Moral and ethical debates pop up all the time on these types of boards, so might as well get a classic one going. Kohlberg came up with this question when he was developing his (rather biased) stages of moral development.
Quote:A woman was near death from a special kind of cancer. There was one drug that the doctors thought might save her. It was a form of radium that a druggist in the same town had recently discovered. The drug was expensive to make, but the druggist was charging ten times what the drug cost him to produce. He paid $200 for the radium and charged $2,000 for a small dose of the drug. The sick woman's husband, Heinz, went to everyone he knew to borrow the money, but he could only get together about $1,000 which is half of what it cost. He told the druggist that his wife was dying and asked him to sell it cheaper or let him pay later. But the druggist said: "No, I discovered the drug and I'm going to make money from it." So Heinz got desperate and broke into the man's store to steal the drug for his wife.
Should Heinz have broken into the laboratory to steal the drug for his wife? Why or why not?
It’s not so much about if you feel Heinz was in the right or wrong to have done so, but rather why you’d think that.
As for myself, I can honestly say I’d have done the same thing in his case. So yeah, I think he should have broken in.
As for why I feel this way: Putting my self in his place I see this as “My wife is dying!” Not just anyone’s wife, but mine. If something in my power could prevent such I thing, you're damn right I’d do it. And breaking, entering, and stealing is very much in that power. Besides, it’s not like he didn’t try all other options first. He was trying to compromise. But the pharmacist wasn’t willing to meet him half way (in such a life or death situation), so I’m all for Heinz in this.