"By eliminating private cars and switching to public transportation, the mortality rate due to vehicular accidents has reduced significantly while making the city more efficient and pedestrian friendly. A major ethical delima has been all but solved by doing so."
not until you realize we are all on a very long trolley to inevitable death that is called aging
This is the problem I have with the trolly problem. This website right here.
EVERYONE, and I mean EVERYONE gets hung up on whether you should pull the lever or not. That's not the point of the trolly problem AT ALL.
The point is to consider whether you pull the lever or not, are you responsible for the outcome. It's a question of ethics. You didn't put anyone in this situation, but you have the ability to do something. If you do nothing, are you responsible for the deaths of the four/five/whatever people? If you act and do something, and only one person dies, are you responsible for that persons death, now that you've been an active participant in choosing one over the other?
For anyone still confused how that's not "do you kill one or four people" - think about this very similar, but differently portrayed problem that has the same moral dilemma: You're walking down the street, and you see a homeless person, they're begging for food, you have half of your footlong subway sandwich left over from lunch; but when you pass by, instead of giving them the sandwich, you continue walking, keeping your sandwich for later. That person, unbeknownst to you, later dies of starvation. Are you responsible for their death?
THATS THE QUESTION. not whether you'd pull the lever or not, not whether you would give someone the leftovers from lunch.... the question is literally, ARE YOU RESPONSIBLE FOR KILLING SOMEONE, either by action or inaction. I don't think that anyone would disagree that killing 1 person vs killing 4/5/whatever people is a "better" choice (not a good choice, just one that's less bad). Thus that's NOT the question. The question is, since you didn't CREATE the situation that these people are in, by doing nothing, when you could have done something, are you responsible, and conversely, by doing something, when you could have done nothing, that leads to someone's demise, are you responsible then?
Jesus.
How can you get so worked up about the trolley problem and still completely fuck up the difference between responsibility and accountability?
the question is literally, ARE YOU RESPONSIBLE FOR KILLING SOMEONE, either by action or inaction
Consequentialism says yes, deontology can say no, depending. Consequentialism is the superior system of ethics in theory, because of course you shouldn't do "YOUR DUTY" if it leads to crappy consequences. But deontology is superior a lot of the time in practice, because the person who says "just don't piss off the fairies bro" often gets better consequences than the guy who uses his galaxy brain to compute a Bentham integral over seven-dimensional utility space and arrives "rationally" at the conclusion that pissing off the fairies is the optimal action.
The most horrifying one to me was the number of people who chose to keep their life savings rather than save 4 people.
I'm not justifying it but if they have a spouse and a few kids they might consider their long term survival over the immediate survival of strangers.
Money can be replaced, lives cannot. If you wanna be more self-serving, those 4 people would probably be very grateful for what you did and help you get back on your feet.
I 100% agree. I'm just trying to understand the logic of someone who would choose money over human life. I also suppose some people are just rotten.
Canonically, the reader/audience stand-in is Mr. Leverpuller. Am I to assume that he's riding in the tram? To where then? Without a lever for pulling he's now unemployed. He has lost his purpose in life. What's the use of safety, when the destination no longer matters?
Now Mr Leverpuller receives a basic income from the state and is free to pursue a career or hobby in a field they enjoy without worrying about how they will survive paycheck to paycheck
Ah... but what when he actually liked the job he was doing? Presenting binary choices with leverthrowing might sound like a strange hobby to have, but I don't judge. Unfortunately, the discarded levers from the scrapyard don't really scratch that itch the same way... they must be connected to something consequential. But without switches to switch Mr. Leverpuller had to get creative: Thus the trolley problem variant with the fat man on a bridge became one of his more infamous later works.
He has now been able to transfer his lever pulling expertise into operating guillotines for the Uber rich.
The journey is the destination, and what is a better journey than idly sitting on a tram with no appointments in sight?
Hell it's my dream.
That gets me thinking. Isn't it wild how growing up we want to drive ourselves around instead of being passengers? Then if we make enough money we tend to go full circle and want to be drove/flown everywhere by others (or spend the money on something self driving). I suppose the difference is you're still being taken where you want to go.
