A Look at the Trolley Problem

@Amperage,

Amperage;119579 wrote:

w/ a twist

1st scenario
-------------
A trolley is running out of control down a track. In its path are 5 people who have been tied to the track. Fortunately, you can flip a switch, which will lead the trolley down a different track to safety. Unfortunately, there is a single person tied to that track. Should you flip the switch?

2nd scenario
--------------
Same as the 1st only the single person is either your son/daughter, your spouse, or your mother/father

An interesting thing to note in the trolley problem is the dilemma of acts and omissionswhat is reasonable to do in that given situation? In this case, you could argue that issues concerning moral dilemmas are secondary compared to the duty I would (hypothetically) be expected to perform and the expectations of others dependent on that duty. This is part of the soldiers dilemma. So if I were a Trolley conductor charged with making sure the Trolley, if in the event of a brake failure, were to do the least amount of damage possible, it would be my duty to switch to the other lane with one person on it. Rarely are we held at fault for doing our duty if it is legally permissible and obligated.

There is also an issue with the scenario and the distinction of intentional/accidental outcomes. To do something intentionally is much different than something accidentally happening. Yet for all intents and purposes, we would just assume that letting the trolley continue out of control without doing anything would be more morally permissible because the essential parts of the scenario (the trolley going out of control) is itself accidental in nature. However, that in itself is an intentional thing because we have aforethought to the potential outcome of the trolley going out of control before it reaches the forks.

So with that in mind, I would have to say I would choose my loved one over the five. In the scenario you describe, I can choose between five people I don't know or one person I do know. The first criteria I suppose is what is most reasonable to do? Do I save five people or one person I do know? First thing I have to reconcile is the fact that, no matter the case, I will in some way be culpable for what happens. If I do not change the tracks and let the trolley keep going towards the five people, I am committing an act by omission. If I change the track towards the person I know, I am still just as guilty because though my intent to kill is not there, I made a conscious choice to switch the track that then kills that one person. In that respect, to let the trolley go on without doing anything seems more of a third degree murder than the latter, which would be a second degree murder. Ironically, much like the example of acts and omissions, I am still committing murder in either case. So it is better within the grander scale to commit the lesser crime, to let the trolley go on.

Partiality wise, I suppose I would choose my loved one rather than the five people I don't know. In so doing, I commit a lesser crime (third degree murder) with an unwilling non-intent to kill anyone, but still culpable because I choose to omit rather than commit. Also, I would suppose the issues would be more convoluted if I were a trolley driver or a passenger. If the trolley driver, then I probably have a specific duty to perform (such as causing the least damage). But if I were a passenger, I am not certified to operate a trolley or expected to know proper procedure as to choosing the lesser of the damaging effects, so I have the benefit of plausible deniability in any wrongdoing.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;119745 wrote:

Pyrrho wrote:
But the question is, is it right to murder one person in order to save the lives of five people?

Yes, that is precisely the question. That's one of the questions the trolley problem raises - the one you sidestepped (by not choosing at all).

On the contrary, my choice was to not flip the switch. How can you say that is not a choice? My answer to the question is that it is not right to murder one person in order to save the lives of five people. Why is this not clear to you? Especially since you quote my answer yourself later in your post.

Zetherin wrote:

Pyrrho wrote:
There is no context of the trolley problem. It is simply a made up scenario to ask the question, is it right to kill one innocent person in order to save the lives of five innocent people? I say, the answer to that question is, "no".

Of course there is context. You must consider the details:

1.) There are only two choices
2.) Each choice has a relation with the other (If I choose A, X is saved and Y dies, if I choose B, X dies and Y is saved)
3.) I am the responsible party (I am the only one that can make this choice)

So, your organ example would not be an apt analogy unless it were identical, in detail, to this question. And since there seems to be more than two choices in your example (you didn't create a sense of urgency like a train speeding does; the people that need the organs could receive mechanical parts, for instance), and you didn't make it clear that I'm the responsible party in regards to making this choice, I don't think it's apt. It doesn't mean it can't be. I just need clarification.

If you want clarification, the people who need the organs are dying, and need the organs very soon or it will be too late for them. There are, in fact, no suitable mechanical parts that are currently possible for livers and such; the only known cure for them is a transplant. So, the choice is, give them a transplant, or they die.

The choice of harvesting organs from someone is very obviously related to the lives of the ones needing the organs; if the person's organs are harvested, the person will die. If no organs are harvested, the others will die. One could, of course, kill more people to harvest organs, taking only one organ from each donor but there is no need to do that, as one can use all of the relevant organs from one person in order to save several people.

In this hypothetical, you are the one who decides whether or not the policy is adopted. It is just like the trolley problem; you happen to be the one near the switch, and no one else is near the switch. It is your decision whether the one person will die or the five needing organs will die.

Zetherin;119745 wrote:

Well, I think I made clear what details I think may differ from your question and the OP's question.

If you need further clarity on any point, you may ask, though the answer will be, the details are the same in all respects except those that are necessarily different because the one involves a trolley and the other involves organ donation.

The question is, is it right to murder one person in order to save the lives of five people?

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;119746 wrote:

I think what that shows is that people are not consistent, and do not make these decisions rationally at all. I have never heard anyone give any decent explanation for the difference in what ought to be done. Of course, I am aware that people do, in fact, give different responses, just as you say. There are psychological explanations, but that is not at all the same as an ethical explanation, or an explanation that would make the difference in attitude in any way rational.

Of course, people do not have to treat the different scenarios already mentioned in this thread the same, because, of course, people do not have to be consistent. However, I think they should be consistent.

People should be consistent and rational, but it remains to be shown that choosing to let five die in both scenarios is indeed consistent and rational.

Quote:

Come now. If a man pulls the trigger on a gun, and shoots a person, it is no defense for the man to say, "I did not murder anyone; the bullet is what killed them, not me." By flipping the switch, you are killing the lone person.

Heh, I didn't mean it in a "people don't kill people, bullet's kill people" way. I was speaking to the psychological difference, like how we have different degrees of murder.

Quote:

If one were going to argue as you do above, one would say that by throwing the fat man, one is not killing him at all; it is the trolley that runs him over and kills him. The simple fact is, you are no more (and no less) killing him than you are killing the person tied to the tracks in the other version.

A psychological difference again.

Quote:

I certainly never said that the organ transplants should take place in that scenario. Indeed, my position on this matter is as far from allowing that as possible. I do not believe that murdering an innocent person in order to save others is ever the morally right thing to do.

But where does this lead you? Let's say you were in charge of NASA's latest asteroid deflection missile program, and your department had just noticed that an asteroid is about strike NYC. You can, if you choose, deflect it slightly so that lands in the ocean 100 miles of shore. However, you know that there is a boat out there with one person on it. If you believe that murdering an innocent person to save others is never the morally right thing to do, then you would let 18,223,567 people die?

You know, if you increased the numbers in the organ donor example I don't think people would argue with it either. Someone with a brand new blood type that could save the world from a disease or some such scenario.

I guess I'm arguing that the moral action is the one that a moral person would take. Which seems like it could be problematical, I admit. It's what I was getting at when I said I'd rather live in a society where I might die of organ failure than one where would callously cut up an innocent person. But I think you can be a very normal, moral person and flip the switch on the trolley.

@Amperage,

Pyrrho wrote:

In this hypothetical, you are the one who decides whether or not the policy is adopted. It is just like the trolley problem; you happen to be the one near the switch, and no one else is near the switch. It is your decision whether the one person will die or the five needing organs will die.

If all the details are the same, what point are you trying to make? If there was the same sense of urgency, and all details were the same, I think the people that would choose to kill that one person to save the five with organs, would decide to flip the switch to save the five on the train.

You think not? If not, why? Or explain the point of offering an analogy.

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;119764 wrote:

If all the details are the same, what point are you trying to make?

He's saying that if we wouldn't kill the one person to save the five organ people, we shouldn't kill the one to save the five trolley people. But we could just as easily say that if we would kill the one to save five in the trolley problem, would should kill one to save five in the organ problem--> perhaps we should kill five in the organ problem, but don't because our instincts get in the way. I would argue that possessing those instincts is a good that outweighs the loss of 5 lives.

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;119765 wrote:

He's saying that if we wouldn't kill the one person to save the five organ people, we shouldn't kill the one to save the five trolley people. But we could just as easily say that if we would kill the one to save five in the trolley problem, would should kill one to save five in the organ problem--> perhaps we should kill five in the organ problem, but don't because our instincts get in the way. I would argue that possessing those instincts is a good that outweighs the loss of 5 lives.

Why wouldn't we do the same with the organ problem?

Pyrrho wrote:

On the contrary, my choice was to not flip the switch. How can you say that is not a choice? My answer to the question is that it is not right to murder one person in order to save the lives of five people. Why is this not clear to you? Especially since you quote my answer yourself later in your post.

You are correct. I misunderstood you. My apologies.

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;119666 wrote:

It's a thought experiment. It's just asking for your priorities, not looking for solutions that save everyone.

Yes I know that. I am saying that the thought experiment is vastly lacking. It is overlooking too much information and so it is not a valid thought experiment. I wasn't talking about trying to save everyone. Basically it is choosing what door to pick except there is a cost involved in choosing the door. In other words, I am basically saying the question is stupid because it has set limits that by our nature is too difficult to calculate.

Jebediah;119666 wrote:

I would definitely choose to kill the five. You're kidding yourself if you don't think people value the life of their spouse over five strangers, that's like saying love doesn't exist.

You have missed my point. The reason I mention it is to point out the flaw in the thought experiment. I know people place values on life and that is why they ask the question. But what happens when you get an apathetic person who cares nothing for anyone on the tracks? Their struggle might be that they want both sets of people to die and protest that there should be a way to split the train cars so two cars move down both sets of tracks killing everyone.

Jebediah;119666 wrote:

What on earth makes you think that? Family bonds are not iron clad.

Behavior is not always predictable and values are not always universal. My point was that people will place the value of life on the type of individual in question. So if the person is someone they dislike, it is easy to send them to their death but if it's someone they care about, it is more difficult. This is why the thought experiment fails.

@Zetherin,

Pyrrho;119728 wrote:

You seem to misunderstand me. Many times, in a hospital, a patient who is judged to be terminally ill is not revived when the patient goes into cardiac arrest, even when the doctors are fairly sure that they could revive the person. This is done because it is judged to be not worthwhile, and may cause prolonged suffering. But it is a failure to prevent death when it is possible to prevent it. Now, tell me, are the doctors who do not always attempt resuscitation murderers? It is their failure to act that leads to the death at that time.

What you consider to be "murder" may not coincide with proper use. Murder is:

In order to murder, one must kill, and in order to kill, one must act. Inaction is never murder, though it may be negligence in some cases.

First off let me say I do not know medical protocol that well but I have always thought that unless that person signs what is known as a DNR then they must try to keep them alive.

You don't have to act to murder someone...you can achieve the same result through inaction.....if someone is hanging from a cliff reaching up toward me saying they are slipping and all you have to do is grab them and you don't, I would consider that the same as murdering someone. Or at least just as reprehensible

Pyrrho;119733 wrote:

A full elaboration would be lengthy, but to give you the right idea, let us consider a different version of the trolley problem that in fact exists. Right now, there are people waiting for organ donors, who will die because they will not get the organs. But we could change that, if we were willing to actively kill people to get organs for them. We could find someone suitable, and harvest all of their organs, thereby saving several people, as one would get the heart, another a kidney, another a liver, etc. So by murdering one person, several (who knows? it might even turn out to be five people) could be saved. Should we be doing that? If not, then I don't see why you would want to murder one person in the trolley problem in order to save five.

Here's where I make a distinction....to kill someone who is not otherwise involved is different, or who's free will is still intact. Once the person has been captured and tied to the track he already has no choice but to accept the possibility he's going to die. Innocent people walking around the street are under not such restriction.

It would seem one's duty to make the best out of a bad situation ie cause the least amount of harm as possible.

I fully understand that saving 5 lives does not justify letting one die but at the same time we could put all of humanity on one side minus 2(you and the guy on the other track) and I don't see how you could say we ought not switch the track.

At the point you walk upon the scene you assume responsibility for all 6 lives whether you like it or not because none of the 6 can exercise their own will

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;119762 wrote:

People should be consistent and rational, but it remains to be shown that choosing to let five die in both scenarios is indeed consistent and rational.

Of course I have not shown that it is the right choice; but I have chosen a consistent position. One could say that we should be harvesting organs from people in order to save extra lives, and we should flip the switch which kills one and saves five, which would also be consistent. But no one in this thread has come up with a consistent story to explain why one should (in an ethical sense of the word) make a different decision in the two cases.

Jebediah;119762 wrote:

Heh, I didn't mean it in a "people don't kill people, bullet's kill people" way. I was speaking to the psychological difference, like how we have different degrees of murder.

A psychological difference again.

I agree that there is a psychological difference; otherwise, people would answer consistently. The problem is, there is no rational justification for the difference.

Jebediah;119762 wrote:

But where does this lead you? Let's say you were in charge of NASA's latest asteroid deflection missile program, and your department had just noticed that an asteroid is about strike NYC. You can, if you choose, deflect it slightly so that lands in the ocean 100 miles of shore. However, you know that there is a boat out there with one person on it. If you believe that murdering an innocent person to save others is never the morally right thing to do, then you would let 18,223,567 people die?

I doubt the scenario, because if it were small enough that it wouldn't cause a tidal wave and destroy New York anyway, it could simply be obliterated instead of diverted. Also, surely the ocean would not be evenly populated with small boats, such that no matter where it is diverted, it kills one person.

But, allowing for your scenario anyway, one could claim that the job of NASA is to save as many as possible, and therefore it should be diverted. However, I think that would be a cop out, as it just moves back the moral question one step, as one may ask, should one ever take such a job?

Since I am not a Millian Utilitarian, I am unimpressed with numbers games on this, and stick to my guns. It is immoral to murder one innocent person to save any number of other people.

Jebediah;119762 wrote:

You know, if you increased the numbers in the organ donor example I don't think people would argue with it either. Someone with a brand new blood type that could save the world from a disease or some such scenario.

No doubt, many would be fine with it, and some would accept it uneasily, but still go along with it. But that proves nothing, as the world is filled with murderers and all sorts of evil doers.

Jebediah;119762 wrote:

I guess I'm arguing that the moral action is the one that a moral person would take. Which seems like it could be problematical, I admit. It's what I was getting at when I said I'd rather live in a society where I might die of organ failure than one where would callously cut up an innocent person. But I think you can be a very normal, moral person and flip the switch on the trolley.

It may be normal, but that does not show that it would be moral to flip the switch.

To me, the value of looking at the two versions of the scenario is that it shows that people do not judge ethical situations rationally, but are instead motivated by other considerations. Most people do not, in fact, operate by a set of consistent ethical principles.

---------- Post added 01-13-2010 at 04:54 PM ----------

Jebediah;119765 wrote:

He's saying that if we wouldn't kill the one person to save the five organ people, we shouldn't kill the one to save the five trolley people. But we could just as easily say that if we would kill the one to save five in the trolley problem, would should kill one to save five in the organ problem--> perhaps we should kill five in the organ problem, but don't because our instincts get in the way.

Exactly.

Jebediah;119765 wrote:

I would argue that possessing those instincts is a good that outweighs the loss of 5 lives.

I think we would be better off if people instinctually regarded people as having such intrinsic worth that they are not to have their lives bargained with, as if we were comparing piles of rocks.

To put this another way, I am glad most people do not want to kill one person to harvest organs to save five, though I wish they also did not want to flip a switch and murder someone. Psychologically, people seem to have less trouble doing bad things to people if they can do it remotely, keeping the blood from literally splashing them.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;119774 wrote:

Of course I have not shown that it is the right choice; but I have chosen a consistent position. One could say that we should be harvesting organs from people in order to save extra lives, and we should flip the switch which kills one and saves five, which would also be consistent. But no one in this thread has come up with a consistent story to explain why one should (in an ethical sense of the word) make a different decision in the two cases.

my distinction is that of peoples free will and their involvement with the given situation

Here's where I make a distinction....to kill someone who is not otherwise involved is different, or who's free will is still intact. Once the person has been captured and tied to the track he already has no choice but to accept the possibility he's going to die. Innocent people walking around the street are under not such restriction
At the point you walk upon the scene you assume responsibility for all 6 lives whether you like it or not because none of the 6 can exercise their own will. Even if the 1 is a father and the 5 are his wife and kids and he's screaming to save them, he has no ability to affect the situation therefore his will is negated, since yours would not be you must assume responsibility for those who's will has been negated and you must try to act in their best interest.

@Amperage,

Pyrrho wrote:

Of course I have not shown that it is the right choice; but I have chosen a consistent position. One could say that we should be harvesting organs from people in order to save extra lives, and we should flip the switch which kills one and saves five, which would also be consistent. But no one in this thread has come up with a consistent story to explain why one should (in an ethical sense of the word) make a different decision in the two cases

But you must clarify in your organ example that people would have to make a choice, just like in the trolley example.

In this case, why do you think others wouldn't be consistent? Why do you think people would respond differently to your organ analogy?

@Amperage,

Amperage;119770 wrote:

...

Here's where I make a distinction....to kill someone who is not otherwise involved is different, or who's free will is still intact. Once the person has been captured and tied to the track he already has no choice but to accept the possibility he's going to die. Innocent people walking around the street are under not such restriction.

It would seem one's duty to make the best out of a bad situation ie cause the least amount of harm as possible.

I fully understand that saving 5 lives does not justify letting one die but at the same time we could put all of humanity on one side minus 2(you and the guy on the other track) and I don't see how you could say we ought not switch the track.

At the point you walk upon the scene you assume responsibility for all 6 lives whether you like it or not because none of the 6 can exercise their own will

I fail to see any relevance to the issue of the one person already being tied up, but if it matters so much to you, you are the director of the hospital, and someone else has already found a suitable donor, and have him (or her) tied up, so he (or she) has no choice in what happens. You now decide if you will use the suitable organ donor or not.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;119782 wrote:

I fail to see any relevance to the issue of the one person already being tied up, but if it matters so much to you, you are the director of the hospital, and someone else has already found a suitable donor, and have him (or her) tied up, so he (or she) has no choice in what happens. You now decide if you will use the suitable organ donor or not.

The difference also is that organ failure is not brought on by some evildoer but by natural causes. Well in some cases maybe it is

We're also talking about a 1 to 1 exchange here.

Not to mention I would have time to ask the "suitable donor" what he wanted.
What if the 1 guy asked you to switch the track?
And there are a ton of donors. And a system already in place for dealing with them as best we can(a waiting list).
There is no such system in place for the trolley problem as best I know, but if there were 5 people in one lane. and a bunch of lanes with 1 person eventually I would bet that someone would volunteer because some people have that much love for others.
I just see them as 2 completely different scenarios

And since when has being inconsistent been inheritantly bad? It at least shows that one can evaluate things on a case by case basis. I would say it might be better to be inconsistently right then consistently wrong.

***EDIT***
I guess re-looking at my thoughts maybe the best way to handle it would be to explain to the guy in the lane by himself the situation and ask him if he would be willing to sacrifice himself to save the 5 others.....If he said no, perhaps I would not switch lanes
***_ _***
That just raises the question about what to do if he was unconscious? Or what if there isn't enough time to ask him? And also what if all of humanity is on the other side and he still says no? And how am I supposed to know if he is thinking clearly enough to make the right decision?.....Perhaps if he were unconscious I would be forced to assume that he would act in the best interest of his fellow man thereby switching lanes. In the 2nd situation I'm not sure but I don't see how he could be acting logically therefore I'd probably still have to switch lanes

@Zetherin,

Zetherin;119780 wrote:

But you must clarify in your organ example that people would have to make a choice, just like in the trolley example.

I do not understand your confusion on this. Either the organs are harvested or they are not. There is no alternative to those two. The only way to save the lives of those needing organs is to harvest the organs. If you do not, they will die.

If you want me to make the problem more artificial, we can say that they will all die if you do not immediately harvest the organs, and there is one (and only one) person you have on hand who could work as the organ donor.

Zetherin;119780 wrote:

In this case, why do you think others wouldn't be consistent? Why do you think people would respond differently to your organ analogy?

I have seen surveys on this in the past. Most people say, pull the switch, but do not harvest the organs. Not everyone is inconsistent, though, so not everyone says what most people say.

Here is a link to a page where someone is attempting to explain why people are inconsistent:

Joshua Greene's Homepage

Though he does not word it quite that way. Please note, being a Psychology Professor, he is interested in the psychology of the matter, which is different from the matter of what is right to do and what is wrong to do. He is examining how, in fact, people make decisions, not how they should make decisions.

@Amperage,

Pyrrho wrote:

I do not understand your confusion on this. Either the organs are harvested or they are not. There is no alternative to those two. The only way to save the lives of those needing organs is to harvest the organs. If you do not, they will die.

But not only no alternatives, but an immediate decision must be made. In the trolley example, the sense of urgency does influence, I think.

Quote:

I have seen surveys on this in the past. Most people say, pull the switch, but do not harvest the organs. Not everyone is inconsistent, though, so not everyone says what most people say.

It just seemed as though you implied people would be inconsistent.

And I'm sure the more you clarified the matter, the more you rationalized each circumstance, realizing the identical nature of each situation, the more you would see people be consistent.

This leads me into my next point: I think someone could feel inconsistent about each circumstance, but be consistent about which choice they choose. These things are not mutually exclusive. And I think the article you showed me was detailing the former; the inconsistency in emotional response. But just because someone feels different about a situation due to whatever psychological reason, it does not follow that their rational response, after critically thinking, will be different. I'm not saying you said this directly, but I would just like to clarify this.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;119774 wrote:

But no one in this thread has come up with a consistent story to explain why one should (in an ethical sense of the word) make a different decision in the two cases.
...
I agree that there is a psychological difference; otherwise, people would answer consistently. The problem is, there is no rational justification for the difference.

I think in the organ example people are making an emotional decision, not a rational ethical one. I have argued that it's better that way, but maybe it isn't.

You can not get by on rational ethics alone. People don't follow rationality. Without our moral emotions and empathy, we would be sociopaths, right? Your rational argument has an emotional base.

Quote:

Since I am not a Millian Utilitarian, I am unimpressed with numbers games on this, and stick to my guns. It is immoral to murder one innocent person to save any number of other people.

:listening: I guess we disagree fundamentally. Why is murdering an innocent wrong in the first place then? Since you are casually waving away the deaths of billions.

Quote:

To me, the value of looking at the two versions of the scenario is that it shows that people do not judge ethical situations rationally, but are instead motivated by other considerations. Most people do not, in fact, operate by a set of consistent ethical principles.

As the joshua guy you linked to said, in the trolley problem we evaluate it rationally, in the organ donor problem emotionally.

Quote:

I think we would be better off if people instinctually regarded people as having such intrinsic worth that they are not to have their lives bargained with, as if we were comparing piles of rocks.

To put this another way, I am glad most people do not want to kill one person to harvest organs to save five, though I wish they also did not want to flip a switch and murder someone. Psychologically, people seem to have less trouble doing bad things to people if they can do it remotely, keeping the blood from literally splashing them.

Yes, this is where the argument lies I think. The joshua guy suggests that we should try to lessen the influence of our "moral common sense" and I agree. It seems like he is disagreeing with you though. He might argue that we should overcome our emotional opposition to the organ harvesting. I think that's the main difficulty in moral philosophy, how much do you go against your instincts? It's very difficult. My argument for why it was better to not harvest the organs could just have been a rationalization [edit--on reflection, it was indeed not a sound argument], the one offered about free will could too.

What do you think about his crying baby dilemma?

It's war time, and you are hiding in a basement with several other people. The enemy soldiers are outside. Your baby starts to cry loudly, and if nothing is done the soldiers will find you and kill you, your baby, and everyone else in the basement. The only way to prevent this from happening is to cover your baby's mouth, but if you do this the baby will smother to death. Is it morally permissible to do this?

@Jebediah,

Ok so what if you are a passenger on a plane and a terrorist has hijacked it and you believe that he has intentions to blow up the worlds largest facility for needy children but the only way to stop him is to kill him?

@Jebediah,

Jebediah;119808 wrote:

I think in the organ example people are making an emotional decision, not a rational ethical one. I have argued that it's better that way, but maybe it isn't.

You can not get by on rational ethics alone. People don't follow rationality. Without our moral emotions and empathy, we would be sociopaths, right? Your rational argument has an emotional base.

:listening: I guess we disagree fundamentally. Why is murdering an innocent wrong in the first place then? Since you are casually waving away the deaths of billions.

As the joshua guy you linked to said, in the trolley problem we evaluate it rationally, in the organ donor problem emotionally.

Yes, this is where the argument lies I think. The joshua guy suggests that we should try to lessen the influence of our "moral common sense" and I agree. It seems like he is disagreeing with you though. He might argue that we should overcome our emotional opposition to the organ harvesting. I think that's the main difficulty in moral philosophy, how much do you go against your instincts? It's very difficult. My argument for why it was better to not harvest the organs could just have been a rationalization [edit--on reflection, it was indeed not a sound argument], the one offered about free will could too.

I don't think it is accurate to call the one method "rational" and the other "emotional" (the one approach appears to be motivated by the principle that we should always do whatever saves the greatest number of people, and the other approach appears to be motivated by the principle that we should never intentionally kill an innocent person), but I don't think it is essential to go into that too much for what I want to say. However, I am making this disclaimer because I do not want anyone to suppose that I endorse those labels for the two approaches.

If we consider the "rational" approach to the original Trolley Problem, where one chooses to flip a switch and kill one to save five, there needs to be some justification for that. I mean, of course, that one must first value life for the question to even be important. To explain that, let us consider another example.

[INDENT][INDENT]Suppose there is a scientist who has in his laboratory two containers of amoebas, one with one amoeba, and another container with a million amoebas (or pick any number you want, over one). Suppose there is another container of acid that is draining through a tube, such that it it currently headed toward the container with the million amoebas, but there is a switch that can be flipped that will cause the acid to be diverted to the container with only one amoeba instead. And let us suppose that there are no other options for saving the million amoeba. Now, should you flip the switch?[/INDENT][/INDENT]

Most people, I suspect, would say that it does not matter, because they do not care about amoebas.

The point of this is, of course, that in order for someone to seriously take a position one way or another, one must care about the things in question.

Now, going back to the trolley example, what is it that makes the lives important? It is only from looking at the matter from an "emotional" perspective that makes the decision important in the first place. If the killing of innocent people is not a problem, then there is no reason to bother flipping the switch. The root, if you will, of the whole concern is "emotional", and so it is primary, not the so-called "rational" approach.

Jebediah;119808 wrote:

What do you think about his crying baby dilemma?

It's war time, and you are hiding in a basement with several other people. The enemy soldiers are outside. Your baby starts to cry loudly, and if nothing is done the soldiers will find you and kill you, your baby, and everyone else in the basement. The only way to prevent this from happening is to cover your baby's mouth, but if you do this the baby will smother to death. Is it morally permissible to do this?

This sort of example gives another twist to the discussion, since the baby dies no matter what.

I don't think the example is quite real, as one may cover the baby's mouth and cause it to pass out, and then remove one's hand so that it will then be able to breath, but let us not let reality interfere with the issue at hand. Wink

I don't think it is right to kill the baby. If you are asking, would I prosecute the person for murder afterwards, that is a very different question from asking whether it was the right choice or not. Many times, it is not a good idea to prosecute someone for doing something that is not right.

If I were a Kantian, I would have written earlier about using people as a means only rather than treating them as an end in themselves, and although I am not a Kantian, I think there is something in this that is quite right. If it is okay to merely use people as a means only, without treating them as ends in themselves, then what is the problem with letting vast numbers of them die? How are they different from the amoebas? If it is wrong to use people as a means only, then it is wrong to flip the switch because that is using the one person as a means to save the others, and not treating that person as an end in him or her self.

Let me add that my biggest concern is that people make some effort to be consistent, whatever their ideas are on morality. If we should always do whatever saves the greatest number of people, then we should pull the lever in the one case, push the fat person in the version with him on the bridge, and harvest the organs to save others. If we should never intentionally kill an innocent person, then we should not pull the lever, we should not push the fat person, and we should not harvest the organs. However, what most people say is not consistent with either of these two options, so upon what basis are people making these ethical decisions? And what should be the basis for their decisions?

If we look at Joshua Greene's answer to what he thinks people are doing (which is answering the first of the two questions in the preceding paragraph), they are not being consistent in their approach to the different versions of the problem. And I agree with him on that point, that people do not appear to be consistent at all.

---------- Post added 01-14-2010 at 01:15 PM ----------

Amperage;119825 wrote:

Ok so what if you are a passenger on a plane and a terrorist has hijacked it and you believe that he has intentions to blow up the worlds largest facility for needy children but the only way to stop him is to kill him?

In that case, we are not talking about killing an innocent person, so not wanting to kill innocent people would not stop one from killing the hijacker.

@Pyrrho,

Pyrrho;119979 wrote:

In that case, we are not talking about killing an innocent person, so not wanting to kill innocent people would not stop one from killing the hijacker.

so then you're for capital punishment?

This to me seems to be an inconsistency. How do you decide who is innocent and who is not? And how do you decide the punishment of death?

if people instinctually regarded people as having such intrinsic worth that they are not to have their lives bargained with, I'm not sure we could kill anyone and be justified

Ok, so what if we take the trolley example except this time you physically see the evildoer sabotage the train and you see him tie the 5 people down to the one track after which he ties himself down to the other track would you switch tracks?

@Amperage,

Amperage;119985 wrote:

so then you're for capital punishment?

No, though one could be, given what I have said so far in this thread. In the case of the hypothetical hijacker, one is killing him not as punishment, but in order to prevent him from succeeding in what he is doing.

Amperage;119985 wrote:

This to me seems to be an inconsistency. How do you decide who is innocent and who is not?

Are you serious? When you see the person hijacking the plane, you decide he is not doing what he ought to be doing. This is very different from the person who is tied to the tracks in the first version of the trolley problem, as he or she isn't doing anything, and is simply an innocent victim.

You don't seriously believe that people who do bad things deserve the exact same treatment as people who do not, do you? They may start with the same basic rights before they do anything bad, but they can forfeit at least some of their rights by their bad actions. Thus, if I am out and about, and I meet a stranger, who merely passes by, I treat that person differently from the one who attacks me or someone else. There is nothing inconsistent in saying that people who do bad things do not deserve to have the exact same treatment as other people who do not.

Amperage;119985 wrote:

And how do you decide the punishment of death?

I wouldn't use the death penalty, but the way someone would decide that would be based upon various considerations, such as the kind of crime the individual in question has committed. I don't know anyone who advocates the death penalty for people they judge to be innocent of wrongdoing.

Amperage;119985 wrote:

if people instinctually regarded people as having such intrinsic worth that they are not to have their lives bargained with, I'm not sure we could kill anyone and be justified

I did not say that everyone had such an instinct, and it certainly is not a fully formed one in many people, if it is there at all. And given the actual responses that most people give to the various versions of the trolley problem, I think it is pretty clear that most people are not consistently following any particular method of reasoning.

Amperage;119985 wrote:

Ok, so what if we take the trolley example except this time you physically see the evildoer sabotage the train and you see him tie the 5 people down to the one track after which he ties himself down to the other track would you switch tracks?

Yes. Then we would not be dealing with an innocent person, we would be dealing with someone who is setting up the situation.

But even in this case, if there was another option, such as waving for the driver of the trolley to stop (or untying the five people, or calling the police when the person starts tying people up, etc.), I would do so (possibly after flipping the switch, just in case it does not stop). But if the person who set it up survived, I think some jail time and/or time in a mental institution would be in order.

Philosophy Forum

A Look at the Trolley Problem

Quick Links

My Account

able2know