The Trolley Problem helps us to become aware of, challenge, and interrogate our ethical intuitions. It reminds us that we cannot always rely on rules to tell us what the right thing to do in any situation is. By drawing this to our attention, the trolley problem helps us to prepare ourselves to face new challenges by helping us to realise that there are limits to ethical theory. This understanding can help us to be better prepared to be unprepared.
We think we know right from wrong. It all seems very clear. Black and white. Simple. Until reality happens, and nothing is as simple as we would like it to be.
“Trolley problems” are philosophical thought experiments which play off two major approaches to ethics (deontology and consequentialism) against each other to expose some of the inconsistencies in our everyday ethical intuitions. The most famous version of the problem ask us to choose whether it would be right to divert a runaway tram car (train or ‘trolley’) onto a side-track to save the lives of five people at the cost of killing one person on the side-track. From a consequentialist perspective, all other things being equal, the right thing to do would appear to be to save the most lives. Five lives are better than one, and one death is preferable to five. The right thing to do is to follow the course of action which results in the best consequences. The means are justified by the ends. Consistently, the majority of people choose to sacrifice one to save five lives.
The trick up the sleeve of the trolley problem is to then present a second permutation of the first scenario. This second scenario offers a similar choice but one which intuitively feels very different to the first. While a majority of people normally would choose to pull a lever resulting in the death of one to save five lives, far fewer would choose to save five lives if the necessary action required was to become physically involved in the killing of one person. Deontological approaches to ethics hold that there are some principles, such as “do not kill” which apply universally in all situations. The consequences might be terrible, but terrible ends should not be used to justify terrible means.
In one instance we maintain that it is better for one to die that five might live, but in another case we hold the opposite.
The trolley problem challenges us to consider whether the means justify the ends, whether murder is always wrong, and what the difference is between killing, and letting die. It provokes and pushes us to examine our assumptions, to question what we see as black and white. It invites us to explore the possibility that in the world of ethics, everything might in fact be grey.
*Further Reading
Foot, P. (1967). The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of the Double Effect. The Oxford Review, (5), 5–15.
Thomson, J. J. (1985). The Trolley Problem. The Yale Law Journal, 94(6), 1395–1415.
Podcast Episode: Trolleyology. The Philosopher’s Arms
(BBC Radio 4), Series 4, Episode 2.