In Tuesdays lecture Professor Johnson brought up the trolley
problem which says there is a runaway trolley barreling down the railway
tracks. Ahead, on the tracks, there are five people tied up and unable to move.
The trolley is headed straight for them and you have little to no time to
evaluate the situation. You are standing not too far from the tracks by the
lever. If you pull the lever the trolley change direction, but you see that
there is one person on the side of the track. You don’t have the skills to work
the lever in a way that would force the trolley to derail without anyone
loosing there life. You have two options and only two; you cannot change the
format of story for any reason. Your two options are: Do nothing, and the
trolley kills five people. Pull the lever taking the trolley off the track
where it will kill one person.
Are you
willing to sacrifice one man’s life to save five other people? As you all may remember in class we discussed
if it was morally right for you to choose if someone should live or die? It
came out to whether or not the one guy was a killer or if the 5 people were
killers. Most of my peers including me chose to pull lever because we couldn’t just
stand there and do nothing. But if the
terms of the situation is slightly changed people tend to give different
answers. For example when were in class someone said well what if the one guy
was a killer they would definitely pull the lever. Or if the 5 people were all rapist
they wouldn’t do anything. The trolley problem brings up the ethical issue of subjective
relativism. Subjective Relativism states that an action is morally right if one
approves of it. So in this case I feel that my decision is morally right. It may seem as if I’m saying it is really easy
to make decision but it’s solely based off my judgment. Think about 1 guy vs 5
people. I can’t just consciously kill five people. By me pulling the lever I could
always say I tried but me just standing and watching six people die would be on
mind every day. Most people or philosophers would say that there is a mistake
with your answer. It’s not because you are in the wrong about whether to kill
one person or five people, but because you are being inconsistent with your
decisions.
I agree with you: I would have pulled the lever, causing one death instead of five. However, I disagree that if the trolley contained five rapists and the other guy was an “innocent” that one should not pull the lever and let the five people in the trolley die. Just because these five people committed a heinous crime does not mean that they deserve to die and the "innocent" guy lives. There are still people and the crimes they committed does not dehumanize them. I would still pull the lever because the result would save five people and only result in one death.
ReplyDeleteI think that the logical and moral thing to do would be to do nothing. I know this is an unpopular opinion, but there is no real reason why one person should be the determinant of who dies and who lives, it is selfish and big-headed thinking. It doesn't matter who the five people are and who the one person on the other track is because if you are just an observer with only enough time to choose 'yes' or 'no' you have no way of knowing if the five people "deserved" to be ran over, or in other terms, if the one persons life is worth that of the five others (or vice versa). As an observer you have no way of knowing the inner demons inside any of those unlucky six people, what they are capable of, who they really are, or why they were put on the tracks in the first place. In many cases, when neighbors or friends of people who have been convicted of heinous crimes are interviewed they are awestruck that the person they knew could commit such deeds, that they appeared so 'normal'. These testimonies suggest that although one person might 'seem' normal they could actually be a horrible person doing horrible things (just watch a few seasons of Dexter and pay attention to the people he chooses to kill). With no way of knowing anything about the people on the tracks it is not your position to chose who gets the right to live, the responsible thing to do is to let 'fate' or 'the universe' take the situation and know that people die every day and as unfortunate as those deaths are, you have no right to put their lives in your hands.
ReplyDeleteAs what was stated above by the author this decision is in no way an "easy" one. In class I was one of the plethora of people that decided that they would pull the lever and kill one person instead of five. Honestly, I really do not know what I would have done until I was actually in the situation. I mean what if it was "fate" for me to be in the situation to decide what will happen? I feel that I would act on impulse.
ReplyDeletePulling the lever or not pulling the lever, I would feel guilty either way. By the pulling the lever I would save five peoples' lives, but there are consequences that follow. In class, I was thinking that the family of the person who died must be devastated, because their family member was chosen to die over all the others. If I wouldn't have pulled the lever, 6 people would have died, but no one who be chosen over the others. In the example given by Shamika about the criminals vs. an innocent person, I would choose the innocent person because the criminals had a choice, and they chose to break the law. In an instant life and death situation like this it is very hard to think about what is morally right and wrong. I would simply go with the one that would cause the least amount of harm to the society.
ReplyDelete