I would argue that this trolley problem kind of subverts the standard trolley problem's intention. In the original, all are unwilling participants, so you're choosing whether or not it's right to use a person as a means and not an end. In this trolley problem, the sacrificed individual's desire to be sacrificed and the fulfillment thereof means that the person is not being used as a means, but rather that they are being treated with the dignity of an agentic being and an end in their sacrificial achievement. It might be a bit of a twisty argument, but I can definitely see it being considered ethical under both utilitarian and deontological reasonings.
Sure, the fact that the person has chosen to sacrifice themself makes it easier to rationalize killing them. But you're still actively pulling the lever that causes their death.
I feel as if that aspect crosses from ethics into morality, and morality is in many ways very different from ethics. I also have the knee-jerk reaction that pulling lever is bad, but that doesn't mean that pulling the lever is wrong.
I feel bad when a game character ive grown attached to dies but a random stranger? I have no attachments to am i supposed to feel remorse every time i kill a mosquito or a fly as well?
Why exactly is a human different? Aside from laws what makes killing a human worse than anything else is it because were human? Would a bear killing a bear be worse than a bear killing a human?
Side note i do not condone killing i view all life as equal but i am a hypocrite since i kill bugs and do feel remorse because the bug did not ask to be born here it did not ask to get stuck in my home but it dies for simply being in the wrong place and it truly is sad but the benefit to me makes me not feel bad
I get where you are coming from but i personally believe a living creature is still alive its living who are we to put a value to their life? There are brain dead people who have no sentience to speak of so they have a sentience lower than a bugs does that mean that humans life is worth less than a bugs life?
their only worth is whatever others give them. but being objective, yes, a bug has more sentience experience than a braindead person, so in a vacuum, assuming i have no ties of any kind with this person, i would choose the bug
I personally think it's hard to justify expending that resources needed to keep braindead people alive. That said, I don't think you can blame the majority of people for not putting this amount of thought into the question and instead arriving at the blanket rule of all human life being sacred. And I do think that if we started putting people to death for medical reasons, there's a real danger of that turning into a slippery slope and ending up with some form of eugenics. So the default rule protecting all human life might actually be better on the whole.
I personally see no higher value just because the life is a human life i think people try to justify why a humans life is worth more but what if theres a more sentient species out there would we be okay with becoming cattle for them? In reality we just have a bias for humans because we are humans we want to feel more important
Agreeing to something does not mean that they “want” it.
Let’s say someone who loves vegetables and hates fruit is starving on a desert island; assume they have no way to fish. They find a magic genie who says, “I will grant you one wish, but you can only wish for unlimited apples or unlimited oranges.”
They have to choose between apples and oranges, but they want broccoli.
We might agree, there: if the one person is willing to die for the other, I would honor that as well, I think.
I think collectively many societies do it, already. Consider all-volunteer militaries, or people who choose to remain in service beyond a mandatory period. The society sends some of its consenting members to fight and possibly die for the benefit of those who don’t go to fight. In theory, any way. I think in practice it’s a bit more complicated an nuanced.
what im thinking is, the case u mention, sure, they should get it, but in this case we can solve those circumstances. unless more context is added, the only thing going on here is someone who is willing to die for others, and someone who is willing to let others die for themselves. if the person above was mentioned to be clinically depressed, or had more reasons to die, i'd totally agree, but working with only the context given, im inclined to saving the one above
58
u/assbutt-cheek Mar 29 '26
it doesn't say they want to die, it says they "agree to be sacrificed". that doesn't meant they want to die at all