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Rule (Penance 28/100)
(midwest.social)
I doubled up a number a while back so now we skip forward lol
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this post was submitted on 30 Sep 2024
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I happily live with myself. The death is on the hands of whomever tied those people to the tracks.
Yes, I pulled the lever and by so chose who lived and who died, but if I was that person alone on the tracks I wouldn't blame the one pulling the lever, I believe it was the lesser of two evil. I would still be fucking pissed, but at the one who tied me there, not the person forced to choose.
I agree with you in theory.
But, easier said than done.
Absolutely, it would still be an horrible experience
This is why I prefer the scenario which uses rail workers instead so there is no criminal that tied anyone down.
Imo arguing about who tied them down completely ruins the entire point of the scenario.
But would you push the fat man over the railing?
No.
In the traditional problem, the man tied to the tracks has no input in the final result, they are just a passive piece of the problem, we can assume what their thinking is and that it is how I rationalized my solution: I would expect the lever to be pulled if I was tied to the tracks and so I pull it myself knowing I would not blame the one pulling the lever for my death.
But in this scenario the man has the ability to act for himself: he can decide to jump. I would never expect him to do so (actually I would never expect 99% of people to pull the lever if they were to die themselves) because that is an action that goes too much against all of our instincts and by pushing them I would, in my opinion, commit a murder.
If I was the fat man I would not jump, and if I was pushed I would absolutely blame the one doing it for my death.
You could think that killing 1 to save 5 is the better outcome, but who decide that 1 human is less worth than those 5? It's just the numbers? Then you could argue that between fighting WWII and submitting to the Nazi the better outcome would have been to not fight them because the people that died in camps were less then the victims of the war. Of course that's an overblown example, but it show why I'm extremely uncomfortable with pushing the fat man: imposing your will on someone who has the ability to act is almost never the answer
Suppose the man is blind then. He has the ability to jump but is unaware of the trolley hurliing towards the people on the track. While he has the ability to act his only "crime" is being unaware. Isn't this equivalent to the original trolley problem?
In this case, all six men are unaware of the runaway trolley heading towards them, believing themselves to be safe. The one working on his own track has not made up his mind yet as to whether he would want himself to be sacrificed. You would impose your own will onto him, wouldn't you?
I don't have any solution for variations of the trolley problem that satisfy me. I would likely act based upon what I felt was right at the time without considering (all) the implications. Without the threat of running out of time however, I believe it's much more difficult to decide how to act.