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[mainiac]

It was a hypothetical...

[Virex]

The level of nonyieldingness here rather surprises me.  Let me tie this into another hypothetical.  Suppose you can travel back in time and kill Hitler thus preventing the war and genocide?  Would you be willing to punish a man for sins he hadn't yet committed?  It's basically the same question I just proposed but here you are being punitive instead of lenient in order to prevent greater suffering.

I don't see what you're getting at? If there's even a clear chance that someone's going to commit genocide I'd say it's better to be safe then sorry and put a bullet in his head lest you do nothing and then find out he does go on a murderous rampage. If it's certain that he's going to commit genocide, then it'd be immoral not to kill him.

Except there may be another that would take his place.  You are putting all blame on 1 person. 
He could not have done all he did alone.  He could not have been the only one that carried idea.  Someone else could have been the one that sparked that idea in him and others, he was just the one that stepped up first/'made the most sense'.

This was after WWI, when the Germans were non-too happy about the state of affairs placed upon them after their defeat.  What makes you think this 1 person is the catalyst that sparked the Death Camps?

I don't see that as a valid argument to sit around and do nothing knowing your inaction killed millions. It may not have stopped it, but there is a chance that it does.

[Phmcw]

I don't see that as a valid argument to sit around and do nothing knowing your inaction killed millions. It may not have stopped it, but there is a chance that it does.

Yeah, or, unopposed, Stalin could have taken control of Europe, then attack the US and bent the world under his Iron fist. Which would have deeply troubled the aliens that are observing us, leading them to conclude that we're an inferior species.
They would have then abandoned us to the lizard-folk who were trying since the extinction of the dinosaurs to avenge their saurian ancestors.  Is THIS what you'd want.

More seriously it's all bullshit. If you're willing to kill an innocent for the crimes he may or may not commit, then you have a problem. And Vector's plan is just as efficient without killing him.

Fakeedit : the point of the first paragraph is that trying to predict the effect of the death of Hitler over the 21st century's history is an exercise in futility.

[DJ]

I want Greece to go down because every Greek I've met on the internet (all 3 of them) has been an insufferable prick who couldn't stop talking about Alexander the Great and the inevitable reconquest of Constantinople. Plus, not letting FYROM call itself just Macedonia is a dick move.

[ChairmanPoo]

When you admit that you are acting more or less blindly, the premise that inaction is immoral falls down.
With which I mean that while I agree that inaction does not render you guiltless, and that it's better to, for instance, sacrifice one of two cojoined twins rather than letting both die, in the Hitler example at this point you're pretty much embarking in a "change time" adventure that might or might not make things better or worse, and thus utilitarian mores don't apply either.

Besides, even assuming certainity, people here are trying to make the point that killing Hitler as a kid would be moral because otherwise you are letting millions die. I agree with you in this, but that wouldn't make killing Hitler any less unjust. Hitler's future deeds don't play any role in this hypothetical scenario, as you are arguing it. If you had to kill, say, Groucho Marx instead of Hitler, it'd remain the same.

I want Greece to go down because every Greek I've met on the internet (all 3 of them) has been an insufferable prick who couldn't stop talking about Alexander the Great and the inevitable reconquest of Constantinople. Plus, not letting FYROM call itself just Macedonia is a dick move.

Greek ultranationalists go into epileptic fits when you remind them that he wasn't Greek, but a Macedonian barbarian. Try it, it's fun.

[Zangi]

I don't see that as a valid argument to sit around and do nothing knowing your inaction killed millions. It may not have stopped it, but there is a chance that it does.

Arguing that you would go back in time to put a bullet in someone's head to prevent X is just self-gratification and the 'easy' way.  There are more effective means, considering the fact that you can go back in time.

Consequences be damned... when you become the morale time police.

Having the means to, would you go back further in time to prevent such atrocities as these with a bullet to the head?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history

[Nadaka]

I've seen some shady stuff happen recently.

Let me just say:

I would not be surprised at all if this was a frame job to remove someone inconvenient.

Nor would I be surprised if he is a misogynist on a power trip used to getting away with anything and getting his kicks from abusing women.

[Bouchart]

I've seen some shady stuff happen recently.

Let me just say:

I would not be surprised at all if this was a frame job to remove someone inconvenient.

Nor would I be surprised if he is a misogynist on a power trip used to getting away with anything and getting his kicks from abusing women.

Yeah there's a good chance that he just stepped on someone's toes.  The timing is too perfect.

[sonerohi]

They're all Freemasons.

[Bouchart]

They're all Freemasons.

Freemasons are mostly harmless but it's the Shriners you've gotta look out for.  It's the hats.

[sonerohi]

Aliens who have kidnapped and replaced the Illuminati who themselves were pretending to be Freemasons, whilst unbeknown to them they are amnesiac super soldiers in the Cuban army. Boom.

[ChairmanPoo]

I was in Cuba once. Nice place, had lots of fun in El Chevere in Havana.  No supersoldiers that I could see, though. Maybe they were undercover.

[Strife26]

I shoot Hitler in the back of the head in a heartbeat. But it wouldn't be a moral thing to do. However, it'd be a case of the possible good (preventing, lessening the severity of, depending on the time frame in question)  outweighing the evil (someone who hasn't committed a crime worthy of death being killed, myself being a murderer).

[Phmcw]

I shoot Hitler in the back of the head in a heartbeat. But it wouldn't be a moral thing to do. However, it'd be a case of the possible good (preventing, lessening the severity of, depending on the time frame in question)  outweighing the evil (someone who hasn't committed a crime worthy of death being killed, myself being a murderer).

You could worsen it : while convincing, Hitler was too lunatic to be a good strategist. Given that it would change nothing to he socio-economical context of the time, you could end up with a more competent nazi leader. Or a communist revolution in Germany, backed by Stalin. Or Kane using Stalin to establish the superiority of nod. You nostalgia you loose btw.

[ChairmanPoo]

Or Kane using Stalin to establish he superiority of nod.

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