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What’s the right thing to do? : Comments
By Steven Schwartz, published 2/2/2022We all must find a way to live with the consequences of our choices. It helps if we know how and why we made them.
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First don't go invading foreign countries;
When it all goes pear shaped you've got no-one but yourself to blame.
Secondly, divert the tram or not divert the tram;
There's no real right answer. do nothing, people die (as assumed by the argument) but it's not your fault.
Do something, less people die (as assumed by the argument) but it was by your hand and you will live with the guilt.
Push the guy off the bridge.
That's murder and there's no certainty the tram will stop from one person anyway.
It may be 6 dead not 5.
If you assume that one big person can stop the tram, then what makes you automatically assume that all 5 men on the tracks will die?
Won't the tram stop after hitting the first 2 normal sized men?
And if you're over the tracks and can see whats happening, then why not just just yell out to the workers below and let them know, assuming there's enough time to throw someone off a bridge? (There are guardrails)
There's no certainty that people will die either from the tram as they may see it at the last second and jump out the way.
With 5 on the tracks, (10 eyes) it only takes 1 person to see the tram coming and alert the others;
With 1 on the tracks (2 eyes) and his back may be turned, there may be no way to prevent a tragedy.
Ultimately, the ends don't justify the means, that's a terrorist mindset.
The reason why my points are all valid, is because there's another important point that you failed to consider in your black and white arguments, 'the grey area', aka 'uncertainty' and you demonstrated it well in your stories about the soldiers.
- That point is, that things don't always turn out as you expect.
And that's why all my 'grey area points' are valid and worthy of consideration just as much as your close-minded poorly devised black and white thought experiments.