Someone’s benefiting from having done harm to another person is morall

Explanation

We’re given a principle of conduct, and asked for the real-life scenario that best matches up to it. The issue is, “When is it morally justified to benefit from harming someone else?” And the principle cites a two-part necessary condition, signaled as usual by “only if”: the victim’s awareness that the behavior could be harmful, and his/her consent. We must see that in the absence of such awareness and/or consent, the benefits accruing from the harm will not be morally justified. Having done that analysis, we can then proceed with confidence to the choices and see how they stack up:

(A) ignores the whole issue of awareness and consent, focusing instead on issues (false statements; preventing harm) that the principle never mentions. Besides, Sonia attempts to benefit, but does not—she gets stuck in detention anyway—so the morality test doesn’t apply here; no one here benefits from harming another.

(B) brings in the concept of accidental behavior, and again ignores the awareness and consent issues.

(C) Here ya go. Max lacked awareness of the potential harm of the experimental drug. Thus a necessary condition for the moral justification in Wesley’s using the results is lacking. He harmed Max without informing Max of the risks. Thus, according to the principle, it is not morally justified for Wesley to benefit from the harm he inflicted on Max, and so the judgment in (C) is right on the money. For the record:

(D) Roger’s mother consented to the operation, and the wording seems to suggest that, as a doctor, she’d be aware of the risks. Since this situation meets the two criteria for moral justification, we cannot use the principle at hand to conclude that Roger was morally wrong to benefit from the transplant.

(E) argues that taking the profits from James is unjustifiable, but that can’t be correct here: James is the one trying to benefit from having done harm, and the principle in the stimulus certainly wouldn’t support it in this case (who, after all, consents to being defrauded?). Denying James the profits would be in line with the principle in the stimulus, but (E) says that denying James is UNjustifiable, which conflicts with the principle.

Answer: C