So the German minister says that he will ask his air force pilots to shoot down a hijacked plane which is showing signs of being used as a missile like in 9/11. The German constitutional court says that this is unconstitutional, you cannot kill somebody to stop more deaths.
This is related to the torture question. Will you be ready to torture somebody like "24" if the person has details that can save somebody's life? I explored this before.
I passed this question past my sister who said that she agrees with the minister stating that the hijackers will learn that blackmail does not work.
My point back to her was, the hijackers are suicide terrorists, the fact that you killed them plus a bunch of other innocent passengers means that they have succeeded in their objective to spread terror. The fact that they were not able to kill more is neither here nor there.
The Glasgow attack was not successful in so far as that it didn't manage to kill any people but it was successful in its primary purpose, to spread terror!
But to go back to the German Minister's treatment, I would also agree to shoot down the plane. I do believe that there are limited cases where the greatest good for the greatest number is justified, specially and if only if you have foreknowledge and reasonable confidence.
Think of this as a sniper taking a shot at a gunman holding a gun to the head of a child and bellowing/shouting that he will kill the child. Will you or wont you take the shot? I would if pushed.
All this to be taken with a grain of salt!!
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