Is it wrong to...

Here's a shockingly simple way, thought up by David Birch to generate some intriguing and unusual ethical questions for a provocative discussion - created by chance.

 

Method

Take two hats and put six cards with nouns in one hat, six verbs in another.  Then place something on the floor with the following written on it:

Is it wrong to...

You'll then need to have prepared some cards with suitable words written on them and put these into two hats.  Here's an example of six verbs and six nouns you could use:

Verbs:

• spit on
• lie to
• murder
• marry
• steal from
• tickle

Nouns:

• the Queen
• yourself
• a baby
• a spider
• an elephant
• a tree

One child chooses a random verb from the verb hat, another child a random noun from the noun hat. You can then have these placed next to the piece of paper with the start of the question written on it.  And so, random ethical questions are generated.

 

Task Questions to take you further:

• Are any of these things actually wrong?
• Rearranging the verbs and nouns as you wish, what would be the most wrong thing?
• Rearranging the verbs and nouns as you wish, are there any impossible things?

 

Open-ended, open to modification, lots of fun.

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