A632.5.5.RB_SchreterPaul

The problem that I have with this week’s assignment is that we have to come up with our own protected values, where we would not sacrifice anything to give up those values. (Hoch & Kunreuther, 2005) With everything that I ever picked up in life, the one thing that I learned is that there is no black or white, only shades of grey. Maybe 10, maybe 20, maybe 50, I don’t know; but certainly not black or white.

Michael Sandel brings up an interesting question on what’s the right thing to do? (Sandel, 2009) In his first question he asked an audience to imagine they were in a trolley car going down a track with five workers at the end of it. The brakes don’t work and inaction will cause the five workers to get run over and die. Just before the five workers is a sidetrack and the trolley steering does work, but on the end of the sidetrack is one worker. How many people will turn the trolley to run over the one worker as opposed to the five?

In most cases the majority of people will choose to turn the trolley to kill one person as opposed to five; it’s the lesser of two evils. In which case, people will take on a hard principle (even myself) that if presented with two evils we must always choose the lesser one. However, if instead there was no sidetrack and the trolley only had one way to go, but we were on a bridge over the track with a fat man leaning over the edge, would we push the fat man off the bridge? As in, inaction will cause a trolley to run over five workers and action (murder) will kill one person but save five.

As far as outcomes nothing has changed: either one person will die or five. But the second scenario puts the individual closer to the action. Most people will have trouble pushing the fat man off the bridge to save five. So while it’s easy to say we can have protected values, those values really aren’t protected if we can make some sacrifices but not others.

Kevin Dutton introduces a similar scenario but instead of a trolley, the individual is in a room with baby Hitler. (Dutton, 2013) A protected value could be thou shalt not kill. But knowing that baby Hitler will one day kill millions and millions of people, is it justified to kill a baby to save the lives of others?

My point is that I don’t think I can have a protected value because I’m sure I can always imagine a scenario where I would be willing to give up that protected value.

References

Dutton, K. (2013). Would You Kill Baby Hitler? (And Other Psychopathic Musings, with Kevin Dutton). Retrieved 2015, from YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDVvYzEdp_s

Hoch, S. J., & Kunreuther, H. C. (2005). Wharton on making decisions. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons Inc.

Sandel, M. (2009). Justice: What's The Right Thing To Do? Episode 01 "THE MORAL SIDE OF MURDER". Retrieved 2015, from TED: http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_sandel_what_s_the_right_thing_to_do