A moral question! What would you do?

A TROLLEY train comes hurtling down the line, out of control. It is heading towards five people who are stuck on the track. If you do nothing they face certain death. But you have a choice: with the flick of a switch, you can divert the trolley down another line - a line on which only one person is stuck. What do you do? Perhaps, like most people, you believe that it is right to minimise the carnage, so you do the rational thing and flick that switch.

But what if the situation was slightly different? This time you are standing on a footbridge overlooking the track. The trolley is coming. The five people are still stuck, but there's no switch, no alternative route. All you've got is a hefty guy standing in front of you. If you push him onto the line, his bulk will be enough to stop the runaway trolley. You could sacrifice his life to save the others - one for five, the same as before. What do you do now?

 

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Yeah nice Quest, The fact that I am above humans and I am transforming human civilization for good. The first question is why are thoes 5 struck there. Its because they are humans, so die instead of me.

 

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If you PUSH a guy off the bridge thats almost murder - He was not even in danger in the first place. But if you flick the switch so that only one person is in danger compared to 5, you would have to do it.

 

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KennyJc is correct.
Furthermore, the situations are not that similar. One asks you simply to weigh the relative value of people's life, the second not only asks you to do this, but also to actively determine an individual's value.

Also, there's a problem with one of your premisses: you claim that it is rational to "minimize the carnage" and that this implies that one death is not as significant as more than one. This is flawed.

 

Imagine how many people died because Bush wanted to show How powerful he has become.

 

This is incorrect, in both situations the guy is not in any danger at all, unless you put him in danger. You can either flick a switch to kill him or push him on the track. These are both choices that lead to his death to save 5 others, the only diff is the method with which you kill him.

 

Why is this flawed? One death is not as significant as 5 deaths. For a start you only have 1 family to grieve rather than the alternative 5 familys, surley this on it's only proves the point?

 

So what?
You're willing to evaluate the value of a life?
What if one person (of the 5) you save happens to be a serial killer?
What if the single person you choose not to save is a researcher on the cusp of curing cancer?
What if the 5 people you save are isolationist's with no family, and the lone person is a community leader with 5 children?

One cannot place a value on a life, therefore, one cannot perform ethical calculus.

 

Well,then what about poor people on the train?

 

I wouldn't put a higher value on one person's life over another. I wouldn't make that decision. I would leave the train going in the direction it is going because it is not really my choice to kill one person over the other five. I would have to leave it to fate, although I know that may seem harsh.

Saying that, I wonder where the responsibility then lies? Am I responsible for those five people's deaths or did I merely let fate take its course?

Nicola

 

Choosing not to choose is still a choice - so you're still responsible.

 

Zap, you are right. Just by being in this situation you have a responsibility to make a choice and to live with the consequences. In that sense, it could be a no win situation.

Nicola

 

I will quickly ask the fat bastard if he is tired of life and my actions will depend on his answer- at least 5 people die each day.

 

I have a nitpick..are you saying the just becuase a person is more valued by others, that their life is worth more? It may be worth more to those people, but a loner may live life as much as anyone else. I think each individual has equal worth, so then 5 deaths would be worse then one death.

To be honest, I would flip the switch, but I wouldn't push someone. It just feels wrong, even if its the same utimately the same action, I just couldn't physically do it. Now, were it someone I knew and cared about stuck with the five, I would push the person, as horrible as that is.

 

Crazy you have brought up the fundermental point of the question. Why would the pushing of the man be so much harder to do than flicking a switch; when they both have the same out come?

 

It's true that you cannot place the value on a life. Theoretically, you never can. You can only judge your capacity to socialize with a certain person provided that you have identified certain characteristics of personality (and unfortunately appearance) with friends and family for reference.

This situation likely calls for apathy. But in that case, five people die.

However, this is more tragic than is the case where you have mental apathy and place the assumption of random probability upon the six people at stake here. Because there is no preliminary social interaction, you have no choice but to assume that it is more likely that a cancer-curer is in the group of 5 people than the person you will push off to stop the runaway trolley.

The best thing to do is to push the guy off.

Personally, though, I am too much of a coward to do something like that. The situation is highly unrealistic in the first place, as I wouldn't take confidence that the guy's bulk mass would be certain to stop the train. Not only that, I am too skinny.

 

dehumanization of the switch as opposed to pushing the guy off, makes it "seem" more acceptable.

 

Agreed. This applies to other things as well.

 

I guess it would be that when you flick a switch it feels so much more apart from what is going to happen, so you can feel seperate from the action, but when you push the guy, its your own physical force causing him to die. It makes it more real to you. At least, thats how I see it.

 

Actually in the first situation I flick the other switch the one that triggers the emergency braking system and kills the power. But then again I am sane like that.

In the second I have no choice but to be the unfortunate witness as I would be the bulky guy. Sorry, but I wanna live.