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RE: What would you do? Moral choice question.
Why are people standing on train tracks? How is one able to assess all of this information while there are still people who remain oblivious on the track?
Why are people standing on train tracks? How is one able to assess all of this information while there are still people who remain oblivious on the track?
Hmmm... Let's say that they were all tied to the tracks by an evil villain! Your position by the lever allows you to see that they are tied (no evil villain in sight).
Haha well hmm that presents another question. Leaving the track as-is and killing the 5 people is the natural course of the track. By intervening, would I not be intentionally killing the one person by altering the natural course of the deadly train?
You would be! As you know there's one person on the other track, you know that flipping the switch would result in their death. The question is: do you believe that it's better to stand by and let the 5 die, or to kill the one to save 5 lives?
Although killing one would require your physical action, allowing the 5 to die would also be a conscious choice that you make.
Both have consequences. Pulling the lever means reducing the largest amount of suffering. The suffering of the loss of one person and the reactions of everyone they know and their families compared to that of five individuals. Without pulling the lever, that would still involve living knowing that you didn't do everything in your power to reduce the loss of life. Isn't that what firefighters and medical professionals do? They try to preserve as much life as possible while knowing in some instances life slips through your hands and there's nothing you can do.
That's an excellent argument, and veers towards a utilitarian perspective on the situation. In this situation, you're stuck between 2 very hard choices (without a 3rd option, unfortunately). It sounds like you've made up your mind and chosen to save the most lives possible.
So let's throw you a curveball. :-D
Let's say that the ONE person on the other track is someone that you love dearly, while the 5 others are strangers. Would this change your decision? Why or why not?
I think the knee-jerk reaction would of course be yes, because you have feelings for that person. However, if the intent is preserve the largest amount of life is no. The feelings that come from seeing someone you care about near death is what all of those families / friends will soon feel, times five. It would be selfish to think that I had sacrified all those lives selfishly. Now with this into the mix, the consequences are even more severe. Would you save someone you love knowing you let 5 innocent people die because of it? Or would you let the train run over a loved one to spare 5 lives?
Excellent question! I would want follow your exact thought process and save the 5. It would probably ruin me to do so, and I'd spend the rest of my life trying to stop something similar from happening. Those 5 people could be just as important to others, so saving my one would be selfish, and I don't think I'd be able to live with that.
There is one exception to this decision:
If I knew with 100% certainty that those 5 people were evil people (without getting into the definition behind what evil is), I would not divert the train and let them die.
Thanks for this discussion! Really dug it!