One innocent baby > Ten stupid people |
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Say there's a runaway train. It's hurtling out of control towards ten people standing in the middle of the tracks. The only way to save those people is to flip a switch, send the train down another set of tracks. The only problem is—there is a baby in the middle of those tracks. |
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One innocent baby > Ten stupid people |
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^ My thoughts exactly, 10 people standing in the middle of a train track while a train is approaching is pretty dumb, so they just get whats coming to them. |
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halp gais how do i analogys? |
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You taking philosophy A-Level? |
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Hastily written, sorry. |
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Traditionally I have heard of this dilemma involving a "fat man" in place of the baby, I would imagine that the baby was added to tug at our heart strings and give the illusion of changing the context of the dilemma. But does the baby change the dilemma? Notice how Wayfaerer added "ten stupid people" to the context of the the dilemma (the OP mentioned nothing of the sort) to demonize the ten people. |
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Last edited by stormcrow; 12-29-2011 at 01:27 AM.
Anybody care to explain how Dianeva's post doesn't directly lead to the conclusion that morality isn't an objective, consistent set of principles, but rather, disjointed norms of a purely social origin? |
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'Objective' is a bit of a vague term. But it's hard to give credence to any concept which isn't even consistent... that is the very concerning thing to me. |
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Standing in the middle of a train track while a train is coming is an unintelligent (stupid) decision, I was merely using the definition. The baby isn't just an emotional distraction, it doesn't know enough to move off the tracks. The people have the means to help themselves, so I think it would be best to hope they will and protect the baby who can't. |
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This is still irrelevant. The thought experiment is setup in such a way that you have to choose to either kill the ten people and save the baby's life or kill the baby and save the ten peoples lives. There are no gray areas, you can’t choose to save the baby and hope the ten people move out of the way, that's not how the dilemma is constructed. Even if the people were stupid (or Nazi's or prostitutes) it doesn't change the content of the dilemma. |
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Last edited by stormcrow; 12-29-2011 at 02:00 AM.
I know how the popular situation is set up. My answer in psychology class to this was "I can't choose one, it's too black and white for reality". I think this is why your conclusion to the classic dilemma was "we can't decide rightly" because it doesn't address reality at all lol. The only dilemma I'm seeing is the one written in the OP, which seems more open to the actual possibilities of life. |
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It's quite simple... in one circumstance, the death of the one is 'morally obvious', yet in an analogous situation, the death of the ten is preferable. That's inconsistency, and it shows that the system is flawed, by any measure. |
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Basically, in reality, I would refuse such a black and white decision because I can. I would try to help everyone, logically, helpless first. The problem with these thought experiments is that reality will always present loopholes you can attempt. |
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If you think about it, though, the baby is probably stupider anyway. Babies aren't usually very smart. |
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Not choosing is still a choice. By not choosing you are choosing to let the train kill the ten people because you could have done something to prevent it. |
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Last edited by stormcrow; 12-29-2011 at 03:42 AM.
The difference between you and I is the fact that you only see numbers when it comes down to any life ( i.e, 10 lives vs 1), whereas what I see is the life quality of 10 adults vs 1 infant. I'm a father so that plays a major part in my decision regarding the sensitive conditions of this scenario. Even if the 10 were not stupid or whatever, my choice is still the infant regardless. I don't think you can relate to this because you're not a parent. |
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Oh I see. You are the final arbiter of whose life is more valuable. |
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This is where I disagree, I think life is too complex for us to even imagine the amount of actions possible in any possible situation. |
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Last edited by Wayfaerer; 12-29-2011 at 04:18 AM.
To Engage in the idealistic thought experiment, there is no right or wrong decision here, it's all very personal. If I had to save my girlfriend (if I had one) or a complete stranger, I would choose my girlfriend with no guilt. If I had to save a talented scientist or a world renowned poker player, I would save the scientist. The value of a human only exists subjectively, but would understandably make your decision. Considering the OP to be the classic idealistic dilemma, I would save 10 strangers over a strangers baby; I don't think there is intrinsic relative value in being a baby lol. If it was my baby, that would be a little more difficult. |
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