The Case of the Speluncean Explorers

by Peter Suber

The book is built on the greatest fictitious legal case of all time, Lon Fuller's "The Case of the Speluncean Explorers," Harvard Law Review, vol. 62, no. 4 (1949) pp. 616-645. Four spelunkers (cave-explorers) in the Commonwealth of Newgarth were trapped in a cave by a landslide. After eating their limited stores of food, and approaching death by starvation, they made radio contact with the rescue team, which estimated that the rescue would take another 10 days. The men described their physical condition to physicians and asked whether they could survive another 10 days without food. The physicians thought that very unlikely. Then the spelunkers asked whether they could survive another 10 days if they killed and ate a member of their party. The physicians reluctantly answer that they could. Finally, the men asked whether they ought to kill and eat a member of their party, selected by lottery. No one at the rescue camp was willing to answer this question. The men turn off their radio, a