NIETZSCHE; DEAD PHILOSOPHERS' INBOX

[explosivecombat]

[TEXT; LOCKED TO doitrockapella]

The offer for conversation is always open, should you desire to take me up on it; I can't guarantee that I'll respond immediately, nor will it necessarily be the response you want, but I'll always respond in some way.

In the name of enlightened discourse.

Comments

[doitrockapella]

Of course it is.

Like I said, I honestly don't know what I personally would do. Either way, I'm going to feel responsible for someone's death, whether it be through action or inaction. Would I sleep better at night knowing only one person had died, instead of five? Maybe.

But what bothers me about this problem in particular is that I know I have a bad habit of imposing what I think is right onto other people's lives whether they like it or not. I don't like doing it in a way that ends with people dying, even hypothetically.

[explosivecombat]

In the name of both candor and fairness, I'll admit that part of the reason I won't argue with you is because I've actually never been fond of the trolley problem in general. There's a reason I've never asked the network about it, despite knowing about it and asking them about far more obscure things, and that's simply that it irks me.

[doitrockapella]

Just not a fan of it, or is there something in particular?

[explosivecombat]

I dislike the notion that I'm going to be held morally responsible for at least one person dying when I neither asked for that responsibility nor did anything that warrants being held responsible. Literally stumbling upon a situation like that while having no hand in creating it and yet being held responsible for the outcome doesn't sit well with me.

I dislike the question of duty to rescue for the same reason, but at least the responses people give to it tend to be more interesting, whereas the trolley problem is fundamentally depressing; since I ask the network about things like this to see their responses, not to contemplate my own, that one strikes me as more acceptable to ask them than this.

[doitrockapella]

Now I'm just going to wonder if you'd like it better given the option to leap on the trolley and derail it yourself, the way I wanted to.

[explosivecombat]

I'm not an altruistic person, you know that.

However, in this circumstance perhaps I could be convinced.

[doitrockapella]

I was thinking more along the lines of the fact that riding a runaway trolley careening down a track seems like it's just your speed, actually.