The movie “Extreme Measures” (1996) is about Dr. Guy Luthan (Hugh Grant), a British emergency room doctor who treats homeless people in a hospital in New York City. When one night a patient dies from weird symptoms, no one takes notice except Dr. Luthan who investigates and finds shocking details of a private medical research program that has been taking place in the hospital secretly. In the investigation, he discovered that the famous neurologist Lawrence Myrick (Gene Hackman) had been doing some research into the healing of spinal injuries by kidnapping homeless men off the streets of Manhattan and forcefully taking them to the hospital. In a bid to prevent Dr. Luthan to drop the case about the illegal research, Dr. Myrick ransacks his apartment and plants some cocaine near his bedside. Consequently, he is arrested and his profession is almost being ruined. Dr. Myrick is shot and killed unintentionally by a FBI Agent, and Dr. Luthan goes to Dr. Myrick’s daughters for help to complete the research in the right way.
As the plot of the movie proceeds, Dr. Luthan is seen to be encountering inner conflict. He seems to be at cross roads in determining which one is more important between conscience and moral duty, or between minor or major issues in the medical research. It is true that nobody should suffer for the sake of preserving human dignity and the happiness of individuals. As such, I agree with the moral philosophy of Kant that maintains that everyone has an equal worth and deserves equal respect from other people. According to Kant, the ‘good will’ always does the right things because they are right. The idea of a good will is closer to the idea of a ‘good person,’ or ‘person of good will.’ The word ‘will’ is discussions to concern by the nature of rational agency. Kant insists that the good will is good even if it does not achieve the targeted results. The basic idea he emphasizes is that the possession of a will makes good person. It is in a way ‘determined’ by, or makes its decisions on the basic of the moral law. Kant’s main intention is to underline the moral value of motivation and its realization at least through the presence of a “good will” in a person. From the point of view of the philosopher, a good will always keeps remaining good. Even if an individual fails to be commanded by his good will, what he does remains a good thing unconditionally. In addition, Kant considers a good will as a unique goodness that is able to produce the result it intended to produce. A good will is still valuable by itself, because its existence is not confined to a certain unique personality. Through the principle of Kant, Myrick’s illegal and immoral research in the movie “Extreme Measures” cannot be considered as a good will because it is not making the decisions based on the moral law. Further, it is not justifiable to use people as guinea pigs in a research without their consent.
On the other hand, the philosopher Jimmy Bentham holds that the relevant consequences people face are due to the happiness created for everyone affected by their action. He says, “Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, pain and pleasure. It is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as what we shall do. On the one hand, the standard of right and wrong, on the other the chain of causes and effects, are fastened to their throne”. Bentham believed that pain and pleasure explain the difference between what is good and moral. He believed that this foundation could provide a basis for social and moral reform in the society. In the movie, the only rationale that we are given for the illegal and immoral Myrick’s project is that someone may benefit from the results of the medical research. This illustrates that for the right action, people tend to focus on the result, not the means of generating the results.
Nevertheless, Kant does not agree with Bentham’s philosophy of utilitarianism since it cannot be a realistic overlook as a self-defeating concept that maintains that undesirable habits such as stealing are done just for the fulfillment of personal desires. In recent past, self-defeating behavior has taken insights from moral theories. He thought, “…the moral worth of an action does not depend on the result expected from it, [nor] any principle of action that needs to borrow its motive from this expected result”. People know what morality is and they can easily change their intentions so as to achieve the desired morality standards in them. In the movie, Dr. Luthan follows the moral law as he tries to stop the medical experiment that is done on living persons. It is important to note that Kant does say that there has to be some incentive for the moral law to be obeyed; however, it cannot be a self-interested incentive since it would defeat it by definition. It is possible for our desires and interests to run in contrary to our demands; therefore, morality is ‘duty’ for human beings. Even if all of our desires and interests were to be trained so carefully to comport with what morality actually requires of us, it would not change the fact that morality is still our duty in the society. It is evident that the obvious rules for defeat among arguments do not handle self-defeating arguments correctly. Their position concerning Dr. Myrick’s experiment is that it is good to improve medical practices to the majority who are suffering from the disease without paying a close consideration for the morality of the minor. However, when people consider the morality of duty, this cannot be good for the society, not only for the majority but also for the minority that includes all people.
Bentham’s impartiality principle is “the greatest good for the greatest number,” and each person “counts as one and no more.” He believes in the greatest happiness is the greatest number, so the experiment to use the minorities in the movie can be justified by Bentham’s impartiality principle. He thinks, “By the principle of utility is meant that principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, according to the tendency which it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question: or, what is the same thing in other words, to promote or to oppose that happiness”. However, the Bentham’s theory cannot protect the rights of minorities for the greatest good of the majorities.
Moreover, there is an imperative; that is, laws which command us and the imperative would not allow for the making of a sacrifice. From second formulation in one of categorical imperatives, there is “Act in such a way that you always treat humanity, [or rational nature] whether in your own person or that of another, never simply as a means, but always at the same time as an end”. Kant tries to establish the basis of such a law when he first mentions about the categorical Imperative. What he comes up with is that it must be for majority, it must be prescriptive that shows what to do or how to act, and it should not be based on motion. A moral law must apply to everyone; the Categorical Imperative asks us to act in ways that we would like everyone to act. The Categorical Imperative asks us to tell others how to act through our own actions so as to remove our biases, for example, it should not be that what I want to do is different from what I want you to do. Moreover, we should act in an objectively approvable way. So, in the movie, the research into the possible healing of spinal injuries cannot be justified by someone’s sacrifice.
Are people in wheelchairs willing to sacrifice other people to help themselves? Are the few sacrifices for the benefit of the majority such as the doing of a medical experiment on living bodies warranted? This is the dilemma addressed in “Extreme Measures.” Kant preserves the sense of human dignity. Kant’s main intention is the moral value of motivation through the “good will” in a person. All of our desires and interests should comport with what morality actually requires of us. Dr. Luthan discovers that homeless people were being used in research. In a reality, if you could cure cancer by killing one person, would you have to do it? The answer is that nobody has the right to misuse one person or minority, even though it will be of benefit for the majority or the society.