Quote Originally Posted by Karious View Post
It was wrong to kill the endless, just as Sphene's motivations and plans were nonsensical.
By one half of moral theory, yes it is wrong to kill the Endless for the act of killing anything is wrong for it harms the life of another. By Kant’s moral philosophy in the FF14 universe harming or forcibly altering anything with a soul is wrong. The complication is Kant is not the only moral theory to judge the situation by we have utilitarian ethics as well.

Utilitarian ethics is judged not on the action, but on the outcome. In the case of the Endless was shutting down the Endless a better outcome then letting the Endless live as Sphene designed? The Endless need a constant supply of aether from other souls to keep going. To keep the Endless going more souls need to be harvested, and here is where keeping the Endless alive is no longer ethical under Utilitarian ethics because by outcome more souls are being harvested than souls saved.

If we allow Sphene to have the power to do what she needs to do to keep the Endless alive more souls are harmed than saved making saving the Endless an immoral choice under utilitarian ethics. The Endless without Sphene's plan will die out anyway without the souls of others to keep it going so leaving them as are doesn't save them. Destroying the Endless stops Sphene from having the power to harvest the souls from the source the unfortunate only positive outcome.