I see, so while innocence is a factor, the an important ingredient here is self-agency.
I would say both are important. Not everything one does to themselves is morally permissible (in virtue of ‘self-agency’). — Bob Ross
So I assume in the case of the one person on the track yelling, "Do it!" dramatically like out of a movie, you would be ok with throwing the track to hit them instead of the five who yelled, "No, please don't!".
Not necessarily. I would have to be certain that they really mean it: otherwise, I would error on the side of assuming they don’t consent. — Bob Ross
What if both sides plead with you to kill them and save the other side?
Assuming both parties really mean it and are in their right minds to mean it genuinely (e.g., they aren’t mentally ill, impaired, etc.), then I would pull the lever. — Bob Ross
The five plead with you to kill them instead of save the one, while the one is pleading with you not kill them, but kill the other five?
This was just to see if numbers ever came into play. No worry. — Bob Ross
You make a good point. Thank you for your response! — Frog
If morality is truly objective, and our emotions are guides to help us follow this morality, then why does this "objective" morality differ from culture to culture? Why do the Chinese value upholding their honour more than we in the west do? Why do the Slavics find it correct to hold in their emotions rather than to "burden" others with them? Why is politeness and discipline considered a core trait in Japan, and not so much in, say, the Baltics? — Frog
This seems like a slippery slope here, assigning individuals "value." To believe that someone is objectively more valuable than another is — Frog
While it is my belief that yes, we are all simply variables in a grand calculus, and that we don't truly matter, to reduce another man to a number is to waste the power you have to make him truly valued. — Frog
We are all insignificant to the universe, and we can only ever be significant to one another, and by refusing to acknowledge them as people, you waste this power. — Frog
However, it would be immoral for someone else to try to force me to voluntarily sacrifice myself to save other people because it is no longer voluntary if I do it. — Bob Ross
He should never intentionally kill innocent people: even to avoid a bad outcome. — Bob Ross
then its a different question
— Philosophim
Well, what's your answer to the different question? — Apustimelogist
Morality has to do with intent.
So is the variable here inaction of watching people die, or affirmative action pulling the lever to kill one of them? Is this inaction versus action?
Or is the question whether it is better to kill one person or five people in this scenario? — Fire Ologist
All of the variables and so many more facts are important to understand before we can judge morality from this — Fire Ologist
What if you had to execute the 999 people yourself? — Apustimelogist
I do not always do what I think I ought to do. — unenlightened
But one of the things I believe one ought not do is calculate the moral value of lives in the way the problem and the situation invites, because every life has infinite value. — unenlightened
But neither do i think it is right to make the opposite calculation of course, that one life is worth more than five. — unenlightened
and neither do I believe there is any more virtue in inaction than in action. — unenlightened
So I have nothing. — unenlightened
In other words, I am not a consequentialist. — unenlightened
I don't agree. Most philosophical thought experiments are silly. To have any value, a thought experiment should take into account the issues we see in the real world. It can still be simple, but it has to be real. — T Clark
Sorry, I feel like I've waylaid your discussion. I know this wasn't the direction you wanted to take it. — T Clark
How often would that type of scenario actually happen in the real world. Answer - almost never. Given that, why has this become such a centerpiece of moral philosophy? — T Clark
OK, but let's make Trolley Car even more ridiculous by having 999 people tied on the track and 1000 in the car. If a person decides not to pull the switch, do you think they did something wrong? Would you condemn them? — RogueAI
The one over the five people every time.
— Philosophim
Yes, but what about one over two. I pull the switch if it's five to one, but I'm not sure what I would do if there are only two people on the car. Or what about saving ten people at the cost of nine? Is that obvious? — RogueAI
I'm not declaring a principle. I'm declaring, "In X scenario, this is the correct answer"
— Philosophim
The one over the five people every time.
— Philosophim
This is what I mean by a principle. but it turns out that you don't think it's every time, but only this specific time. — unenlightened
And the only lesson I can learn, in that case, is to ask Philosophim whenever there's a moral dilemma, because he will know the correct answer, but will not know why it is correct. That is more of a cult than a philosophy. — unenlightened
I don't know what i would do, quite possibly freeze like most of the people in the video. But if I didn't freeze, I would pull the lever. But I would feel guilty about it, because I do not believe it is moral to do so. I believe it is the comfortable thing to do. — unenlightened
We need a non-human intelligence. It is my hope that AI will one day be that intelligence.
— Philosophim
Many people, most notably red-blooded, liberty-loving Americans, including most of those who would benefit from a sensible system of distribution, would condemn you for that hope. — Vera Mont
Here's... as close as possible... to a real world test. Just to check how people would actually react rather than believe they would. — Christoffer
when is it morally acceptable to choose non-interference?
— Tzeentch
When there's insufficient knowledge of the outcome, or of the moving parts of a situation. — Christoffer
If there is a principle that it is right to act to kill 1 to save 5, the principle should apply to both scenarios. — unenlightened
Then the arithmetic is not crucial, and your justification based on the arithmetic is not valid. — unenlightened
The sameness in the scenario is that one acts to deliberately kill one person not in danger, in order to save 5 people who would otherwise die. — unenlightened
And yet doctors are not permitted to sacrifice one person to save five lives with organ transplants. — unenlightened
There's an interesting question. Is there lack of evidence of other intelligent life because it is so rare for it to get started? — Apustimelogist
↪180 Proof What are you talking about? — bert1
Have you read any Schopenhauer? I couldn't think of a better philosopher that presents an exact counter to your claim that existence is inherently good — schopenhauer1
I almost feel TCATHR is a literal counter to this whole notion — schopenhauer1
Not necessarily. And just repeating the same argument just repeats the same fallacy. *shrug* — DifferentiatingEgg
Of course it is, it suffers from the is-ought leap of logic, you'd need an additional premise that connects the initial descriptive with the final prescriptive. "We should increase existence" is not logically supported by the premise. — DifferentiatingEgg
↪Philosophim Except the argument you made is from presupposition on "what is good" among quite a few others. Which if we're going into logic ... well, let's not forget that fallacy. — DifferentiatingEgg
However such a discovery needs to withstand criticism and mutliple attempts at rejection to ultimately come out trumps and change our paradigm of reality - for example Einsteins theory of general relativity. — Benj96
So if you really believe you're onto something important go with it! — Benj96
I don't see how that is the implications of my conclusion. The implications would be that if you decide to bathe in the blood of babies, other subjects will exert their subjective morality upon you and take you to the criminal courts. — Benj96
Subjective morality can still have concensus (agreement on general right and wrong) without being objective like gravity is. — Benj96
Wait, I don't understand how an objective reality leads to objective morality. — Benj96
So even with an objective reality, for me this doesn't necessitate an objective morality, just a morality restricted to subjective experience - a subjective morality. — Benj96
