Editing Trolley problem (section)

{{Short description|Thought experiment in ethics}}
{{Other uses|The Trolley Problem (disambiguation)}}
[[File:Trolley Problem.svg|thumb|upright=1.35|One of the dilemmas included in the trolley problem: is it preferable to pull the lever to divert the runaway trolley onto the side track?]]

The '''trolley problem''' is a series of [[thought experiment]]s in [[ethics]], [[psychology]], and [[artificial intelligence]] involving stylized [[ethical dilemma]]s of whether to sacrifice one person to save a larger number.  The series usually begins with a [[Scenario (vehicular automation)|scenario]] in which a [[runaway train|runaway]] [[tram|trolley]] or [[train]] is on course to collide with and kill a number of people (traditionally five) down the [[railway track|track]], but a driver or bystander can intervene and divert the vehicle to kill just one person on a different track.  Then other variations of the runaway vehicle, and analogous life-and-death dilemmas (medical, judicial, etc.) are posed, each containing the option to either do nothing, in which case several people will be killed, or intervene and sacrifice one initially "safe" person to save the others.

Opinions on the ethics of each scenario turn out to be sensitive to details of the story that may seem immaterial to the abstract dilemma.  The question of formulating a general principle that can account for the differing judgments arising in different variants of the story was raised in 1967 as part of an analysis of [[Abortion debate|debates on abortion]] and the [[Principle of double effect|doctrine of double effect]] by the English philosopher [[Philippa Foot]].<ref name="Philippa Foot 1978">Philippa Foot, "[https://web.archive.org/web/20240712123155/https://www2.econ.iastate.edu/classes/econ362/Hallam/Readings/FootDoubleEffect.pdf The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of the Double Effect]" in ''Virtues and Vices'' (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1978) (originally appeared in the ''Oxford Review'', Number 5, 1967.)</ref>  Later dubbed "the trolley problem" by [[Judith Jarvis Thomson]] in a 1976 article that catalyzed a large literature, the subject refers to the meta-problem of why different judgments are arrived at in particular instances.

Philosophers Judith Thomson,<ref>Judith Jarvis Thomson, ''[https://learning.hccs.edu/faculty/david.poston/phil1301.80361/readings-for-march-31/JJ%20Thomson%20-%20Killing-%20Letting%20Die-%20and%20the%20Trolley%20Problem.pdf Killing, Letting Die, and the Trolley Problem]'', 59 The Monist 204-17 (1976)</ref><ref name="Judith Jarvis Thomson 1985">{{cite journal | last1 = Jarvis Thomson | first1 = Judith | year = 1985 | title = The Trolley Problem | url = http://www.psy.vanderbilt.edu/courses/hon182/thomsontrolley.pdf | journal = Yale Law Journal | volume = 94 | issue = 6| pages = 1395–1415 | doi = 10.2307/796133 | jstor = 796133 }}</ref> [[Frances Kamm]],<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Kamm | first1 = Frances Myrna | year = 1989 | title = Harming Some to Save Others | journal = Philosophical Studies | volume = 57 | issue = 3| pages = 227–60 | doi = 10.1007/bf00372696 | s2cid = 171045532 }}</ref> and [[Peter Unger]] have also analysed the [[dilemma]] extensively.<ref>Peter Unger, ''[[Living High and Letting Die]]'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996)</ref> Thomson's 1976 article initiated the literature on the trolley problem as a subject in its own right.  Characteristic of this literature are colorful and increasingly absurd alternative scenarios in which the sacrificed person is instead pushed onto the tracks as a way to stop the trolley, has his organs harvested to save transplant patients, or is killed in more indirect ways that complicate the chain of [[Causality|causation]] and responsibility.

Earlier forms of individual trolley scenarios antedated Foot's publication. [[Frank Chapman Sharp]] included a version in a moral questionnaire given to undergraduates at the [[University of Wisconsin]] in 1905. In this variation, the railway's [[switchman]] controlled the switch, and the lone individual to be sacrificed (or not) was the switchman's child.<ref>Frank Chapman Sharp, ''A Study of the Influence of Custom on the Moral Judgment'' Bulletin of the University of Wisconsin no.236 (Madison, June 1908), 138.</ref><ref>Frank Chapman Sharp, ''Ethics'' (New York: The Century Co, 1928), 42–44, 122.</ref>  German philosopher of law [[Karl Engisch]] discussed a similar dilemma in his [[habilitation thesis]] in 1930, as did German legal scholar Hans Welzel in a work from 1951.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Engisch|first=Karl|title=Untersuchungen über Vorsatz und Fahrlässigkeit im Strafrecht|publisher=O. Liebermann|year=1930|location=Berlin|pages=288}}</ref><ref>Hans Welzel, ''ZStW Zeitschrift für die gesamte Strafrechtswissenschaft'' 63 [1951], 47ff. About the German discussion see also Schuster, Crim Law Forum 34, 237–270 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10609-023-09452-0</ref> In his commentary on the [[Talmud]], published in 1953, [[Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz]] considered the question of whether it is ethical to deflect a projectile from a larger crowd toward a smaller one.<ref>Hazon Ish, HM, Sanhedrin #25, s.v. "veyesh leayen". Available online, http://hebrewbooks.org/14332, page 404</ref> Similarly, in [[The Strike (Westinghouse Studio One)|''The Strike'']], a television play broadcast in the United States on June 7, 1954, a commander in the [[Korean War]] must choose between ordering an air strike on an encroaching enemy force at the cost of his own 20-man patrol unit, or calling off the strike and risking the lives of the main army made up of 500 men.<ref>[https://www.paleycenter.org/collection/item/?q=westinghouse+studio+one&p=4&item=T83:0226 "Studio One: The Strike(TV)"] The Paley Center. Retrieved August 07, 2022.</ref>

Beginning in 2001, the trolley problem and its variants have been used in empirical research on [[moral psychology]]. It has been a topic of popular books.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/24/books/review/would-you-kill-the-fat-man-and-the-trolley-problem.html | title=Clang Went the Trolley| newspaper=The New York Times| date=2013-11-22| last1=Bakewell| first1=Sarah}}</ref> Trolley-style scenarios also arise in discussing the ethics of [[autonomous vehicle]] design, which may require programming to choose whom or what to strike when a [[traffic collision|collision]] appears to be unavoidable.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last1=Lim|first1=Hazel Si Min|last2=Taeihagh|first2=Araz|date=2019|title=Algorithmic Decision-Making in AVs: Understanding Ethical and Technical Concerns for Smart Cities|journal=Sustainability|language=en|volume=11|issue=20|pages=5791|doi=10.3390/su11205791|arxiv=1910.13122|doi-access=free}}</ref> More recently, the trolley problem has also become an [[internet meme]].<ref>{{Cite web |date=December 19, 2016 |title=Students Assist Professor Bert Huang in Empirical Study of Law and Moral Dilemmas |url=https://www.law.columbia.edu/news/archive/students-assist-professor-bert-huang-empirical-study-law-and-moral-dilemmas |access-date=2024-12-15 |website=[[Columbia Law School]] |language=en}}</ref>