Descent part 2 - Wrong Actions For The Greater Good

[marsh8472]

PICARD: Data, it's not too late. If you remove the fibres, then Geordi might yet recover.
DATA: That would not be possible.
PICARD: Why? Because Lore tells you so?
DATA: It is for the greater good.
PICARD: Good? Data, isn't good and bad, right and wrong, a function of your ethical programme?
DATA: That is correct.
PICARD: What does that programme tell you about what you're doing to Geordi? About what you and Lore are doing to the Borg? It tells you that these things are wrong, doesn't it, Data? So how can actions that are wrong lead to a greater good?
DATA: You are attempting to confuse me.
PICARD: No, you're not confused, Data. You're sensing the truth. Your ethical programme is fighting the negative emotions that Lore is sending you.

Picard stumps data by asking him how wrong actions lead to a greater good. But it happens all the time, ends justify the means logic. In our own history like dropping the heroshima bomb to save millions of lives or killing of innocent people during an anti-terrorism attack.

Or in Star Trek history like:

TNG "The High Ground" - terrorism to fight oppression
DS9 "In the Pale Moonlight" - killing people to bring the Romulans into the war to save the alpha quadrant
TOS "The City On The Edge of Forever" - allowing someone to die to preserve the timeline
VOY "Tuvix" - killing one person to save two people
ENT "Anomoly" - torturing someone for information to help save Earth
DIS "Choose Your Pain" - killing lifeform / genetic experimentation used to save their captain

Lore justified the experiments already here:

LORE: I thought it might look good on me. What do you think? Maybe we should work on your sense of humour, brother. Actually, I was thinking La Forge's implants might make him an ideal test subject for my experiment.
DATA: All the Borg you have experimented on so far have suffered extensive brain damage.
LORE: Using the humans to perfect the procedure will allow us to prevent any further Borg deaths.

Was Picard's question a valid reason for Data to question his motives? I'm wondering if the writers just forced Data to be confused to save time given that the episode was almost over.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Some of your examples are very much NOT leading to the greater good. There are cases where doing bad things for the greater good might be justified but you also have to be cautious about letting that logic be used to justify atrocities.

In this case, Data was being manipulated. Picard's question about how an evil thing could lead to the greater good was less a philosophical question and more getting Data to question the manipulation.

 

[marsh8472]

Looking at episode "The High Ground"

DATA: Dimensional shifting is such an unstable procedure, sir, that I cannot say. Sir, I am finding it difficult to understand many aspects of Ansata conduct. Much of their behavioral norm would be defined by my programme as unnecessary and unacceptable.
PICARD: By my programme as well, Data.
DATA: But if that is so, Captain, why are their methods so often successful? I have been reviewing the history of armed rebellion and it appears that terrorism is an effective way to promote political change.
PICARD: Yes, it can be, but I have never subscribed to the theory that political power flows from the barrel of a gun.
DATA: Yet there are numerous examples where it was successful. The independence of the Mexican State from Spain, the Irish Unification of 2024, and the Kensey Rebellion.
PICARD: Yes, I am aware of them.
DATA: Then would it be accurate to say that terrorism is acceptable when all options for peaceful settlement have been foreclosed?
PICARD: Data, these are questions that mankind has been struggling with throughout history. Your confusion is only human.

Picard says it's normal to be confused about these things in that episode but then tells Data in "Descent part 2" that he's not confused and that he's actually sensing the truth that what he's doing is wrong. The experiments Lore performed on the crew and the borg follow the same sort of reasoning as episodes trying to benefit a society by the suffering of a few through experimentation like in TNG "Ethics, VOY "Nothing Human", and VOY "Scientific Method".

 

[JesterFace]

Perhaps Picard was saying what he was saying to confuse Data, as he Data himself suspected.

 

[Mojochi]

I think more than it being sound logic, it was a sound tactic at trying to push Data's ethical subroutines, which they'd just gotten back on. Lord knows Data wouldn't think what he was doing was right, for any reason, if he were of his right mind, & Picard knows that. It's only done to get him past the tipping point. Picard knows Data himself would come the rest of the way on his own. I don't think you take what Picard is saying as an infallible mandate. It's just a moral puzzler to get his friend to start thinking like his friend again, not a Kirk finds the logic linchpin & crashes the computer brain kind of moment

 

[Nakita Akita]

I think it was Picard really interested in saving his butt.

 

[Tenacity]

There are cases where doing bad things for the greater good might be justified but you also have to be cautious about letting that logic be used to justify atrocities.

Kirk contemplating killing a million people on Deneva to prevent the spread of the parasites to countless planets. The inhabitants of Deneva were innocent of any wrong doing, so would Kirk action have been an arocity if he had glassed the planet?