Daisy Van Zile

Clint Johnson
October 20, 2015
English 1010

Audience: Law school students looking to argue their first case.

Purpose: To help them show how to argue the case by acknowledging and
debunking all other points of view on the matter.

Ethics vs. Resources in Lifeboat Ethics

We live in a world where everything is up for debate. The world is now a jury
and there are analyzing every fact whether guilt is obvious or not. Everything comes
down to rebuttal and justification. In this article Hardin very good data and logic and
incorporates emotion to help us understand why sharing is a bad idea not only for
ourselves but for the world by debunking theories on how others believe we should
be helping to provide.
Lifeboat ethics was written by Hardin in 1974. The text speaks of our limited
resources and how it is not a crime to not share them. Hardin explains that the
world has been thought of as a spaceship when a lifeboat is more appropriate to
demonstrate the limitation and selection of resources. Hardin uses the lifeboat
situations to urge us to be selfish. We need to disregard ethics for our own good.
Hardin shows that no matter how we try we just do not have enough to share
without damaging ourselves or the earth.
Hardin first uses pathos and questions what out ethics are worth. He refuses
the then accepted spaceship theory and instead uses a lifeboat example. He has

you consider being in a lifeboat with ten open spots but 150 people swimming
towards you needing space. Hardin wants you to decide if you would select ten or
take them all in and drown. If you were to pick the ten how would you go about
doing so? Hardin also questions if your life is worth squeezing one more person on
the boat. Being a lawyer has a lot of pathos work. You have to engage feelings. No
jury wants to hear just facts blowing out at 100 miles per hour. You have to use
pathos to question the juries ethics. Every emotion felt in a courtroom is crucial to
determining the guilt factor. There are many cases won over feelings and not by
looking at the crime. For example murder is wrong but if it is for self-defense and
you can make the jury identify with the guilty party they often lean towards not
sentencing the affected person not because murdering was right, but because you
made them question when it was ok to kill.
Hardins biggest appeal throughout the text is logos. He shuts down other
ideas with simple logic. The first idea in question is a world food bank where the
whole world contributes what they can and distributes according to need. Whos to
say whether some country is in need or not and stop countries of taking advantage
of the situation? Would there be more give than take? One of the best logos appeals
Hardin uses is the tragedy of commons. Common areas and wealth are never taken
care of and there is always someone taking more than their fair share. In the end
the area can be completely ruined by the actions of just one person with no respect.
As it is we are overloading the world with just the basic requirements mankind
needs to live. With the topic of immigration he brings up the point of just shorting
the resources the country has to begin with and finishing them at a faster rate.
Hardin urges us to be selfish for our own good; much like you would while working
on a case. The ideas or theories throw out all have to be rebutted. Every option has

to be questioned. Hardin left no stone unturned ad point back to the selfishness and
constant abuse of humanity to build his case. He makes everyone sound
questionable except himself. When arguing a case you want everyone to stumble
for a comeback and then debunk that. You want to make everyone question
themselves because your logic is simple and well put. Everyone in a courtroom
should have doubts but yourself.
To conclude Hardin was a very effective communicator backing up his claims
with data and current world trends. He successfully brought his point across being
just the right amount of critical to help urge the US to be more selfish in their
actions. With every case success must be brought across with both emotional and
factual factors. He leans you over to the selfish side by making you question
yourself and your intentions. Hardin comes out as the smartest and well versed man
like any lawyer arguing a point should.