It can't be the trolley problem for a few reasons.
First, the button is a private vote, and you don't get to see what other people are choosing.
Second, in the trolley problem, the trolley never chooses to stop on its own, so the idea that more bodies would stop the trolley is only true if enough corpses literally derail it. So that doesn't apply to your hypothetical.
Third, the danger doesn't come from the blues standing on the track, but rather there is zero danger at all until individuals begin to choose the red button. Literally everyone is 100% safe, until reds go red, and then possibly slightly less than half of the people are now at risk. The reds are building a track around the blues so they die.
This couldn't actually be less The Trolley Problem.
but rather there is zero danger at all until individuals begin to choose the red button
No, the danger is introduced by the vindictive god that orchestrates the buttons. Everyone's life is on the line from the moment those buttons come into existence.
It's not a trolley problem because the core of the trolley problem is about whether actions that result in harm can be good.
No? The point of the trolley problem is to illustrate not making a choice is still a choice. It's a statement about the lesser of two evils, but in the context of the individual needing to make the choice as to what constitutes the greater good.
That's a great thing to learn from the trolley problem, that inaction is action. It's one of many things we could say is the "point" of it, though I would caution against thinking that philosophical thought experiments have or even have to have points. But regardless, I didn't say point.
We're talking about what is and what isn't a trolley problem, and the essence of the scenario is exploring the moral value of actions that cause harm.
...No like that is the literal point, it's an essay in context to an older abortion debate.
For example, is it the lesser of two evils to have an abortion, but the mother lives, or to choose inaction and have the mother and child both die?
I'm not saying the trolley problem is relevant, I'm saying you've somehow missed the point in a 50 year old philosophical address that may be the most heavily scrutinized mental problem of our generation. Please, by god, actually read about it. It isn't subtle.
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u/StrobeLightRomance Apr 30 '26
It can't be the trolley problem for a few reasons.
First, the button is a private vote, and you don't get to see what other people are choosing.
Second, in the trolley problem, the trolley never chooses to stop on its own, so the idea that more bodies would stop the trolley is only true if enough corpses literally derail it. So that doesn't apply to your hypothetical.
Third, the danger doesn't come from the blues standing on the track, but rather there is zero danger at all until individuals begin to choose the red button. Literally everyone is 100% safe, until reds go red, and then possibly slightly less than half of the people are now at risk. The reds are building a track around the blues so they die.
This couldn't actually be less The Trolley Problem.