One of the most famous thought experiments in ethics is "the runaway trolley". It aims to clarify how we should distinguish right from wrong. I have read it before and heard it before, but here is how it is presented on the BBC's website. Read the experiments and then weigh in with your opinion.
Here is the scenario:A runaway trolley car is hurtling down a track. In its path are five people who will definitely be killed unless you, a bystander, flip a switch which will divert it on to another track, where it will kill one person. Should you flip the switch?
Now here's another version of the problem--with a twist:
The runaway trolley car is hurtling down a track where it will kill five people. You are standing on a bridge above the track and, aware of the imminent disaster, you decide to jump on the track to block the trolley car. Although you will die, the five people will be saved. Do you jump?
Now here's yet another version--with (of course) a twist:
Right before your leap, you realise that you are too light to stop the trolley. Next to you, a fat man is standing on the very edge of the bridge. He would certainly block the trolley, although he would undoubtedly die from the impact. A small nudge and he would fall right onto the track below. No one would ever know. Should you push him?
13 comments:
The only difference between the 2 scenarios is that the first only involves flipping a switch, therefore indirectly causing the one person to die whereas in the second situation, you are required to actually push the man where the act of pushing is actually very rude. Pushing takes more effort and energy to do as opposed to simply flipping a switch. People probably feel that by exerting more force, you are willing to put more effort into killing somebody. This kind of makes you seem more enthusiastic to get the person killed. Also, pushing the fat guy onto the train tracks leaves more room for failure. It’s much harder to push a guy right in front of the train, exactly right where he will be able to stop the train. He could roll past the tracks and the fat guy will turn around, unharmed, and yell at you for trying to get him killed. He could also land on a spot where he will be killed along with the rest of the 5 people. In the switch situation, it's simply flip and kill, not much room for any faults. Well, if you're going to kill someone, at least be efficient in doing so.
In the first scenario I would not flip the switch to divert the train from hitting 5 people. Although the numbers seem better, the five chose to be on the track, while the one person on the other track is completely innocent and does not deserve to die for the 5 guilty people. People may choose to flip a switch but not to sacrifice themselves or someone else because they physically have to take someone else's life. The flip of a switch seems far less threatening. I do not believe that numbers should play a role in this scenario, but rather innocence and guilt. Although the bystander, by doing nothing, seems to be guilty by killing four additional lives rather than one, the bystander would rather be guilty for changing the course of action. The only motivation to save the guilty people would be to save more lives, which is generally and initially praised by the public; however, when one analyzes the situation, the bystander who flips the switch is at fault for killing the only innocent person in the scenario. We heard this situation in the pyschology one course, but we also saw an old episode of M*A*S*H to accompany it. The situation shows a bus load of people hiding in a war zone very quietly, but one lady on the bus has a baby. The baby begins to cry, threatening the lives of all the passengers. The mother, in trying to quiet the baby, suffocates it and kills her child. Her intentions are ambigiuous, but it calls into question again, is one life, no matter how innocent, less valuable than a bus load?
Well, hopefully the five people would realize the trolly is comming and get off the track but seeing that this is not the case i would deffinately pull the switch. Even thought it is horrible that someone has to die either way it is better to save 5 lives instead of only one. For the second scenerio i would probably not jump because me jumping in front of a trolly will not stop the trolly. It might not even make a difference so then six people would die. I also would not push the fat man off the bridge although i would probably yell for him to do something. Though, that probably wont make a difference either. So, although i would let the fat man live, 1 other perspn is going to die because i would flip the switch so that five people are saved and 1 person dies. It is tragic but i live and so do the 5 other peopl and the fat man. =]
Pushing the fat man on the tracks and trading five lives for one are the same exact scenarios but in one you have more distance from the lives your are choosing to allow. In each scenario accepting to do something would save 5 people and kill one. How do you put a price on the one life vs. the five others? It is not something which is easy to answer yet the choice is clear for each of us (different but clear). I would do nothing and walk away from this situation because I do not choose who lives and dies, the trolley accident does.
It is acceptable for people to flip the switch but not kill the Fat Man (let us call him Homer, not Fat Man). This is based on the Army’s principle of triage; you save as many as you can. This is evident in the first scenario, when the idea of definitely saving 5 lives by sacrificing 1 is easy to choose. It would be selfish to sacrifice Homer because you can jump in front of the train as well. Plus, there would always be a sense of guilt if Homer was killed but you survived along with the rest of the people on the train. On the other hand, Homer in front of the train would definitely save the lives of the people on the train, whereas you jumping on front of the train may or may not, assuming you’re normal sized. Some of the questions raised here include, is it ethical to sacrifice the life of one person to save the lives of five?
YES,4 Blogs!P.S. Ms. Powers, love the Homer pic, but I pictured the fat guy to be more like Peter from Family Guy.
This blog poses questions having to do with fate and morals. In my opinion it is not at all more acceptable to flip a switch to turn the train and kill one person, than to push a man off the bridge to save the five people. It is actually the same exact dilemma, you will be changing the fate of that train, and those five people on that train were in a sense “meant to die.” This question actually reminds me of the discussion that we had on Thursday. Whether it is one or five, a human’s life is being taken and who are we to judge whose life is more valuable than another? We are putting a cost on human life. What I would do in this situation would be to leave the train as it is, on its set path. No ones life is worth ending but it is not ethical to kill one person, and have your reasoning be that their life was not as important as five others.
In the first scenario, most people would flip the switch to save five people, and kill one. We choose this because we see that by saving more people we might think we did something better. In reality saving one or saving five people doesn’t make a difference in its goodness. In the second scenario, it asks to sacrifice your own life to save five other lives. Many people would think yes they would do that. When facing the problem then, I think most people will not choose to jump and kill the five other people. Yes, we want to save people but at the same time we don’t want to kill ourselves to do so. In the last twist, it asks to push a fat man off the bridge because he can stop it. It is wrong to do so and I think people would feel guilty pushing a fat man off a bridge. When you sacrifice one person in the first scenario, it is the same idea as pushing the fat man off in the third, yet no one thinks of it as the same.
Like most people, I would agree that flipping the switch and killing the one person is the best thing to do. I would still feel terrible for doing it but out of all the situations I would choose that one. However, I would never push the fat man. Both the fat man and the single person are innocent people but I would rather not push the fat man. I think this is because pushing the fat man is more direct. You forced him to jump by pushing him off the bridge. In the other situation, flipping the switch is all your doing. You wouldn’t feel like your directly killing someone if you just flipped a switch. However, pushing someone off the bridge would be directly murdering someone. This situation asks you if it is just in sacrificing one life in order to save multiple lives.
To answer this, I would have to think about what kind of people they were. Let’s say that the situation was this instead: There is a runaway trolley car hurtling down a track where it will kill five people. However these five people are all criminals. You can flip a switch that will divert it to another track where it will kill only one person. However, this is a good person. To be honest, I think I wouldn’t flip the switch. I think I would rather have the five criminals die then someone who is a good person. As said in “Bentham’s Calculus”, a situation like this forces us to admit that us as humans do weigh one life against another.
This is one of the toughest questions of right and wrong one could probably ask another. Both of the situations will kill at least one person if you were to try and save the other five. The obvious choice for the first one is to just flip the switch and redirect the train. This seems like the right thing to do. The other is when you actually have to physically push someone in front of the train. The firs one with the switch was an indirect way to save a group of people which you wouldnt feel as bad about. The second is one that you would directly interfere with the train running five people over by deliberately sacrificing an innocent bystander. The first situation the one person was already on the tracks and could have just as easily have been grouped up with the others in danger while the second situation the innocent bystander was not in any harms way at all and you put him there. What it all comes down to is was it necessary to mess with the fate of five people or one person or does it even matter.
To the point of right and wrong in this situation it all depends on that persons life experiences and what they have been through. These are all valid reasons about whether or not the person will find it necessary to intervene or not to and just let things naturally unroll.
The first scenario was the best because it was easy. Obviously we would choose to have one person, not five, die. The second one is harder though. I would probably let the 5 people die. I'm not a bad person, but
I would rather live. It is only 5 people in a world of billions. The third is very difficult. One person dying is better than five dying (anybody dying is bad though, DUH). But electing to push someone to into an oncoming train is horrible. It is worse than letting five people die. I consider that murder. To push someone into a train, knowing that they will die is just unbelievable. Like I said, 5 people isn't that bad, but murder is. Why did we have to call this man fat? That is also unethical.
Fat people in our society are equivalent to being elderly or handicap. We pity people who are overweight because they are the under dogs in the world. So, some people would chose to kill five people instead of killing one because they’re the underdog. But the way fat people are treated in America is nothing short of the way Hitler treated the Jews, they aren’t fit and healthy. They are world problem now; they’ve become so much of a problem that they had to change most people’s child hood friend cookie monster into veggie monster. Even though it may sound bad if my own life couldn’t stop the train then I would nudge the fat man. To justify my choice I could say because that fat people are abused in society and this would be a big favor from me to him. In the end 1 life is better than 5 and if mine won’t work well then his second best, fat or not the train needs to be stopped. He is a casualty in a very complex plan.
I think the hardest part is deciding what to do between the three differenet experiments is the physical aspect of the decision. In the first situation, the flipping of the switch is an easy decision to make, but would it be so simple if you personally or even just met the person on the receeding end of the deal. Would you then make that decision so quickly? Of course not, you would have to think about it which may take too long, ending up killing those five people. However in this case, that isn't a factor, and most people would indeed pull the switch. However it is a different situation entirely in the second scenario because you are the person on the receeding end of the deal. Then of course you would choose to kill those five people. That brings up the dilema: is your life worth more than the first person's? Obviously you are responding of course no, but in reality your actions are saying yes. You weighed your life more important than the others. Needless to say, I would not jump in front of the trolley. In my thinking, no one would directly blame me for the death of the five people because no one would expect me to sacrifice my life, and therefore I would feel little guilt. Then again, in the third and final situation, you are asked, indirectly, whether or not the life of the fat man weighs up to your life. And to you, it doesn't because no one's life is as valuable as your own. Unfortunetly for that helpless fat man people would probably choose his life over the life of five people as well as there own. However to be honest, I don't know if actually put in that situation, that I would even think of that as a possiblty. As I mentioned before, no one would point the finger in my direction for te runaway trolley, so no guilt would be mine. But if I decided the fate of some fat man, then I would feel guitly and would probably watch the five people die. However, how do we know what the fat man would do in the second situation. Would be sacrifice himself to save the lives of those five people since he is in the same place and time as me?
This one's closed!
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