Killing Baby Hitler

Let's say that genetic research becomes so advanced that it is able to predict psychological traits in humans from the moment they are born to a 99.9% degree of accuracy independant of external influences.

If you were in a position of authority and Adolf Hitler's DNA results were sent to you for review a couple of day's after he was born, stating that all evidence suggests a genocidal maniac in the making, would you order the termination of that baby?

Discuss.

c20

 

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you are asking this question from an unprovable premise.....tat our genes determine what we will become. you should read The Gene Illusion

Also, may i add, tyrants are not alone in evil, many people prop them up, and vite them in, and support them by succumbing to their propaganda. so he situation is far more complex than your simplistic question allows for

 

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Just because the genes are the same doesn't mean that the human will develop into the same person they came from. A different time and surroundings will really alter the way anyone will become.


If its the same gene, it won't be the same being!

 

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Hi duendy,

I agree with you regarding the method for detection and I will probably look up The Gene illusion, however the purpose of the thread is to determine whether with hindsight, people would ( or could ) kill a baby 'suspected' (99.9%) of having the capacity and will to commit great evil.
I could have used a kind of time machine scenario but the DNA one was easier to spit off the top of my head.
Sure tyrants are not alone in evil but they are the body that their allies gravitate towards.

So ...

If you could be presented with evidence (no matter how fictional for the purposes of this discussion) that determined there was a 99.9% probability that this person was going to be the active force for evil, would that level of surity be enough to terminate the life?

peace

c20

 

I don't think Hitler's genes were all that special.

 

hitler ruined the moustache for everyone.

 

The scenario is unrealistic as it assumes that ONE person can do so much harm, all by himself.

If there weren't so many OTHER people who ALSO thought like Hitler, people who ALSO pursued particular national-socialistic values, National-socialism would not take root.

You know, Hitler didn't go personally to each and every person in Germany, and put a gun to their head and told them to follow him, or he will shoot them.

 

Know something? Hitler had his hair parted from right to left. I have a whirl on my scalp, so that my hair naturally parts from right to left.
My mother used to comb my hair from left to right, because from right to left, it is Hitler's way ... and my grandma made fun of me when I had it from right to left, saying I looked like Hitler. And I had long hair.

 

yeah.now that you mention it it does feel weird to have it right to left.side partings arent really good for much tho.

 

Yes. Hitler or anyone related to him should be eliminated, to stop any possibility of the man ever existing again, ever, in any way, shape, or form.

 

Maybe a way of stating this without being so ridiculously in the camp of nature over nurture would be "Imagine that it is 1900 and you can look into a crystal ball, and see that baby Hitler will one day be a genocidal dictator. Would you kill him now?" Slightly different question, I know, but similar.

 

it's pointless---wit resppec--cause you question is deterministic. the asking of is and exploring within te confines of your preconception binds us TO that pre-conception

 

But it was Hitler who some people followed. Everyone else grew in the same soil as you put it and not everyone thought that ethnic cleansing was the right way, so there must have been something different about Hitler's makeup.
Anyway, this was not posted in the Biology and Genetics forum not least of all because I understand very little of it (as I have proved

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).

Forget Baby Hitler and examine a Hitler contemplating ethnic cleansing on a mass scale. You see that he means to carry out a set of plans designed to ethnically cleanse but as yet he has not actually done anthing about it.

You are in the unique opportunity of making the choice to let him live or die before he has a chance to carry out his plans. Ethically speaking, would it be right to terminate someone's life because of their intentions independant of the fact that no actions have been witnessed?

This is pertninent in light of Britains decision to lock people up if they 'glorify' terrorism irrespective of any evidence to suggest that they might actually comit acts of terrorism.

My initial question was ill thought out and you pointed out the flaws very eloquently. I am solely interested in whether justice should be carried out on a hunch if that hunch is 99.9% a surity.

peace

c20

 

After world war one, the conditions in Germans were right for fascism to take place and if hitler had been killer perhaps someone else would have led the nazi party to control Germany. And this person may have been more succesfull and won world war 2. Then where would we be


Stick to the devil you know

 

((((((((((((((((((()))))))))))))))))

 

God you fizzy little.....

 

hey i dont agree that peoples genes tell you what they will become people can choose there own path,

BUT people none of you even said what you would do, just take this thread less serious for a change and see it as a hyperthetical non serious question please,

i know im not going to answer the question either so i contradict myself but i just want people to lighten up a tad.

 

empty force of chi,read the thread.

 

What if the indicators showed Hitler's creative tendencies ?

He might well look like a "keeper" !

He did, after all, try his hand at painting before dabbling in politics.

We all know after the fact that he became a "genocidal maniac", but if he'd been able to squeak by and get ito that Art Academy, we might instead be discussing his choice of subject matter, techniques of composition ,and use of color...

 

Hitler was a creative genius. Unfortunately, like most creative geniuses find out, he had to sell out to rise to power. Incrementally the powers that govern internationally coopted his programs and took them much further than a sane person would have.

Taking away creative genius isn't going to stop crap like that. Hitler didn't run his own program. He was used. At best we take away people who can inspire a nation and substitute mediocrity, but mediocrity is what did Germany in. Most of the geniuses left. For obvious reasons Hitler couldn't.