Assignment

Context: View this video on the Trolley Car Problem:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02bx2hh

The trolley car problem is a philosophical thought experiment in which you must decide how to respond to a runaway train.

It asks you to analyze two different scenarios. In the first scenario, a runaway train is speeding toward four people standing on the track. You can stop the train by switching tracks. However, there is a man on the track. Would you switch the track knowing one man would die to save four? In the second scenario, the runaway train is speeding toward four people on the track. But this time, you cannot flip a switch to change tracks. The only way to save the lives of the four people is to push a large man off a bridge to stop the car.

Would you push him knowing he would die to save the other four?

Write a 3-4 page paper in which you do the following:

1) Discuss how an ethical egoist and a utilitarian (choose either act or rule utilitarianism) would respond?

2) State your own position on each scenario. Would you reroute the train? Would you push the man off the bridge? What moral logic justifies your positions?

3) Compare your responses to that of ethical egoism and utilitarianism.

4) Assess the strengths and weakness of your positions in light of these two consequentialist theories.