As it goes with my previous 2 thought experiments, there is no right or wrong answer here. This is purely a hypothetical situation that is meant to be discussed. Have fun! -------------------------- Greg has just one minute to make an agonizing choice. A runaway train is hurtling down the track towards the junction where he is standing. Further down the line too far away for him to reach, forty men are working in a tunnel. If the train reaches them, it is certain to kill many of them.
Greg can't stop the strain. But he can pull the lever that will divert it down another tack. Further down this line, in another tunnel, only five men are working. The death toll is bound to be smaller.
But if Greg pulls the lever, he is deliberately choosing to bring death to this gang of five. If he leaves it alone, it will not be him who causes deaths among the forty. He must bring about the deaths of a few people, or allow even more to die. But isn't it worse to kill people than it is simply to let them die?
The rails are humming, the engine noises getting louder. Greg has only seconds to make his choice. To kill or let die?
--------------------- I was sparked to use this thought experiment to help illuminate new points about abortion.
Yet you can show it to the family members of the fourty that heck, it wasn't my fault. I may have been Neglective, but to kill five that have done nothing wrong? And let Fourty live that don't know how to preform a job? I don't know where that would go..
^What you fail to realize is it's a runaway train and shouldn't be here. The men had no idea, and were probably just doing what their boss told them. The train had lost control or else it could have hit the breaks. It was bound to continue going until it hit something. Neither group of men is in the wrong here.
o.O Then I really wouldn't know What to do.. o.o It seems kinda odd of a runaway train but.. Maybe then, Pulling the Lever may have been right. I say you are bound to die when you should. The akward thing is that if wwhatever the kids name was wasn't there, the fourty would have died. Its like picking lives over others, which, I have to right to do. Numberwise, I'd go with the Five. But its a hard desicion.
One person always has to take one for the team. If he kills 5, Gregs' conscience would be adversely affected, but if he lets 40 die, the same thing will happen. So in the end, the moral choice is to let 40 die, the ethical choice is to kill 5. He may be so intimidated by the result of either choice that he may blank out, get hit by the train, and 41 people die. That's what happens in real life, but this isn't about real life.
To make a choice to allow 40 people to die because of your inaction or to know that 5 died because of your action is a difficult question. Knowing nothing of the people on either track other than that some of them are about to die. I suppose that if I were in the position of "Greg" I would have to pull the switch. Logically among a group of 40 there is more chance that at least some of them will have familys and children. It is true that all 5 on the other track could have children but I would rather try to explain my action to five grieving families than forty.
