Up@dawn 2.0

Thursday, April 4, 2013

14-1 Foot and The Trolley Problem

Philippa Foot's Trolley Problem consumed the majority of our group discussion. 

A quick example of the Trolley Problem can be found on Wikipedia: 
Person A can take an action which would benefit many people, but in doing so, person B would be unfairly harmed. Under what circumstances would it be morally just for Person A to violate Person B's rights in order to benefit the group?



Immediately we brought up the example of the popular series 'The Walking Dead' and the incredibly difficult decision Rick is faced with when he can save Michonne's life, or the whole clan's life under Michonne's sacrafice. 



While sitting on the other side of the TV, we can easily yell, cry and judge, however, being in the situation could prove to have dramatically different results. It was very hard for us to make a decision on whether or not we would save the mass or individual.... it is hard to decide when the situation is strictly hypothetical. It was also hard to understand why we would be in the situation in the first place, and how that feeling of power could/would overcome us. Psychologically, we all have evil inside of us... would this take over when someone else's life is in our hands?  

Several questions were raised when attempting to understand and decide how/why we would chose to save a group of people and sacrifice one person, sit back and do nothing, or save one person and sacrifice a group. The issue of knowing the people who need saving, identifying individual morals, and the question "Does it matter?" (Thinking like Kant) all came to our minds. We began to think like philosophers, question questions, and say 'what if'. 

So what would you do? If the situation arose, and all the people who needed saving were strangers, who would you save? Who would you sacrifice? 

The final question is: Would your decision change if your own life was at stake? (If you save the masses=you die and if you save the individual=you live, or the other way around). Food for thought! 



1 comment:

  1. I think that the problem also has to with time and our relationship with it. Flipping the switch to save a group of people rather than one changes the course of reality, our decision ultimately intersecting with that of others. This though experiment is largely hypothetical, and we can only really assess it through our moral lens by breaking it down into situations we can understand. But the trolley problem is perhaps reflective of how we perceive human life and the greater good. But who's to say how we would act on impulse, and whether our action indicates something inherent in human consciousness.

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