Business Ethics Now 3rd Edition by Andrew Ghillyer

Exercise 52

Derek Parfit describes a case called the "Harmless Torturers." He says that in the bad old days, one torturer gave a jolt of 1,000 volts to a victim, but nowadays 1,000 operators each flip a switch carrying 1 volt. Any individual contribution to the overall effect is negligible, and therefore each one believes he or she has not personally done any significant harm. Would the same logic apply in the HealthSouth case What, if anything, is wrong with the reasoning involved