In the afterlife, will Leonard deserve punishment for the muders he committed in the flim The Momentum - Essay Example

For this essay, it means this: the willful, deliberate commission of a morally incorrect act. Also, for purposes of necessary brevity, let us say that Leonard was not morally justified in the homicides that he committed. It is the opinion of this writer that Leonard will not be punished for the killings he engaged in, due to the caveat in the above definition regarding deliberate action. This implies that the person committing the action must 1. Understand the difference between right and wrong; and 2.

Voluntarily choose to do wrong anyway. Given this definition, what sort of acts would be excluded from it? First of all, acts that are purely the results of circumstances outside the person’s actions are not “wrong,” even though they may cause horrible suffering and tragedy. As an example, imagine a motorist driving along a busy commercial street when a child suddenly runs in front of his car and is truck and killed. Let us say that the driver is not under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and that he is within the speed limit and operating his vehicle in a manner consistent with the principles of responsible driving.

Let us also assume that he did not see the child until she was in the path of his car, and that he could not brake in time to prevent striking her fatally. Neither did he have time to swerve his car in another direction. Intention to strike the child, no malice in his heart towards her. It was an unfortunate accident in the purest sense of the word. He should not be punished by the courts for his act, nor by God or some other entity that apportions reward and punishment in the afterlife. In a real sense, in fact, it can be argued that he did not “act” in this scenario at all.

The real culprit in the sad affair was the laws of physics. The man had no knowledge of the coming event and hence was unable to act to prevent it.