Originally posted by xmarksthespot
I think a variant of this question was used in a study. Interestingly people tended to answer yes for the first question, but were inclined to answer no for the second.Oh and AC, the rotund man will die. But a man large enough to stop a speeding train isn't going to live that much longer anyway.
Re: Re: Re: Moral Relativism
Originally posted by xmarksthespot
1) A runaway train is on a track. A bus with a busload of people are stuck on the tracks. You are standing next to a switch that will divert the train onto another track where a railway worker is caught on the tracks. Do you flip the switch?2) A runaway train is headed towards a busload of people stuck on the railway tracks. If you push a rotund railway worker into the path of the oncoming train this will bring the train to a halt. Do you push the man?
Those who answer "yes" to either question presuppose that all human life is equally valuable, and therefore the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.
Suppose the bus is filled with convicted murderers, or the man who will be struct by the train is developing a cure for cancer, how many people would still answer "yes"?
Originally posted by Storm
Because the trolley dilemma is an “impersonal” moral dilemma while the footbridge dilemma is "personal", requiring active personal involvement.
Well it isn't really Impersonal it just seems to be less personal.
Originally posted by Adam_PoE
Those who answer "yes" to either question presuppose that all human life is equally valuable, and therefore the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.Suppose the bus is filled with convicted murderers, or the man who will be struct by the train is developing a cure for cancer, how many people would still answer "yes"?
Either way, I don't think it is my duty or right to decide who lives and dies. As VVD said, it's selfish...then again so is saving the people in the Bus.
I think there is no absolute right or wrong, everything will be relative but with consequences. Like if killing for example is not exactly wrong but there would be bad consequences for you, and those consequences make it a bad thing.
Things will not be classified right or wrong because they are, but because they bring bad consequences to you... I mean, do a "relatively" bad thing if you want but do not complain after you do that. There could be some people who do "bad things" and does not complain of their lives, but we must know what they really fell, or how really is their lives, not what they tell... maybe they don´t even know how their lives are.
Originally posted by xmarksthespot
I think a variant of this question was used in a study. Interestingly people tended to answer yes for the first question, but were inclined to answer no for the second.
Interesting that if one believes that it is right to try to save more lives possible, they do it only in one situation if the consequences are the same to both situations. It is easier to kill a worker if you kill him indirectly !? We just choose to intervene in the situation when we know we will not feel guilty even if it will cost many lives, or is there something that makes the second situation where you push the worker wrong ? There is even the possibility that saving more lives possible is not always right, but why ?
Originally posted by Atlantis001I recall I read about this in a New Scientist article Exploring the Moral Maze. The moral dilemma was part of a study by Dr. Joshua Greene a postdoctoral fellow in the Dept. of Psychology at Princeton University. Their explanation was that there was "competition" between emotion and reason when coming to moral decisions, and that greater conflict occurred in the latter scenario requiring greater cognitive processes. Psychology isn't my forte. However if one's interested in further information:
Interesting that if one believes that it is right to try to save more lives possible, they do it only in one situation if the consequences are the same to both situations. It is easier to kill a worker if you kill him indirectly !? We just choose to intervene in the situation when we know we will not feel guilty even if it will cost many lives, or is there something that makes the second situation where you push the worker wrong ? There is even the possibility that saving more lives possible is not always right, but why ?
Originally posted by xmarksthespot
Their explanation was that there was "competition" between emotion and reason when coming to moral decisions, and that greater conflict occurred in the latter scenario requiring greater cognitive processes.
Originally posted by Victor Von Doom
an already difficult decision to decide whether you should intervene if your intervention can save lives, albeit with a smaller loss of life caused directly by you. The variable is obviously the proximity and level of interference. Therefore it's tempting to take the objective moral stance on the switch-flicking option, but shy away when you need to actively push someone to their death.For myself, I wouldn't intervene either way, unless there were some other factors involved, such as personally knowing and liking someone I was about to leave to die. Slightly selfish, but it's an almost impossible decision anyway.