Friday Five for October 7th 2011

[infernusgoatus]

Today's questions are or are inspired by famous thought experiments:

The trolley problem and other thought experiments

1. What is your response to Philippa Foot's infamous trolley problem? (For those who don't know, the problem is thus: "A trolley (or train, if you prefer) is running out of control down a track. In its path are five people who have been tied to the track by a mad philosopher. Fortunately, you could flip a switch, which will lead the trolley down a different track to safety. Unfortunately, there is a single person tied to that track. Should you flip the switch or do nothing?") Why should/why shouldn't you flip the switch?


2. What if the only way to stop the trolley from killing five people would be to physically push someone into its path? Should you push that person or leave them be? Why/why not?


3. What if the person on the other track is a child? Should you flip the switch or do nothing? What if you had to physically push the child instead of flipping a switch? Why/why not?


4. A sailor builds a ship and names it Vessel of Theseus. He takes it on a long voyage and along the way, he is forced to repair it with new parts at every port. By the time he reaches home again, not a single piece of the original ship remains attached. Having lost all its original pieces, is it still the same ship? Why or why not?


5. What if the original pieces of the Vessel of Theseus were then gathered up and used to build another ship, christened Hobbes' Way? Which ship (if either) is the original Vessel? Why?

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Comments

[delilahdraken]

Answers copied here because my journal is locked for personal entries.

1) There are two way my reaction to this dilemma might show itself. One, I would phone emergency services in a blind panic, scream at the operator to get there fast, faster, the fastest, bloody damnit all! Like I reacted when Mimi had her seizure/pinched nerve thing/might-have-been-a-bruised-spine back in '09. I was not able to remember even the easiest bits of first aid. I just stared at her convulsing in what I now know was only pain and nothing with her brain and I could do nothing but scream at the emergency medic to get there faster.

On the other hand, as the people described in the trolly problem seem to be neither my family nor friends or people I know the names of, I would most probably go very Vulcan on the happenings. The whole 'the needs of the many are greater than the needs of the one' thing. I would kill the one person to save the other five. After that I would go to the police and make them lock me up because apparently I am capable of cold-blooded murder in the name of prosperity (or however they called it during the Nazi court cases).

You probably remember the movie Blade Runner. There is a test they give to people to make sure they are real humans and not hidden replicants. I would never be able to make this test believe that I am a human.

When I was in fourteen our German teacher gave us a similar thought experiment as the trolley problem here. It was one of those worst case scenario things where the probability of survival is near to null, something like an exploding nuclear power plant. It went along the lines of 'try to rescue a bunch of people and most probably die doing it or watch it all happening and live to tell about it'. Then I was one of the very, very few who opted in the secure survival rate. Later our teacher told us that this test was given to both normal people and people living in long-term capitivity for murder. 98% of the murderers, especially the serial killers, chose survival. I'm still frightened about what that says about myself.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Hello, Scylla. Meet my dear friend Charybdis.

2) I would not push a person into the path of the trolley. If there is nothing else to be done, like maybe use a car or tree or trash can, I would use my own bones to stop the trolley.

On the other hand, maybe two people would be able to stop the trolley without the loss of life. Limbs cut off maybe, but not dead. Dreadfully optimistic of me, I know.

3) The fact that the other person is a child makes no difference to my answers.

Maybe I would try to get the child out of the bonds of question one so that the trolley can go its course without hitting anybody, but most probably even that would not change a thing. If as the thought experiment implies I would not even be close enough to do anything but push the button, I would push the button. I would far more happily go to prison for it, but I would still do it.

Hey there, Charybdis. What? You already know Scylla?

4) Yes, it is the same ship. It may have been repaired so often that it no longer looks or feels like the original ship to those who did not make the journey, but it is still the Vessel of Theseus.

5) First I must congratulate the ship builder who managed to build a ship out of broken parts. That takes some serious expertise in engineering, I think.

If it were possible, which I do not doubt - people do it all the time, just look at all the car restaurations -, then Hobbes' Way would only be the original re-built Vessel of Theseus if said Vessel no longer existed. If both ships sail the world at the same time the best word I can come up with to describe Hobbes' Way is a 'sibling ship'. Same built, same parts as the original, but a different name and builder.

If one were to anthropomorphise the two ships into humans or another intelligent species, I would say Vessel of Theseus is the very ill original person who needed a lot of organ transplants and Hobbes' Way is the clone that was born later in the life of Vessel of Theseus. Like identical twins they have the same genetic material, but they are two different personalities. Memories and experiences shape us, even machines are shaped by what they have to live through, so either way the Vessel and Hobbes' Way are always two separate individuals.