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Absurd Trolley Problems

neal.fun

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Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#741

Post by stavros »

ParetoOptimal wrote: post #697
stavros wrote: post #647

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are morally responsible for the child's death, you are morally responsible for basically every evil in the world right now, since you didn't do everything in your power to prevent all of them. You may say that that is the case, but if you're responsible for everything, you may as well be responsible for nothing.

> If you are morally responsible for the child's death, you are morally responsible for basically every evil in the world right now No, you are morally responsible for every evil happening right in front of you that you could immediately change with little risk to yourself. For instance if you can't swim and the child is in the middle of the pond, I'd argue you aren't responsible because the risk is too great to your…

> No, you are morally responsible for every evil happening right in front of you that you could immediately change with little risk to yourself.

The problem with this is that you snuck a quantitative difference there and made it sound qualitative. How much risk is "little risk"? What if you could spend all your money and save N people from starvation? There's no risk to you, so are you responsible for their deaths if you don't do it?

What if the child is a bit less likely to pull you under? What if even less than that? Where do you draw the line?

You're never completely free of responsibility, there are just varying degrees.

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#742

Post by avgcorrection »

The original/vanilla Trolley Problem is already absurd and not a legitimate problem at all. Not pulling some lever is just as much of a choice as doing it. The only salient difference is that less people are harmed, so the choice is obvious.

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#743

Post by fmoralesc »

throwaway742 wrote: post #220
ConstantVigil wrote: post #117

Kill count: 84 Apparently I solved philosophy? Im gonna assume that title stays the same for everyone lol. So, explanation for why so high. Simply put; I don't believe 5 people really got tied to those rails each time. They are in on it somehow. If so, that is sick and twisted they would tie someone else to the rails purposely. So they deserve the trolley instead. Now on the chance that they really are all innocent;…

I only got 58. Anyone get lower?

I got 44.

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#744

Post by smeej »

The combo tradeoff between saving tens of thousands of lives of people who had, on average, 6-12 months of life expectancy, versus potentially shortening the lives of millions or billions of people by only months or weeks, and not seeing those effects for 70-80 years, seems to have been part of the covid shutdown tradeoff calculation.

Granted, it has all the additional complication of the uncertainty of the real world, but there were a lot of claims of, "I can't believe you won't shut down for (weeks/months/years) to save grandma!"

I wonder, in the end, if those decisions will end up having saved or cost more total days of human life.

How many people's lives are you willing to shorten by even a week or a month due to increased stress to save the life of someone whose comorbidities will likely kill them in 6 months anyway?

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#745

Post by Etherlord87 »

jorvi wrote: post #671
rax0m wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did the problems under the assumption that "pulling the lever" was an act, while doing nothing was not acting. Implied legal (and moral) liabilities made a difference in my choices.

> Implied legal (and moral) liabilities made a difference in my choices. This is always my problem with the trolley problem. Are we supposed to take second order effects into account? For example, if I destroy the trolley that is killing 5 people over 30 years with CO2, does another trolley get built to replace it? Or ‘kill 5 people now or send the trolley into the future 100 years and kill 5 people then’. Is it 100%…

I think the trolley problem is not about simply getting the right answer. The problem is about figuring correct answers for various circumstances, defining those circumstances, discussing them and improving one's and others understanding of morality.

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#746

Post by synu »

el_nahual wrote: post #682
kortex wrote: post #623

I found myself following a heuristic that is basically Asimov's laws: - whenever possible, do no harm - do not let harm occur due to inaction - when given a choice, preserve the most amount of healthy lifespan in aggregate - higher lifeforms are more valuable than lower ones (cat vs lobsters) - deferred consequence is better than immediate (since it opens the door to other later interventions) It kind of really bring…

There's a (famous?) quote from a google engineer Andrew Chatham who worked on self driving cars. When asked about the trolley problem, he said "It takes some of the intellectual intrigue out of the problem, but the answer is almost always ‘slam on the brakes’” [0] [0]: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/aug/22/self-driv...

You could adjust the question to be “the brakes have failed and..” to avoid that out.

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#747

Post by throw123123123 »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #522
rax0m wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did the problems under the assumption that "pulling the lever" was an act, while doing nothing was not acting. Implied legal (and moral) liabilities made a difference in my choices.

Legally perhaps, but morally, I've never gotten why so many people think that the physical act of pulling or not pulling makes so much difference. It's a binary decision with two outcomes, in my personal view it is irrelevant which of the outcomes is caused by physical action and which by inaction (at least, supposing that you have enough time to think about what to do - obviously, if you have to react in a split sec…

Because the real world is more complex than a lever, and there are many unknowns in how either physical or human manifestations respond to actions, and doing nothing removes your intent from the mix.

A very clear example of this is medicine with the "do no harm" principle - that the actions of the physician should be chosen to minimize the scenarios of harming the patient under any circumstance - under chance, under lack of patient compliance, etc.

Furthermore, the actions in the real world have also different experiences and meanings. Its easy to think about pulling a lever to kill 1 instead of 5, but not easy to think of killing one to harvest their organs and save other 5, though they are, with a lot of abstraction, "equivalent moral actions".

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#748

Post by qsdf38100 »

smeej wrote: post #744

The combo tradeoff between saving tens of thousands of lives of people who had, on average, 6-12 months of life expectancy, versus potentially shortening the lives of millions or billions of people by only months or weeks, and not seeing those effects for 70-80 years, seems to have been part of the covid shutdown tradeoff calculation. Granted, it has all the additional complication of the uncertainty of the real worl…

Why is saving grandma going to cost months of life expectancy to other people ?

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#749

Post by makeitdouble »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #522
rax0m wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I did the problems under the assumption that "pulling the lever" was an act, while doing nothing was not acting. Implied legal (and moral) liabilities made a difference in my choices.

Legally perhaps, but morally, I've never gotten why so many people think that the physical act of pulling or not pulling makes so much difference. It's a binary decision with two outcomes, in my personal view it is irrelevant which of the outcomes is caused by physical action and which by inaction (at least, supposing that you have enough time to think about what to do - obviously, if you have to react in a split sec…

The trolley problem is specifically about a situation that is ongoing regardless of your presence.

You're not running the train, nor own the railway, you didn't bind the people on the rails. You just happen to be there, and can perhaps improve the outcome.

In case the worst outcome happens because of your inaction, the biggest moral fault lies on those who created the situation in the first place. (If you're looking at a bank robbery and don't push the alarm button, you have some moral responsibility, but the robbers are the villains.)

When you take action, you become part of the situation and take full responsibility of the outcome.

So, no, I don't think the choice are morally symetrical. Taking action is morally a high risk high return strategy, while inaction is low risk mild returns (best case is you did nothing and that was the right choice, so you could have been absent, it wouldn't have made a difference)

Re: Absurd Trolley Problems

#750

Post by agentultra »

kortex wrote: post #623

I found myself following a heuristic that is basically Asimov's laws: - whenever possible, do no harm - do not let harm occur due to inaction - when given a choice, preserve the most amount of healthy lifespan in aggregate - higher lifeforms are more valuable than lower ones (cat vs lobsters) - deferred consequence is better than immediate (since it opens the door to other later interventions) It kind of really bring…

Enough context is lacking. That's kind of what makes it all absurd. Take the cat vs. lobsters. Did you know felis catus is responsible for the extinction of some 37 species of birds world wide mostly due to colonization. They're not indigenous predators to the North Americas and enjoy the protections and long life afforded by their proximity to humans while killing for entertainment.

Lobsters on the other hand? Useful in their natural environments, have not become an invasive apex predator, could go on and feed many people too if properly managed and allowed to live their lives.

Yet the majority of people saved the cat thinking it's a "higher life form."

A bit absurd. Also the idea of trolleys without brakes and levers and cats that can't move off the track in the face of on-coming danger.

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