I don't believe anyone has the right to take a human life, even their own. I think humans have a moral obligation to protect both life and the quality of life.
Murdering one person in hopes of saving a greater number is not a justifiable action because it involves murder. You sacrify all meaning and the future value of life for the number of a few lives in the here and now.
This is different than the decision of the train engineer. The train engineer is a passive player in any moral decisions to be made. The engineer doesn't have the ability to stop the train, the only moral decision actionable. A rational actor would probably choose the route that committed the least number of murdered lives assuming that is the only information he/she has. But numbers may not be the only factor. For example if the one life was a child, a doctor, or the President, and the five are criminals, lawyers, only people with fatal illness, he/she might choose to save the life of the one to improve the quality of life for everyone else or to protect the most innocent of the victims even if they are fewer in number.
The only reason numbers of lives play a prominent role in these what-if games is because they are the only variables for people to be considered, no other information is given.
merrymadscientist wrote:
I was thinking about this recently. Obviously there are few people who have a problem with people receiving organs from someone who has died naturally. However, I saw this philosophy problem on the bbc website and took it a step further.
The original problem was about when it might or might not be OK to kill/let die one person to save the lives of more than one person. For example, would it be morally OK to kill one healthy person who had no friends or relatives, in order to save the lives of 5 people needing organs who would die without them. I think most people say no in this case.
Then the problem went on to say that if you were a train driver and you saw ahead of you 5 people tied to the track and there was no way of stopping the train from killing them, apart from taking a diverting line which would then run over and kill a single person, would it be morally right to divert the train and hence save 4 lives. In this case most people choose to divert, but which (if any) is morally right, and why is this situation so different from the one above?
These types of questions are interesting in themselves, basically because it is impossible for us to calculate the value of a life, or of certain lives against others. However I was wondering this.
What if I (a healthy and fit 30 year old female) decided that I'd had enough of life and I wanted to die, but also to donate my organs, therefore saving 5 lives (of people who presumably want to live a lot more than I do). I wouldnt expect any money or anything for it, but for the organ transplants to work, I would have to die by a means and in a place where it was possible to immediately remove the organs and retransplant them (so I couldnt just commit suicide by any means in a private place). Would this extremely altruistic act be morally right?
I think most people would abhor the idea, but in the sense that each life is equally valuable, and taking into account the fact that I no longer want to live anyway, wouldnt this really be the morally right thing to do? (assuming that none of the transplant receivers or any offspring they have later go on to be mass murderers - this can never be ruled out, but is impossible to quantify).
I think in this society we place too much value on life for lifes sake and don't consider the quality of life enough. If I have considered that my life is useless - Im not going to reproduce, not going to do anything 'important', then isnt it right that other people who may be more important to humanity (or not, but at least they think their lives are worth living) can live instead of me? By the way, I am not suggesting that all suicidal people should be rounded up and killed in controlled conditions, but if this is what someone really wants, then shouldn't it be an option? What a waste if I end up killing myself another way and destroy all those lovely healthy organs.
Just wondering what people think (I am not saying that if it was an option I would do it anyway). By the way, assume that I have no relatives or friends (which isnt the actual truth, but it complicates things if there are).
03 Dec 2008, 5:47 am
There's no way I can begin to comprehend the pain and confusion in those times, for I've never lost a child or anything of the sort.
