, it would mean that 88 people who were murdered in 2011 (Natividad, 2013) would have lived, around 600,000 people living there would feel safe and happier because they knew they didn’t have to worry about murders. In Mill’s philosophy the happiness of 88 people who were going to prison without actually murdering anyone is not so valuable than happiness of innocent people. This trail of thought can certainly seem cold if you think of it on the bigger terms. If it would always better to value the benefit of most of the people, human rights could be in danger. It could for example justice killing people with a hereditary diseases so that the future of humankind would be healthier.

In my opinion, this is a really difficult argument and both extremes are a bit outrageous. For example, Kant would prohibit lying even in a situation where it would definitely save someone’s life. On the other hand, utilitarianists would say it’s okay to lie in all the situations where there’s more benefit than harm. Kant’s point of view is that even a good end result is bad if it’s been achieved with something that could not be universal law, and utilitarianism suggests that everyone is capable to distinguish which option causes more good in the end. There are so many subjective opinions on what causes more happiness, based on what makes the person themselves happy. So it’s almost impossible to objectively calculate what a more important form of happiness is. If one of the murderers in Minority Report would have invented cure for cancer after murdering one person, is it still okay to imprison him? There’s something good in both of the opinions: Kant’s point of view is equal and treats everyone similarly while the utilitarianism might exploit one person to gain happiness to others. On the other hand, utilitarianistic ideas are based on numbers and well-being of as many people as possible, where Kant’s rules can harm people in some situations because they are not concerned about the end result.

To conclude, there’s not one answer to this dilemma. In the case of Minority Report, an idealistic system turned bad when someone exploited it, and that’s what often happens: even if the concept is good, greedy and dishonest people can ruin it. No justice system is flawless. I think I would personally be happier in a city where PreCrime system was working, but considering the society as a whole it wouldn’t probably be such a good idea after all. And maybe that’s the point: if everyone would just care about their own happiness, there would be even more injustice happening in the world.

Bibliography:

1. Anderson, Kerby, 2004
Utilitarianism: The Greatest Good for the Greatest Number http://www.probe.org/site/c.fdKEIMNsEoG/b.4224805/k.B792/Utilitarianism_The_Greatest_Good_for_the_Greatest_Number.htm 2. Heydt, Colin,
“John Stuart Mill (1806-1873)”, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, webpage http://www.iep.utm.edu/milljs/#SH2d 3. Johnson, Robert, 2008
“Kant's Moral Philosophy”, Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy, webpage http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-moral/ 4. Kantian ethics,
Webpage
http://www.csus.edu/indiv/g/gaskilld/ethics/Kantian%20Ethics.htm

5. Natividad, Ivan, 2013
“D.C. 2012 Murder Rate Ranked 8th Among Nation’s Most Populated Cities”, article on homicidewatch.com http://homicidewatch.org/2013/06/17/d-c-2012-murder-rate-ranked-8th-among-nations-most-populated-cities/ 6. Spielberg, Steven (director), 2002
Minority Report, film

7. Sweet, William,
“Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)”, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, webpage http://www.iep.utm.edu/bentham/ 8. Wikipedia
Articles on John Stuart Mill, Jeremy Bentham, Washington D.C and Minority Report (film) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stuart_Mill http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremy_Bentham http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington,_D.C. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_Report_(film)