Who shot JFK?

[ciphergoth]

For the purposes of this post, I don't really care who shot JFK; it's just a convenient mystery with which I can ask a question about truth.

Alice believes that Lee Harvey Oswald shot JFK. She believes that Lee Harvey Oswald was in the Texas Book Depository, aimed a loaded rifle and shot JFK, at which point his head visibly exploded as seen in the Zapruder video.

Bert disagrees; he doesn't know for sure who shot JFK, but the one thing he's sure of is that Lee Harvey Oswald was not pointing a loaded rifle out of the window of the Texas Book Depository at the President at the fateful moment.

What do I believe? As I say, I neither know nor care, but there's one thing I know for sure: one of Alice or Bert is wrong. In sufficiently weird conditions both of them might be wrong, but one of them is wrong for sure. We may never know which of them is wrong, but at least one of them is definitely wrong.

Does anyone disagree with this?

Comments

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

I wish this wasn't necessary; I wish people would address the core of a philosophical example rather than tugging at the edges. Of course as you say one can strengthen the edges but it's dull and wordy work and it's hard to feel it really serves people.

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

Isn't that precisely the work that a philosophical example can helpfully do, though? By doing the edge-fiddling and word-sharpening, you get a better understanding of what the issues are and how they might be resolved, and the distance from the real-world example helps you do that without getting tangled up in every single last detail. (Of course, there's then the very hard work of translating the implications of your deliberations back to the real world ... but who said philosophy had to be easy?)

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it's that way, sometimes it's nitpicking. For example, if I'm setting up a moral dilemma asking whether you pull the lever to divert the train, I don't really want to have to set out in detail why you can't rush to where the people on the tracks are and rescue them, etc; I'd like all that to be taken as read and skip straight to the meat of the dilemma.

[djm4]

It's not at all obvious to me what the meat of the dilemma is here; I have a sneaking suspicion that it's only obvious to you because you're trying to prove a particular point, but even knowing which point you're trying to prove (as I now do), I still can't be sure which replies here (if any) you think are addressing the core and which are tugging at the edges. I do think most people - probably everyone - have been trying to discuss this in good faith.

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

All both true and fair - thanks David.

[jhg.livejournal.com]

I sympathise, but a quick scan of others' responses (which is all I've been able to do - I miss the really good discussions so often!) will indicate its necessity.

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

As djm4 says, I'm being unfair - insofar as people aren't addressing what I consider the core, it's entirely because I haven't made clear which bit I think the core is.