《公正：该如何做是好》：第一课(1).docx

可编辑 精品文档 This is a course about justice and we begin with a story. Suppose youre the driver of a trolley car, and your trolley car is hurtling down the track at 60 miles an hour. And at the end of the track, you notice five workers working on the track. You try to stop but you cant, your brakes dont work. You feel desperate because you know that if you crash into these five workers, they will all die. Lets assume you know that for sure. And so you feel helpless until you notice that there is, off to the right, a side track and at the end of that track, there is one worker working on the track. Your steering wheel works, so you can turn the trolley car, if you want to, onto the side track killing the one but sparing the five. Heres our first question: whats the right thing to do? What would you do? Lets take a poll. How many would turn the trolley car onto the side track? Raise your hands. How many wouldnt? How many would go straight ahead? Keep your hands up those of you who would go straight ahead. A handful of people would, the vast majority would turn. Lets hear first, now we need to begin to investigate the reasons why you think its the right thing to do. Lets begin with those in the majority who would turn to go onto the side track. Why would you do it? What would be your reason? Whos willing to 可编辑 精品文档 volunteer a reason? Go ahead. Stand up. Because it cant be right to kill five people when you can only kill one person instead. It wouldnt be right to kill five if you could kill one person instead. Thats a good reason. Who else? Does everybody agree with that reason? Go ahead. Well I was thinking its the same reason on 9/11 with regard to the people who flew the plane into the Pennsylvania field as heroes because they chose to kill the people on the plane and not kill more people in big buildings. So the principle there was the same on 9/11. Its a tragic circumstance but better to kill one so that five can live, is that the rea