Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
the ideas of saving people and letting them die. Because of this, the issue isn't as
relevant in the realm of hedonic calculus. People who would choose group A over B
but not C over D would do so not because A was more
moral
than C—they would
do it because they
perceived
that there was a moral difference when there was not.
There was a mathematical equivalency there that they did not understand. In plenty
of situations, however, a perceived mathematical equivalency can actually resonate
deeply on a moral level, and this is the sort of quandary that Bentham was after
when he constructed his hedonic calculus.
There is a famous series of “moral dilemma� problems that have various ver-
sions and spins. All of them center on a runaway trolley and are, with another nod
to Sir Occam, starkly simple. Taken as individual choices, they make for interesting
discussion. The real intrigue comes when they are taken as a series, however. That
way, they are not being judged as the simple A vs. B questions that they are. Instead,
we are forced to deal with why option A in one question is better or worse than
option A in another one.
When Is Killing not Killing?
In the initial question—the one that sets up the series as a whole—we are given the
following scenario:
An unmanned, runaway trolley is heading down a track. In its path are five
people (who are either unaware of the approach of the trolley or, in a more
dramatic version, tied to the track by some nefarious dude) who will be
killed by the trolley if it reaches them. Thankfully, you are by a switch that
will send the careening trolley onto a siding. On the siding, however, is a
single person (also either blissfully unaware or tragically trussed) who will
be killed if you were to send the trolley onto the siding. What should you do?
It would seem, given the relative simplicity of the scenario that the answer is
clear—you must throw the switch, saving the five people on the main track despite
killing the one on the siding. Tossed up against Bentham's criteria (particularly the
seventh one), this makes sense. The extreme negativity of death is multiplied by the
five people in the first choice and only by the one in the second. Five is greater than
one. Throw the switch. Divert the trolley. Save five people. (Sorry buddy….) Done.
Let's put a spin on this issue (Figure 9.5). Imagine that we are now on a bridge
over the track with a large weight available nearby. If we toss the weight onto the
track, we can stop the trolley before it hits the five people. Once again, this much is
simple: Toss the weight. Stop the trolley. Save the people. Done.
