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Foot and Trolley Cases: Kant Was Wrong
Could discoveries in moral psychology
undermine, or support,
ethical principles or theories?
preview
Yes, unless Foot’s approach is entirely wrong.
Foot’s Method of Trolley Cases
‘We are about to give a patient who needs it to save his life a massive dose of a certain drug in short supply. There arrive, however, five other patients each of whom could be saved by one-fifth of that dose.’
May we give the whole dose to the first patient?
We could save the lives of five patients by killing a healthy person and distributing their organs.
May we kill the healthy person?
Why do we say one is permissible (or even required) and the other impermissible?
(Foot, 1967, p. 13).
Answer 1: Because of the doctrine of double effect.
‘it is sometimes permissible to bring about by oblique intention what one may not directly intend.’ (Foot, 1967, p. 7).
‘We are about to give a patient who needs it to save his life a massive dose of a certain drug in short supply. There arrive, however, five other patients each of whom could be saved by one-fifth of that dose.’
May we give the whole dose to the first patient?
We could save the lives of five patients by killing a healthy person and distributing their organs.
May we kill the healthy person?
‘there are five patients in a hospital whose lives could be saved by [making] a certain gas, but that this inevitably releases lethal fumes into the room of another patient whom [...] we are unable to move.’
May we manufacture the gas?
Why do we say one is permissible (or even required) and the other impermissible?
(Foot, 1967, p. 13).
Answer 1: Because of the doctrine of double effect.
‘it is sometimes permissible to bring about by oblique intention what one may not directly intend.’ (Foot, 1967, p. 7).
Answer 2: Because duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
‘We are about to give a patient who needs it to save his life a massive dose of a certain drug in short supply. There arrive, however, five other patients each of whom could be saved by one-fifth of that dose.’
May we give the whole dose to the first patient?
‘there are five patients in a hospital whose lives could be saved by the manufacture of a certain gas, but that this inevitably releases lethal fumes into the room of another patient whom [...] we are unable to move.’
May we manufacture the gas?
Why do we say one is permissible (or even required) and the other impermissible?
(Foot, 1967, p. 13).
Answer 1: Because of the doctrine of double effect.
‘it is sometimes permissible to bring about by oblique intention what one may not directly intend.’ (Foot, 1967, p. 7).
Answer 2: Because duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
This is an example of Foot’s Method of Trolley Cases.
‘My conclusion is that the distinction between direct and oblique intention plays only a quite subsidiary role in determining what we say in these cases, while the distinction between avoiding injury and bringing aid is very important indeed’
(Foot, 1967, p. 12).
rough reconstruction
1. What people say is determined by the principle that duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
2. When people saying something is determined by a principle, it is likely true.
Therefore:
4. Duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
What actually determines what we say?
- whether an agent is part of the danger (e.g. on the trolley) or a bystander;
- whether an action involves forceful contact with a victim;
- whether an action targets an object or the victim;
- how directly the victim’s suffering impinges on the agent; and
- how the victim is described.
‘A brief summary of the research of the past years is that it has been shown that almost all these confounding factors influence judgments, along with a number of others’
(Waldmann et al., 2012, p. 288).
‘My conclusion is that the distinction between direct and oblique intention plays only a quite subsidiary role in determining what we say in these cases, while the distinction between avoiding injury and bringing aid is very important indeed’
(Foot, 1967, p. 12).
‘it seems hopeless to look for the one and only explanation of moral intuitions in dilemmas.
The research suggests that various moral and nonmoral factors interact in the generation of moral judgments about dilemmas’
(Waldmann et al., 2012, p. 290).
Could discoveries in moral psychology
undermine, or support, ethical principles or theories??
‘My conclusion is that the distinction between direct and oblique intention plays only a quite subsidiary role in determining what we say in these cases, while the distinction between avoiding injury and bringing aid is very important indeed’
(Foot, 1967, p. 12).
rough reconstruction
1. What people say is determined by the principle that duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
2. When people saying something is determined by a principle, it is likely true.
Therefore:
4. Duties not to harm rank higher than duties to help.
conclusion so far
Could discoveries in moral psychology undermine, or support, ethical principles or theories?
Foot’s argument hinges on why people are disposed, on reflection, to make certain patterns of judgements.
Although she relies on guesswork, Foot is concerned with an empirical issue; one which moral psychologists have advanced our understanding of.
Could discoveries in moral psychology undermine, or support, ethical principles or theories?
Phase 2
Identify general arguments against the use of intuitions in doing ethics.
Consider implications for Rawl’s method of reflective equilibrium.
Phase 1
Find places where a particular philosopher’s ethical argument relies on an empirical claim, and where knowledge of this claim depends on scientific discoveries.