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The Murder Dilemma (an ethics question)

What would you do?

  • Total voters
    26
Who the **** built this train and why aren't the tracks fixed?
 
Goshin said:
Send the train to be derailed, then go kill the man tied to the tracks myself. Everybody dies.



Then hunt down whoever came up with this "dilemma" originally and kill HIM. Slowly.
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Switch the tracks. I am opposed to sacrificing people against their will, as DifferentDrummr mentioned that aspect several posts ago, but not switching the tracks is sacrificing a ton of people for this one person. Not acting is not only murder from my perspective, which is inexcusable in my mind, it's murder because you're a damn coward, which is both inexcusable and pathetic.

I wouldn't regret flipping that switch for an instant.
 
Jesse Booth said:
Switch the tracks. I am opposed to sacrificing people against their will, as DifferentDrummr mentioned that aspect several posts ago, but not switching the tracks is sacrificing a ton of people for this one person. Not acting is not only murder from my perspective, which is inexcusable in my mind, it's murder because you're a damn coward, which is both inexcusable and pathetic.

I wouldn't regret flipping that switch for an instant.
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Does doing nothing qualify as "sacrificing," though? Not saying you're wrong or right; just curious about your reasoning on this.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Does doing nothing qualify as "sacrificing," though? Not saying you're wrong or right; just curious about your reasoning on this.
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If you do nothing, it is because you are not willing to kill a single person who has been tied to the tracks in order to save an unknown number of people, possibly a handful, possibly a hundred or more. Doing nothing is definitely sacrificing these people, in this situation.
 
Jesse Booth said:
Switch the tracks. I am opposed to sacrificing people against their will, as DifferentDrummr mentioned that aspect several posts ago, but not switching the tracks is sacrificing a ton of people for this one person. Not acting is not only murder from my perspective, which is inexcusable in my mind, it's murder because you're a damn coward, which is both inexcusable and pathetic.

I wouldn't regret flipping that switch for an instant.
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It still could be a train full of Liberals, progressives and other socialist types instead of people. Of course, you don't know if the body on the tracks is a person or a leftist either.
 
DVSentinel said:
It still could be a train full of Liberals, progressives and other socialist types instead of people. Of course, you don't know if the body on the tracks is a person or a leftist either.
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Without knowing who the people are, I have to rely on simple mathematics to determine which option is the least destructive. Also, your partisan humor is getting a little repetitive. You need to work on some new material. Soon.
 
Yup I get the dumba$$ award...I hit the wrong option. I would definitely switch the rails.
 
Jesse Booth said:
If you do nothing, it is because you are not willing to kill a single person who has been tied to the tracks in order to save an unknown number of people, possibly a handful, possibly a hundred or more. Doing nothing is definitely sacrificing these people, in this situation.
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And possibly none.

Only switching the tracks to kill the single person is murder....or at least manslaughter.
 
Dear person tied to the tracks,

Today is your lucky day! I'll be down there to untie you as soon as I watch the train wreck! There is nothing cooler than a train wreck.
 
Utilitarian choice is to flip the switch. As much as I like to think I would pull that switch, I am not a Vulcan and would probably let it go on. Inaction vs action.

I would probably justify my regret by saying there was nothing that I could have done and it's the train companies fault.

I also think that when it came down to the line, more people who said they would switch the tracks would be unable to do it either.
 
Nilly said:
Utilitarian choice is to flip the switch. As much as I like to think I would pull that switch, I am not a Vulcan and would probably let it go on. Inaction vs action.

I would probably justify my regret by saying there was nothing that I could have done and it's the train companies fault.

I also think that when it came down to the line, more people who said they would switch the tracks would be unable to do it either.
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Esp. the religious but religious or not, many believe in miracles.

There's no guarantee that anyone would be killed on the train...it's likely...but no one would ever know and we all see the 'miracles' in disasters regularly, whatever they are attributed to...physics or God.
 
Jesse Booth said:
If you do nothing, it is because you are not willing to kill a single person who has been tied to the tracks in order to save an unknown number of people, possibly a handful, possibly a hundred or more. Doing nothing is definitely sacrificing these people, in this situation.
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I have a couple of issues with equating doing nothing to "sacrifice." In one sense, sacrifice refers to slaughter, but in its other sense, it refers to giving something up in exchange for something else. In the first case, if you're not responsible for putting the train on the tracks, and it's not your job to be switching the rails, it's hard for me to see how you can be directly "slaughtering" the passengers on the train. If you're claiming that you're giving up the lives of the passengers to save the life of the person on the tracks, there's the second issue. The lives of the passengers are not yours to trade, and they never were.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Technically, if you flip that switch, you're murdering the person on the tracks, no matter how you look at it.
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No. It is logic. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or one.
 
When "Sophie" made her "choice"....did she murder the child they took away?
 
For the purposes of the hypothetical, I am assuming everything stated is a certainty. Most importantly, that means if the tracks are switched, it is certain many people will die.

That in mind, I would let the train continue.

I think this decision would be more likely to destroy my mind in the end, but even if it wound up taking me down with it, that's still less harm and suffering than switching the tracks.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Not quite the same: the SS officer could have spared the child without her knowledge. A train moving at full speed can't be stopped in time.
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In your scenario, a layperson has no knowledge of how many, or even if any, people will die.
 
Deuce said:
Who the **** built this train and why aren't the tracks fixed?
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They are in the process of renovation and the crew is out for the day.
 
Lursa said:
In your scenario, a layperson has no knowledge of how many, or even if any, people will die.
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If a train with hundreds of people on board goes off the rails and flips on its side, it's a pretty safe guess that - at the very least - there will be a handful of deaths and quite a few severe injuries, wouldn't you say?

Don't forget that a train of this size has the kinetic energy of a small atomic weapon.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
If a train with hundreds of people on board goes off the rails and flips on its side, it's a pretty safe guess that - at the very least - there will be a handful of deaths and quite a few severe injuries, wouldn't you say?

Don't forget that a train of this size has the kinetic energy of a small atomic weapon.
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A good guess? Yes. Knowlege? No.

And I have never heard your assessment of a train/energy/atomic weapon. I would never has assumed such a thing, and I dont even buy it now without proof. It may be but I'd never have thought of it.

Miracles occur in every disaster...we all read about it...I would not assume I knew better or that people wouldnt survive.
 
Lursa said:
And I have never heard your assessment of a train/energy/atomic weapon. I would never has assumed such a thing, and I dont even buy it now without proof. It may be but I'd never have thought of it.
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All it takes is a little math. Start with the weight of the train, add the weights of its passengers and crew, multiply by the square of its speed, and divide by 2 to get the kinetic energy.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
All it takes is a little math. Start with the weight of the train, add the weights of its passengers and crew, multiply by the square of its speed, and divide by 2 to get the kinetic energy.
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Well I'm certainly not going to be doing that math as I watch a train approaching, endangering all those people, now am I?

So it's kind of a non-point. The point is...I dont know the result in loss of human life...cant, no one can. As far as I know, it might be none. Stranger things have happened, as have 'miracles,' whether the result of physics or God.
 
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