Conversation on Utilitarianism

Jay and I had a conversation on Utilitarianism whilst I was finishing off the essay. Fortunately we had it in digital format so I decided I could easily paste it (slightly edited, we ended up talking about irrelevant things) into my journal.

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ALEX:

Trolleyology:

The trolley is heading towards 5 people tied to the track. I could switch it so it hits just The Girl. (Or guy, or whatever. It's always a girl in the movies.) What do I do? (We did this a while ago, I've just suddenly had a brainwave on it.)

What I SHOULD do: Switch the train so it hits her. :( 

What I probably WOULD do: Save her.

Yeah, that's the difference. Have fun chewing that one over.

JAY: 

Of course you SHOULD save the five. Stuff the THOU SHALT NOT KILL thing. Doesn't mean you will.

There's not much to think about. In the end, snap decision will decide. And I think I would probably save the girl. Even at that cost. Because I could not destroy her, even at the cost of murdering five others. At a time like that I would see nothing in my life except for the girl. Call me immoral, I'm just being realistic.

P.S. Oh, I would expect someone else to save the five. Like if it was the Prime Minister or the SAS on a rescue mission.

***

I think Jay's got the reality of the situation in a nutshell. Realistically, I think everyone would save the person they cared about under the pressure that they are put under in that situation. Shame, because I think it's very selfish. I consider myself to be very much on the side of Utilitarianism and the criticisms I hear of it only seem to make my views stronger. You should save the five instead of the one, you should shock one cat instead of two.

It just makes sense.

Sticking to your guns

(Lizzie, if you're reading this: Don't read this until you've seen Series 1, Episode 18 of House, it has major plot spoilers! Really, don't do it.)

I had a philosophical problem presented to me whilst watching House M.D. a few days ago. I love House as a character, he appears to be cynical and mean but all he really cares about is saving the lives of patients. House is prepared to do anything in order to save his patients, even risking his job on numerous occasions. He is a very morally-driven character.

House was told that he had to fire one of his team of staff, to prove that he was loyal to the new manager of the hospital where he works. He refused because it wasn't fair to fire any of the three for no reason as they all did a good job. House avoided this issue until his manager told him he could keep all of his staff if he did a ten minute presentation promoting the manager's new drug from another company. House accepted this to save his staff, even though he is completely opposed to promoting new drugs.

In the end, House messes up the speech and gets into even bigger trouble with his manager. He finds out that he can't go against his strong moral belief that, as a doctor, he shouldn't be endorsing a drug.

I don't think I would have been strong enough to commit to what I believed I thought was right that much. House broke the rules because he didn't think they were morally right. On occasions he has also broken the law due to his strong compulsion to save lives. For example, one patient had signed a form to say he did not want to be resuscitated if he stopped breathing but House restarted his heart anyway. I don't think that I would have done the same, as the patients wishes to stay dead should have been respected, especially as they were written down in a legal document.

You'll probably get a lot of synopses and responses to House, it's quite philosophical if you think about it.

Red pill or blue pill?

I was thinking about The Matrix today. Interestingly, I wasn't thinking about the main issue it presents to us, that of whether we can know if the world we live in is really real. I may come back to this at a later point, as it deals with one of the few philosophical issues I can remember thinking about as a child. No, the thing I am interested in is which pill to take.

In the Matrix, Neo discovers there is something strange going on with the universe. He gets mixed up with weird people and his life is turned upside down. Finally, Neo has the chance to find out what is really going on with the world. He is offered two pills - red and blue. If he takes the red pill, everything will be revealed to him. If he chooses blue he will wake up at home and not remember anything about The Matrix. Needless to say, Neo chooses the red pill and the action of the film begins.

To me, Neo choosing the red pill was not so surprising. He had been looking for what was really going on, he wasn't about to refuse when he was so close. And, of course, it's a movie. But what would I do? What do I judge to be more important - happiness or knowledge?

I seem to be terribly inconsistent with my views on this. I had previously thought that I would much rather be happy than know everything that is happening to me, as happiness is one of the most, if not THE most, important things I pursue in life. It turned out, however, that I was dead wrong.

When something important in my life actually happened and I was faced with this choice, to know or to live in ignorance, I just had to know. I suppose this shows that there are certainly differences between how we think we would act and how we actually would act. It's all very well discussing what you should do in certain circumstances in a Philosophy lesson but when you actually get there it's completely different. I wonder how I can think more like I would in an actual situation. Perhaps by giving myself examples involving people and things that I know.

Red or blue? I can't quite believe I'm saying this but... Red.

Welcome to my Journal

Hi everyone!

Welcome to my Philosophical Journal! The idea of this journal is to note down any philosophical thoughts I have in my daily life. I hope to have many sitting on the bus, as it can get rather dull. This will help cultivate my philosophical reasoning skills. I'm taking an exam in philosophy in two years time so it's pretty important that I get a lot of practice. If anyone happens to have stumbled across my musings, please feel free to read and comment on them. I am intrigued to hear what you all have to say, especially if you want to argue with me, or are pointing out something I haven't thought of yet!

A big hi to anyone in my philosophy class. I offer you my philosophy and hugs. Thanks to JSM for letting me write my journal like this!