The Causality Factor
An Element Of Objective Morality
Publish Date - 18th September 2023 - 528 Words
1. Have you caused harm or loss or a violation of consent?
2. Have you almost caused harm?
3. Did you intend to cause harm or loss or a violation of consent?
If one drives through a red light, but it is entirely safe to do so, then why should anything be done about it?
If they didn't cause harm, intend to or come close to it, then no one else has a right to do anything about someone safely passing through an intersection.
In the cases where someone had actually caused harm, whether accidentally or deliberately, then apprehension by anyone is reasonable to attempt to remedy the situation.
If you were running along the beach and almost ran into someone, then no harm is done and you are not doing an inherently dangerous activity.
If you were riding a motorbike on a foot path and almost ran someone over, then this is cause for you to be be told not to do such a dangerous thing, to not ride your motorbike on the foot path or to at least be more careful. It is not an act which warrants punishment or physical violence as a retaliation. But it is an act which came close to causing harm, even though that was not the intention, which makes it a case for consideration, but not much else.
If you have caused harm but it was not your intention, but mere accident, then this is unfortunate, but not a situation worthy of punishment. It may require corrective rehab, for example if one caused harm while drunk but did not mean to. Or if one had a car crash when it was possible to avoid the crash if they had better driving skills. It's an arbitration centers job to identify the problem which caused the accidental harm and to find an equitable remedy to make it less likely for the same accident to occur again. This may be individual rehab or suggesting a new technical solution to the peoples council.
If one had plans of shooting up a retirement village, spoke about it publicly down at the pub and showed people the guns they planned to do it with, well they must be apprehended before they commit a crime. They had not caused any harm yet, had not come close to it but had intentions to do so in the future, so thus they can be treated as if they actually had caused harm and should be rehabbed immediately.
The same thing can be applied for loss and consent violations in the appropriate contexts.
In modern everyday life, if you have not violated a causality factor, anyone's rights, the lore or the golden rule, then you have done nothing wrong.
Examples of the legal systems allegations of wrong doing would be running a red light, speeding fines, parking ticket fines, e tag fines, not paying gst or all types of tax, not paying rates, not complying to a breathalyzer, not giving police private details or any other trivial matter with no reasonable justification.
All these legal allegations don't hold any weight when measured against the much higher standard of Objective Morality.