I have seen this type of (to me) rather bizarre non sequitur argument a few times over recent months, and from individuals that I would normally consider to be intelligent and able thinkers.
Basically it goes like this:
1. Our actions/decisions have possible but unpredictable/unforeseeable consequences.
2. (from 1) therefore we should ignore the (inconveniently negative*) probable/predictable/foreseeable consequences of our actions/decisions.
*while of course taking full account of any conveniently positive consequences
to illustrate with an example extreme enough to be (I hope) obviously false:
Any action I take could result in someone, or indeed many people, being murdered at some point in the future (in a chaos "butterfly" kind of way)
If people are going to be murdered as a result of my actions anyway, it is OK if I murder someone myself.
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