Ethical Dilemma: Pulling the Lever or Pushing the Man - Utilitarian Perspectives

Abstract

Discussion 5 Two options exist in the Trolley Problem for workers to prevent the trolley from murdering people: pulling the lever to divert the trolley or doing nothing; and throwing a guy off the bridge to stop the trolley. Only one person will be killed in the first scenario, because it involves a worker who isn't directly in the path of the moving trolley. Similarly, if the worker who is not on the tracks decides not to pull the switch, he or she will cause the trolley to remain on the same track and kill four people, but only save one. The trolley will come to a halt if you shove the man off the bridge over the rails in the second scenario. There is a lever you can pull that will allow you to redirect the trolley to a different track. It would save the lives of four individuals and only kill one person if this option was chosen. In the second situation, I could never stop a trolley by shoving someone else off the same bridge I was on, as I did with the man who was pushed off. If I were to do that, I would be unable to live with myself. Utilitarianism is an ethical theory that can support the claim that this is the optimal course of action. Utilitarianism is defined as the concept that the optimal acts are those that result in the greatest good for the largest number of people if and only if they maximize the total amount of happiness in the world. Utilitarianism, an ethical theory, argues that this is preferable to the alternative of four people dying. In other words, saving four individuals is the best thing you can do for the most people. Pulling the lever or pushing the...