Quote Originally Posted by Objection View Post
Oh, I can think of a few scenarios where I might have to kill someone to save the lives of others, but in those cases it would not be a moral dilemma - it would be because the person I have to kill is either infected or otherwise poses a direct threat to my life.

Besides, it doesn't matter if I can think of such scenarios. You're the one who claimed that such scenarios existed, so it was your job to come up with the example. I mean, clearly if you believe they do exist, then you can think of some, so why would you withhold that information?
... Why do you claim I withhold information when right below in your post you answer to an example given by me? The second one after screaming guy btw.


Well this is slightly better. In that scenario, you're effectively either turning five people into zombies or turning one person into a zombie, so the option that results in four less zombies to shoot later is, on the face of it, the better solution.

But wait! We don't know anything about the six people in this scenario. Maybe the guy at location B is a trustworthy zombie survival expert and the guys at location A are backstabbing low-lives who pose a greater threat to you than the zombies. Suddenly, letting the zombies get the five guys at location A is the better choice because, if they're that much of a threat already, someone would have to kill them at some point anyway, and them becoming zombies might make them slightly less threatening.

And that's why I insist on specifics. If a person can't draw logical conclusions about all of the options (including the unstated ones), or if the logical conclusions that person can draw are not consistent with each other, then that person has insufficient information (or worse, inconsistent information, though fortunately I don't see much of that these days) and therefore it would be incorrect for that person to claim that they made the right decision.
Now we're making progress. See, the thought experiment already gives us some information about your moral thinking - you do value the lifes of 5 over the life of 1. But you value the life of 1 good guy over the lifes of 5 scumbags(in a specialized apocalypse scenario). That's why the whole thing was made. To see which of the 2 options people take, to debate which is the right one.
And who says you are supposed to know anything about these guys? Maybe all are strangers to you. Maybe the single guy is your friend. Would you value the life of one friend over the life of five strangers who might be good guys or bad guys? If yes, what if they had children with them, or were more than 5?

Oh, and while I'm at it, whenever "shoot a guy" is an option, "kill said guy with melee weapon" is also an option, as is "knock out said guy with melee weapon", and "throw said guy to the zombies" or "leave said guy at mercy of zombies", unless you specify circumstances that clearly indicate that those cannot be done (eg, you're on a critical mission with many lives at stake back at base and you only have this one chance to succeed at it, all the melee weapons got stolen/broke - some might question going on such a critical mission with limited weaponry, but hey, sometimes the decision may be either that or lots of lives being lost at the base).
What's the point? The trolley problem and similar are designed to offer two options. 'Solutions' like "The clear answer is to attempt to switch the train in such a way that it derails." are pointless, they just avoid the morally tough choice by postulating a third option with no downsides where everyone lives.
If you do that, the philosopher just (grudgingly) modifies the scenario to disallow your cheap way out until you HAVE to make the tough choice. So by LOGICAL REASONING you should realize you should just accept the premise of the thought experiment instead of looking for more or less clever loopholes.