crouching_sin | [Anon] [Text]

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[Anon] [Text]

Here's a question for you all. It's something that I read a while back, and I'm interested in your answers. Anonymous is fine, if you want.

There are five patients in a hospital. All of them are dying due to complications with various organs. All of them will die within the next day or so if they don't get an organ transplant. Magic won't save any of them, incidentally, if you were hoping to use that.

A young backpacker comes into the hospital or a checkup. He has no relatives, and he is in excellent health. As it happens, you, the surgeon on duty, notice that he is a perfect match for all five of the patients.

Assuming the backpacker does not give consent, is it morally permissible to cut him up and transfer the organs to the other patients? These are not organs that the backpacker can live without, so he'll die if you do.

I'm interested to hear what you think.

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[Oh, that's an easy one.]

No.

In fact, I'd hate to see any kind of medicinal practice where that would be acceptable.

I can see the logic for saying yes. One life for five. The ends justifying the means. Someone might ask more info on the patients. Their input into society. Their ages, if they have family, etc.

But I still wouldn't say it's morally right. It's DEF. unethical since a doctor swears to do no intentional harm. But honestly morality and ethics have nothing to do with logic anyways. If it was me dying, or someone important to me, I don't know for sure what I'd say.

I'd... LIKE to say no, which is really all anyone can really say and still be honest.

Doctors need to save all the lives they can though, right? There's no other way to save these people. Should he let them die and have killed five people rather than one?

You'd like to say no? What you'd like and what the right thing to do aren't always the same thing. Isn't it better, as you said, to save five people? The backpacker has no one who's going to miss him.

Then the value of a life is only in what they offer to others? If the backpacker has no family or friends, it's like he doesn't exist? I can't accept that.

That depends. Maybe the backpacker would go on to make a mark on history, but odds are that he wouldn't. The odds are somewhat better among five people.

This is a variant of the "runaway trolley" problem, isn't it? Five young children on the tracks with a runaway trolley bound straight towards them, and you have the possible option of pushing a single large man into the way, because his size will be enough to effectively stop the train. Yours has slightly different trappings, but it's effectively the same question — five saved for the sake of one lost, and is the morally correct answer the one that results in the greatest sum total of preserved lives, regardless of the means used to get there.

My question is, at what point did the surgeon on duty decide it was his right to play god?

That's correct. A student of philosophy, I see.

Don't doctors play God all the time, though? Patient lives hang in the balance every day and people live or die based on his actions or inactions.

Doctors are also charged to "first do no harm" as they make those decisions. And it's hard to justify murder under an ethical charge to do no harm.

True. The ambiguity is a bit more clear in your example... but it's interesting to see people react to the doctor example since doctors are generally held to be respected individuals in communities. So the response to the question is generally much more extreme.

This is a terrible question. Why would you ask something like this when it's impossible for a situation like this to happen here?

[...look, this hits a little too close to home and it's really bothering Rossiu.]

No one can die here, so a question like this is pointless.

It's obvious you're testing to see how people react, as opposed to advancing any particular side for yourself.

What is it you're trying to discover, exactly?

For one, knowing how people judge morality is amusing, if nothing else. It also helps when it comes to figuring out just what sort of thing a person will react badly to in the future. So it's just statistics, for now. I can't battle all the time.

[Sorry, but he's not going to be baited into a video response just yet, Rossiu.]

In a place where people can die, then.

[...he's actually not trying to bait, he's just not very good at texting...]

It shouldn't be left to one person. It's not fair to let someone play god with all their lives. It's especially not fair to consult the people who could die either way.

So your answer is no, I'm guessing?

Of course. I would never do something like that.

[...this sort of thing happened in his village for years, so he's still very worked up over it.]

Granted, I couldn't be in that specific position to begin with. I don't know anything about medicine, much less surgery.

[And naturally he gets caught up on that.]

... It's a hypothetical situation. I would be surprised if you did know something about medicine or surgery.

...I don't think I know anyone who knows how to perform surgery...

[THAT MIGHT BE A BAD THING SINCE THEY'RE FIGHTING A WAR, UM]

Why did you pose this question in the first place?

[He doesn't sound accusatory any more, at least?]

Curiosity. The way that people respond to philosophical thought experiments can tell you a lot about them.

...I suppose I see the merit in that. It would at least give you something to think about. Have you gotten any interesting answers so far?

You aren't concerned that it goes both ways?

Most are the expected answers, so far.

There's a reason I'm on anonymous.

They're mostly answers like mine, aren't they?

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