| Kantor said: I would also feel terrible in the situation you described, but I would feel considerably worse if I was dead. I'm not a killer, either. The thought of killing somebody makes me feel sick. But if it was to save my life, or the life of somebody I was very close to, I would definitely consider it. Fair enough. What if we changed it a little, and said you had to kill this person to save the life of your best friend? To be honest, this is one of those things that I couldn't answer until the situation came up irl. I honestly don't know what I would do. Though having said that, your argument about the person you kill having people care about him/her, surely there are people who care about you who would be equally devastated if you died? Yes, there are. I have family, friends, and a girlfriend who would all be very sad if I died. But how would they feel if they knew that I had killed someone to save myself? That seems very selfish to me. Basically, the difference is me killing or not killing someone. It's a bit like another conundrum I heard. A train is travelling on a track. Four people are tied to the track. If you do nothing, they will all die. You can pull a lever to make the train change tracks. One person is lying on this second track. If you do so, the one will die, but the four will survive. Would you pull the lever? I certainly would, it's three fewer deaths. But some people, apparently, think that pulling the lever is murder, and leaving the four to die isn't. What's your opinion on that? I agree with you; saving 4 people and losing one is better than saving one and losing four. This would still make me feel terrible though, because I'd feel like I killed the one person. I can see why they would view that as murder, but I would rather save the four people. Hopefully, less people would be affected by the death of one than the death of four. |
That last one is a situation that I'd hate to come across...
