On "I did not harm anyone"

Page last modified June 17, 2017.

This is an optional reading for the students in my CSC 301 Computers and Society class.

"I did not harm anyone" Is Not A Valid Moral Excuse

by Dr. Marek A. Suchenek

June 17, 2017

This article is posted here for in-class educational use only. No other use or uses is/are allowed.

You are the topmost authority when it comes to your morality.

You are free to chose wich moral norms, if any, you are going to follow, and will have to live with the consequences of your free choices.

There is no due process in the court of your moral opinion as you, the supreme judge in all cases related to your own morality, know all the facts and thoughts that pertain to any judgements of yourself that you may pronounce.

Thus there is no benefit of doubt, no burden of proof, and no plea bargains in the mentioned above court. If you broke your own moral norm, you are guilty of it in the court of your moral opinion as soon as you did it. As simple as that.

In particular, "I did not harm anyone" is never a valid moral excuse.

Example. A student in my class once asked me: "But what if not harming anyone is the only moral norm that I follow?"

Well, suppose that:

#1. Not harming anyone is the only moral norm that you follow,

#2. You broke one of your own moral norms, and

#3. You admit #2 but you excuse yourself with the plea "I did not harm anyone".

Is this a valid moral excuse?

Well, if you did not harm anyone as you say in #3 then, by virtue of #1, you did not break any of your moral norms, contrary to what #2 states.

Thus you did harm someone. But then the claim you make in #3 is a lie (you made a false statement while knowing that it was false), and as such it cannot be a valid excuse.

So, be honest with yourself while evaluating your own actions based on your own moral norms.

A minor point that a critical observer can make in this context is that how can you be so sure that you did not harm anyone? There is no way of factual verification of any no harm done claim simply because whatever you do or don't do may have some unknown or unpredictable consequences, one of which could be harming someone.