Um, you express the opinion that the trolley shouldn't be diverted.
I bolded your answer.
The issue is, as Boring7 correctly points out, whenever this comes up you assert that there is no possible argument to be made here, despite the situation being an extremely famous ethical dilemma.
I expressed no such opinion. I didn't address the trolley problem in this thread at all. In fact I reject the fundamental premise that the Tuvix episode represents a trolley problem in the first place, so I'm sure as fuck I didn't get side-tracked into giving an opinion on an irrelevant topic. A topic that is, I'll grant you, a very famous and interesting philosophical and moral dilemma, but that is irrelevant to the episode in question.
Ahh, so the problem is you either didn't watch the episode closely at all or don't actually know what the Trolley Problem is, despite my linking it.
There is no way in which the Tuvix episode is not a Trolley Problem. It's about choosing whether 2 people live or one person lives. If you say "But Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, so it doesn't count", you are again wrong since as Hahnsoo1 points out just above you, that's also a formulation of the trolley problem. The episode is designed to be one. It's fucking shoe-horned into being one.
The post I had made that started this discussion is this:
Devil's advocate; Brannon "Artist with ADD" Braga was likely just doing it to "challenge" viewers with the runaway cart problem, and given the internet fights over it I would say he was successful. The fact he had to use a shoehorn AND a sledgehammer to do it was just Braga's trademark style.
Counter-counter argument. There are people, even in this very thread, defending Threshold and Star Trek: First Contact, and there are people elsewhere defending Phantom Menace and Ron Paul. So no matter how massive a stinker Braga or anyone else puts on screen, you will find someone on the Internet willing to fight to defend it. It does not make it a mark of quality.
Boring7 argues that the fact we are talking and debating about this episode is a mark of its success. I counter-argued that there's someone on the internet to argue for anything you can think of no matter how bad it is, and therefore the fact there are people arguing about it is not in itself evidence of success. Somehow Boring7 decided that implied both a viewpoint on the trolley problem and a rejection of all opposing viewpoints. In short, he's being a complete silly goose.
No, he is still correct. Your counter-argument is based on the fact that there is no argument to be made at all. You are trying to say that it's a stupid debate just like all these other stupid internet debates that exist, and none of those other debates make the topic worthy of debate.
And the only way this works is if you either:
a) don't think there's more then one answer to the Trolly Problem
b) don't think it's actually a Trolley Problem (ie - it's not a meaningful argument in the first place)
We all thought it was a), since b) seemed absurd. But since you've claimed it's b) well, you are still wrong, just for different reasons. Now it seems you are refusing to believe there's another answer to the dilemma because you refuse to even admit it's a dilemma.
The Trolley problem isn't a side-track. It's the central premise of Tuvix, made ridiculous and given the Star Trek hand-waving treatment. Just because there isn't a runaway train to be seen doesn't mean that it isn't a Trolley problem (hooray for negative qualifiers!). The issue here is that the ability to save many lives rests on the opportunity cost of killing a life (or fewer lives, depending on how you put the context). The MASH finale is a Trolley problem. Tuvix is a Trolley problem. There are multiple episodes of Star Trek that deal with the Trolley problem. There was a TNG episode where Troi is up for officer training and has to send Holo-Geordi to his death in a simulation. That's a Trolley problem, too.
There's no right answer, even within the context of Voyager and Star Trek. They've waffled on both sides of the decision (Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?), depending on the context and episode. :-P
Tuvix isn't really a trolley problem because in the trolley problem the three people are all alive. Tuvok and Neelix are dead. They have no body, no individual conscience, not even an inter-dimensional floaty ghost spirit. Just because the doctor found a monkey's paw that can wish them back with the sacrifice of another, it doesn't change their deceased status.
Tuvix is more like if someone, possibly someone with horns and goat-legs, told you that if you shoot this perfectly nice man you met a couple weeks ago, who's pleading for his life, in the face, he'll bring your two dead friends back to life. Only on a very superficial level is that choosing who lives and who dies. It really is much more than that, and much darker morally to pick the 2 over 1.
Or to put it another way it's a more twisted version of pushing the one fat man in front of the train to save two others that would be hit by it. It's more akin to murder than simply throwing a switch, but there is still a lot of grey to argue over. Tuvix pushes it farther, and imo goes too far into the black preventing it from being a good morality problem.
Tuvix isn't really a trolley problem because in the trolley problem the three people are all alive. Tuvok and Neelix are dead. They have no body, no individual conscience, not even an inter-dimensional floaty ghost spirit. Just because the doctor found a monkey's paw that can wish them back with the sacrifice of another, it doesn't change their deceased status.
Tuvix is more like if someone, possibly someone with horns and goat-legs, told you that if you shoot this perfectly nice man you met a couple weeks ago, who's pleading for his life, in the face, he'll bring your two dead friends back to life. Only on a very superficial level is that choosing who lives and who dies. It really is much more than that, and much darker morally to pick the 2 over 1.
Or to put it another way it's a more twisted version of pushing the one fat man in front of the train to save two others that would be hit by it. It's more akin to murder than simply throwing a switch, but there is still a lot of grey to argue over. Tuvix pushes it farther, and imo goes too far into the black preventing it from being a good morality problem.
Their deceased status is irrelevant if it can be reversed. Nothing you've said here changes the fundamental facts:
Janeway has a choice. She can push the button which kills Tuvix and Neelix and Tuvok are alive, or she doesn't and Tuvix is alive and Neelix and Tuvok are dead.
It's straight up Trolley Problem. Act or don't, differing numbers of people are dead as an end result of the two possible scenarios.
Tuvix isn't really a trolley problem because in the trolley problem the three people are all alive. Tuvok and Neelix are dead. They have no body, no individual conscience, not even an inter-dimensional floaty ghost spirit. Just because the doctor found a monkey's paw that can wish them back with the sacrifice of another, it doesn't change their deceased status.
Alive/Dead is picking at nits (especially in Star Trek, where Neelix was resurrected by Borg technology and Scotty survives in a transporter buffer), and I believe it's not relevant to the definition of the problem (or rather, it's just another context by which you can phrase the problem). The Trolley problem is, at its base, "Person A can take an action which would benefit many people, but in doing so, person B would be unfairly harmed. Under what circumstances would it be more morally just than injust for Person A to violate Person B's rights in order to benefit the group?"
It's reworded in different contexts based on how you want to draw the line. The Fat Man (which you pointed out) is a Trolley problem, too. It's a matter of degrees and context, and people make different decisions based on the context and their own background to justify the answer. This is why it's an ethical dilemma.
It's not like saying that "It's a Trolley problem" means we are saying "So the answer is therefore this..." In fact, stating that it's a Trolley problem is the opposite; it means that there is no right answer to it. Even now, you will get a varying number of people who will say "Yes, I will pull the switch" based on rewording the problem, and it's almost never 100% one way or the other.
You may personally believe it to be more morally unjust to choose the two over one. This isn't based on "truth" or "absolutes", but on your own background and how you interpret the context of the situation. The problem gets more grey and muddled the closer you are to the subjects affected by the decision (The Mother variant: "Would you kill your mother to save multiple strangers?") and the fewer people on the "multiple people" side of the balance ("Would you kill a person who is going to murder millions of people someday? Maybe you would." "Would you kill someone to prevent him from killing two strangers? Maybe not."). It also is more muddled when you formulate it as "one person saves multiple people by his death or vice versa" than "You must choose who dies!" (it may sound like the same problem, but surveys have shown that it is not).
EDIT: This is totally going on my "Circle of Life: Star Trek PA Forums" thingy, whenever I get around to making it.
But you are essentially raising the dead. It very much changes the problem, especially in the context of Trek, where they very much have the technology to do this all the time but don't for moral reasons. It would kind of take the bite out of the ending to part 1 of "The Best of Both Worlds" if Riker said "Fire. We can always clone/transport/magic another Picard anyway".
Additional context matters. Beyond the dark magic aspect their motivation for killing Tuvix is purely selfish. They want Tuvok back, and for some bizarre reason Neelix. They go against their own Federation code of ethics simply to bring their friends back. The Trolley problem is based on cold numbers. You can still see it that way, but the crew didn't, which is why they look away in shame when it happens.
Yeah they were totally going for a trolley problem, but they muck it up too much for it to be a successful one.
Edit: I should add this isn't entirely the writer's faults and that they are stupid dumbshits. You don't get into specifics with the trolley problem for good reason. If the two are old ladies, and the one is an attractive 18 year-old super genius, the thought experiment isn't going to require a lot of thought for the majority of people. Tuvix simply failed to boil the problem down far enough to it's base elements to be effective.
No, we aren't saying that your internal justification for your choice is invalid. We are saying that it is a Trolley problem, as defined by previous contexts and associations with the Trolley problem (i.e. people still call it the Trolley problem even when you are talking about the MASH finale). The Trolley problem doesn't cease to become a Trolley problem because of a lack of a trolley or changing the numbers or the context. The Trolley problem is NOT based on cold numbers, as you assert. Again, even now, when presenting people with the Trolley problem, you will get varying answers based on cultural background, social status, context of how the problem is worded, etc. There is no "successful Trolley problem" or "unsuccessful Trolley problem", no more than there is a "(un)successful Prisoner's dilemma". It's simply a defining term and allows you to compare it to other similar problems with the same base issue.
Maybe you feel that your answer to the Trolley hitting 1 man by flipping a switch to save 5 men is different from the problem posed by Tuvix. This is fine. The context is what matters, as you said. Changing the context may change your personal answer. Everyone has a different answer.
Also, right now, you are adding additional details to the episode that don't exist: "possibly someone with horns and goat-legs, told you that if you shoot this perfectly nice man you met a couple weeks ago, who's pleading for his life, in the face, he'll bring your two dead friends back to life." Jesus, man. You are literally adding religious imagery involving the devil, and you are invoking imagery of cold-blooded point-blank murder shots to the problem. Also, I ask you what "Federation Code of Ethics" would say "You should absolutely not unfuse two lifeforms from an amalgamation of multiple lifeforms" or "You should not revert transporter accidents".
The most important thing these moral dilemma hypotheticals point out (to me) is that morality is not clearly defined by "save x amount of life vs y". Our familiarity with those involved and perceived social accountability are always more important than strict moral commandments.
Consider this: would you choose the life of your lover or best friend over the life of 10 random strangers? I don't think anyone would blame you for not being able to sacrifice someone you were so intimate with. Intimacy makes things much fuzzier.
I think they turned away because they couldn't stand to look at this on the bridge, all the time:
Yech. It's bad enough you knew Neelix was making the food (finding his straggly sideburn hairs in whatever horrid soup-like substitute he had concocted that week). But at least you probably wouldn't have to deal with him but 3 times a day. Also, apparently if you combine emotionless logic with Alf-like wackiness, you get someone who sounds like they spend most of their free time sitting on park benches near playgrounds wearing pants with holes in the pockets.
Even if there WERE no way to split him, I'd have dropped him off on the first habitable rock I could find. And then dedicate one of the holodecks to eating, drag in all the food supplies, and have a genius holodeck chef make food that wasn't their best approximation of a really good space corn-dog they had at a interstellar truck stop, but the dog is actually a species of rodent and the breading is skin cells harvested from the air filters. And train someone else, via the holodeck, up to Security Chief. Surely there's starfleet training programs on the damn thing, and not just Flash Gordon parodies and French Cafes.
edit: Me fix broken link
Haha; wait. Did the transporter accident also combine Tuvok's uniform and Neelix's clown suit? I never noticed that detail.
Man what an awful episode.
Devil's advocate; Brannon "Artist with ADD" Braga was likely just doing it to "challenge" viewers with the runaway cart problem, and given the internet fights over it I would say he was successful. The fact he had to use a shoehorn AND a sledgehammer to do it was just Braga's trademark style.
I take it that in this case, ADD stands for "Artistic Deficit Disorder"?
Well that too, but Braga has actually written good stuff (on occasion) and I have been given the (possibly mistaken) impression that a lot of the "just plain awful" writing was Rick "Anti-taste" Berman. The thing is, Braga has the attention span of a gnat, and anytime he comes up with something that has potential to be interesting it is dropped after 5 episodes (or five MINUTES) in favor of something else. I like to call it "Jeph Loeb Syndrome," in honor of the man who can't stop retconning his own retcons.
The most important thing these moral dilemma hypotheticals point out (to me) is that morality is not clearly defined by "save x amount of life vs y". Our familiarity with those involved and perceived social accountability are always more important than strict moral commandments.
Consider this: would you choose the life of your lover or best friend over the life of 10 random strangers? I don't think anyone would blame you for not being able to sacrifice someone you were so intimate with. Intimacy makes things much fuzzier.
Agreed. I find those choice difficult in video games, so I couldn't imagine having to make it as a REAL decision.
Mass Effect: Bring Down the Sky spoilers
I let that Batarian go. I just couldn't let that scientist die after she had helped me so much.
I "know" deep down it was the wrong decision, but I'd do it again.
God. I'm now at the point in my Voyager viewing where Chakotay is in a boxing ring as "The Maquis Mauler" for no raisin. Is it in his contract to say "A-koo-chee-moya" at least once per season? Or is it to limit saying that to only once per season? I can't quite decide. Knowing Robert Beltran, I'd say it's the latter.
I think they turned away because they couldn't stand to look at this on the bridge, all the time:
Yech. It's bad enough you knew Neelix was making the food (finding his straggly sideburn hairs in whatever horrid soup-like substitute he had concocted that week). But at least you probably wouldn't have to deal with him but 3 times a day. Also, apparently if you combine emotionless logic with Alf-like wackiness, you get someone who sounds like they spend most of their free time sitting on park benches near playgrounds wearing pants with holes in the pockets.
Even if there WERE no way to split him, I'd have dropped him off on the first habitable rock I could find. And then dedicate one of the holodecks to eating, drag in all the food supplies, and have a genius holodeck chef make food that wasn't their best approximation of a really good space corn-dog they had at a interstellar truck stop, but the dog is actually a species of rodent and the breading is skin cells harvested from the air filters. And train someone else, via the holodeck, up to Security Chief. Surely there's starfleet training programs on the damn thing, and not just Flash Gordon parodies and French Cafes.
edit: Me fix broken link
Haha; wait. Did the transporter accident also combine Tuvok's uniform and Neelix's clown suit? I never noticed that detail.
Man what an awful episode.
Devil's advocate; Brannon "Artist with ADD" Braga was likely just doing it to "challenge" viewers with the runaway cart problem, and given the internet fights over it I would say he was successful. The fact he had to use a shoehorn AND a sledgehammer to do it was just Braga's trademark style.
I take it that in this case, ADD stands for "Artistic Deficit Disorder"?
Well that too, but Braga has actually written good stuff (on occasion) and I have been given the (possibly mistaken) impression that a lot of the "just plain awful" writing was Rick "Anti-taste" Berman. The thing is, Braga has the attention span of a gnat, and anytime he comes up with something that has potential to be interesting it is dropped after 5 episodes (or five MINUTES) in favor of something else. I like to call it "Jeph Loeb Syndrome," in honor of the man who can't stop retconning his own retcons.
Braga does his best work co-writing with Moore. They were partners for years until Voyager IIRC. Berman & Braga bring out the worst in each other, as well. Without Berman Braga is a decent showrunner (re: Threshold tv series).
Loeb's retcons are the least of his flaws now. His writing abilities flatlined after his son died and never recovered. Now he's the head of Marvel's television division.
I was adding hyperbole for comedic effect, but I was not that off base considering Tuvix was pleading for his life and Janeway was very cold-blooded about it. Joke: Also Janeway may be the devil or just crazy, the jury is still out on that one.
Would you consider "In the Pale Moonlight" to be the same? The episode really doesn't. Sisko struggles with the choices he's made, feels terrible about it, but ultimately accepts it as something that needed to be done. Not because it was really okay, but because of the sheer scale involved. He sees it as saving billions of lives, the entire alpha quadrant. Against that, the life a Romulan Senator, a criminal, and the conscience of one starfleet officer were acceptable losses. The episode nor it's fans/detractors don't consider Sisko's choice to actually be wrong; the debate is always whether such an episode should exist in Trek at all. I don't think I've ever seen anyone try to say Sisko made the wrong call. Tuvix is of a similar nature just not as extreme and one-sided (and thus there are some who will defend it). The circumstances involve don't make for any compelling moral dilemma, as the deck is stacked too far to one side. The trolley of "In the Pale Moonlight" would only determine is who are the uncompromising Rorschachs, which if that's all your trolley problem is going for, it'd consider it a failure and a waste of time. Tuvix may not be that far, but far enough that it fails to be thought provoking. Thus, making the crew of Voyager look like a bunch of selfish possibly murderous asses.
Also I can't think of any other really comparable transporter accidents. Scotty did it to cheat death, but he didn't die. The Thomas Riker problem wasn't reversed though, and when Picard and the others were de-aged, I believe they had the choice to reverse it. When I said Federation Code of Ethics, I meant they don't seem to be okay with taking measures to bring back the dead like this, as they certainly would have the tech to do so all the time if it was acceptable. Not to mention they'd probably totally consider it murder, what with the prime directive frequently being crazy and pro-genicide.
I was adding hyperbole for comedic effect, but I was not that off base considering Tuvix was pleading for his life and Janeway was very cold-blooded about it. Joke: Also Janeway may be the devil or just crazy, the jury is still out on that one.
Would you consider "In the Pale Moonlight" to be the same? The episode really doesn't. Sisko struggles with the choices he's made, feels terrible about it, but ultimately accepts it as something that needed to be done. Not because it was really okay, but because of the sheer scale involved. He sees it as saving billions of lives, the entire alpha quadrant. Against that, the life a Romulan Senator, a criminal, and the conscience of one starfleet officer were acceptable losses. The episode nor it's fans/detractors don't consider Sisko's choice to actually be wrong; the debate is always whether such an episode should exist in Trek at all. I don't think I've ever seen anyone try to say Sisko made the wrong call. Tuvix is of a similar nature just not as extreme and one-sided (and thus there are some who will defend it). The circumstances involve don't make for any compelling moral dilemma, as the deck is stacked too far to one side. The trolley of "In the Pale Moonlight" would only determine is who are the uncompromising Rorschachs, which if that's all your trolley problem is going for, it'd consider it a failure and a waste of time. Tuvix may not be that far, but far enough that it fails to be thought provoking. Thus, making the crew of Voyager look like a bunch of selfish possibly murderous asses.
Also I can't think of any other really comparable transporter accidents. Scotty did it to cheat death, but he didn't die. The Thomas Riker problem wasn't reversed though, and when Picard and the others were de-aged, I believe they had the choice to reverse it. When I said Federation Code of Ethics, I meant they don't seem to be okay with taking measures to bring back the dead like this, as they certainly would have the tech to do so all the time if it was acceptable. Not to mention they'd probably totally consider it murder, what with the prime directive frequently being crazy and pro-genicide.
The Federation needn't know about Tuvix. What happens in the Delta Quadrant, stays in the Delta Quadrant.
I was adding hyperbole for comedic effect, but I was not that off base considering Tuvix was pleading for his life and Janeway was very cold-blooded about it. Joke: Also Janeway may be the devil or just crazy, the jury is still out on that one.
Would you consider "In the Pale Moonlight" to be the same? The episode really doesn't. Sisko struggles with the choices he's made, feels terrible about it, but ultimately accepts it as something that needed to be done. Not because it was really okay, but because of the sheer scale involved. He sees it as saving billions of lives, the entire alpha quadrant. Against that, the life a Romulan Senator, a criminal, and the conscience of one starfleet officer were acceptable losses. The episode nor it's fans/detractors don't consider Sisko's choice to actually be wrong; the debate is always whether such an episode should exist in Trek at all. I don't think I've ever seen anyone try to say Sisko made the wrong call. Tuvix is of a similar nature just not as extreme and one-sided (and thus there are some who will defend it). The circumstances involve don't make for any compelling moral dilemma, as the deck is stacked too far to one side. The trolley of "In the Pale Moonlight" would only determine is who are the uncompromising Rorschachs, which if that's all your trolley problem is going for, it'd consider it a failure and a waste of time. Tuvix may not be that far, but far enough that it fails to be thought provoking. Thus, making the crew of Voyager look like a bunch of selfish possibly murderous asses.
Also I can't think of any other really comparable transporter accidents. Scotty did it to cheat death, but he didn't die. The Thomas Riker problem wasn't reversed though, and when Picard and the others were de-aged, I believe they had the choice to reverse it. When I said Federation Code of Ethics, I meant they don't seem to be okay with taking measures to bring back the dead like this, as they certainly would have the tech to do so all the time if it was acceptable. Not to mention they'd probably totally consider it murder, what with the prime directive frequently being crazy and pro-genicide.
The Federation needn't know about Tuvix. What happens in the Delta Quadrant, stays in the Delta Quadrant.
Guess that also explains Janeway's promotion to Admiral.
She got her ship home with some cool future-tech. Promotions for some, posthumous commendations for others.
The Trolley problem isn't a litmus test. It's not designed to determine "who is what" of anything. It simply frames the ethical problems of unjustly penalizing one or more individuals to positively impact the outcome of another more numerous set of individuals.
"In the Pale Moonlight" involves much more than just a Trolley problem. It is a character study of an individual, and the lengths he would go to ensure the safety of an extended community. In the case of a Pale Moonlight, the stakes are weighted HEAVILY more toward the multiple individuals, because the death of one Romulan Senator (who already is "an enemy" of the Federation, despite being reluctant allies) will manipulate the Romulans to assist in the war, which will determine the fate of all races and governments in the Alpha Quadrant. Sisko also tried to use deceptive means first, and he wasn't the direct agent of the actual killing (although he assumed responsibility because of his moral character). But despite his moral objections and guilty conscience, he states very plainly that he would do it all again in a heartbeat.
But this is NOT agonizing for the viewer. As guilty as Sisko may feel, his actions are entirely justified by the observers. He is trying to do the most good, by deceiving and ultimately eliminating a villain who is in his way. You won't find many people who would say "Oh, but you should not deceive/assassinate that poor innocent Romulan." The ends sometimes do justify the means, and television viewers recognize this difference. "In the Pale Moonlight" isn't interesting because of its Trolley problem (which, when it comes to the death of the individual, is downplayed to Act 5, after the climax), it's interesting because it's about Ben Sisko.
"Tuvix" and its Trolley problem are more grey and muddled than "In a Pale Moonlight". It involves a smaller group of people (Tuvok and Neelix) who are beloved as a member of an extended family. The "greater good" amounts to a bare majority, 2 versus 1. Again, the fewer people in the majority, the more grey the answers are. The closer the relationship to the potential victims, the more grey it is. The deck isn't "stacked too far to one side", it's balanced in such a way as to cause strife and division, unlike "In a Pale Moonlight". The decision SHOULD be agonizing, and it clearly was. This is not a decision that any of the characters state that "they would do again in a heartbeat", although we really aren't privy to what their thoughts were afterwards. I find "Tuvix" to be more thought-provoking than "In the Pale Moonlight", precisely because the ethical dilemma is more jarring and less clear-cut, but it is less compelling because it isn't about someone as interesting as Ben Sisko.
Um, you express the opinion that the trolley shouldn't be diverted.
I bolded your answer.
The issue is, as Boring7 correctly points out, whenever this comes up you assert that there is no possible argument to be made here, despite the situation being an extremely famous ethical dilemma.
I expressed no such opinion. I didn't address the trolley problem in this thread at all. In fact I reject the fundamental premise that the Tuvix episode represents a trolley problem in the first place, so I'm sure as fuck I didn't get side-tracked into giving an opinion on an irrelevant topic. A topic that is, I'll grant you, a very famous and interesting philosophical and moral dilemma, but that is irrelevant to the episode in question.
Ahh, so the problem is you either didn't watch the episode closely at all or don't actually know what the Trolley Problem is, despite my linking it.
There is no way in which the Tuvix episode is not a Trolley Problem. It's about choosing whether 2 people live or one person lives. If you say "But Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, so it doesn't count", you are again wrong since as Hahnsoo1 points out just above you, that's also a formulation of the trolley problem. The episode is designed to be one. It's fucking shoe-horned into being one.
There is no formulation of the Trolley problem that involves raising the dead. The problem is that you didn't read the Trolley problem page you're so proud of having linked to. I guess you should. Here, I'll be nice and link it for you again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
You'll notice perhaps that the formulations of the problem all have something in common: you have to decide who gets to live and die. Your action means some people die and your inaction means other people die. In this episode Janeway has no such decision to make. Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, and Janeway didn't kill them. A transporter accident "made" the decision already at the beginning of the episode. Janeway's inaction means no one else has to die.
Killing one to save the lives of two is a trolley problem. Killing one to raise two from the dead is not. And killing one to raise two of your friends from the dead is just fucked up levels of immoral.
To put that last point in the trolley framework you so enjoy, if you do end up reading the Trolley problem page you'll get to one called "the mother", which asks "would you kill one to save five if the one you had to kill was your mother". This episode, if it were a trolley problem, would be the opposite one, asking "would you kill five to save your mother", and answering it with an emphatic "yes". Now there's a reason that scenario is not in the list of trolley problems: it's because it's not an actual moral dilemma. It's just straight up immorality and selfishness. Which, to be fair, a lot of people would give into. I myself don't know what I'd do if I ever were in this situation, and I hope I never am. But giving into it doesn't make it right, nor does it make it a moral dilemma. And in the context of Star Trek, it shouldn't be an issue at all since Roddenberry Humans are supposed to have evolved beyond that.
Devil's advocate; Brannon "Artist with ADD" Braga was likely just doing it to "challenge" viewers with the runaway cart problem, and given the internet fights over it I would say he was successful. The fact he had to use a shoehorn AND a sledgehammer to do it was just Braga's trademark style.
Counter-counter argument. There are people, even in this very thread, defending Threshold and Star Trek: First Contact, and there are people elsewhere defending Phantom Menace and Ron Paul. So no matter how massive a stinker Braga or anyone else puts on screen, you will find someone on the Internet willing to fight to defend it. It does not make it a mark of quality.
Boring7 argues that the fact we are talking and debating about this episode is a mark of its success. I counter-argued that there's someone on the internet to argue for anything you can think of no matter how bad it is, and therefore the fact there are people arguing about it is not in itself evidence of success. Somehow Boring7 decided that implied both a viewpoint on the trolley problem and a rejection of all opposing viewpoints. In short, he's being a complete silly goose.
No, he is still correct. Your counter-argument is based on the fact that there is no argument to be made at all. You are trying to say that it's a stupid debate just like all these other stupid internet debates that exist, and none of those other debates make the topic worthy of debate.
And the only way this works is if you either:
a) don't think there's more then one answer to the Trolly Problem
b) don't think it's actually a Trolley Problem (ie - it's not a meaningful argument in the first place)
We all thought it was a), since b) seemed absurd. But since you've claimed it's b) well, you are still wrong, just for different reasons. Now it seems you are refusing to believe there's another answer to the dilemma because you refuse to even admit it's a dilemma.
The problem here is that you misread a critical part of my post before replying. I bolded the crucial part. Please read it more closely before replying again, and notice how it has exactly jack shit to do with the trolley problem.
hahaha that really is the best page.
"The federation is gone, Riker's beard is everywhere!"
They should have made it so that, in the mirror universe, everyone had a beard. Even the women.
There is no formulation of the Trolley problem that involves raising the dead. The problem is that you didn't read the Trolley problem page you're so proud of having linked to. I guess you should. Here, I'll be nice and link it for you again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
You'll notice perhaps that the formulations of the problem all have something in common: you have to decide who gets to live and die. Your action means some people die and your inaction means other people die. In this episode Janeway has no such decision to make. Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, and Janeway didn't kill them. A transporter accident "made" the decision already at the beginning of the episode. Janeway's inaction means no one else has to die.
That is not an all-inclusive list. The Trolley problem does indeed extend to "raising the dead", or in this case, restoring two individuals to a temporal position where they are no longer an amalgamation, if you'd like (yes, this also changes the context, but so does phrasing it as "raising the dead"). The issue is not dead-raising or killing two for the price of one... it's simply "Person A can take an action which would benefit many people, but in doing so, person B would be unfairly harmed. Under what circumstances would it be more morally just than injust for Person A to violate Person B's rights in order to benefit the group?", which is listed on the page you just linked. That is why it's a trolley problem, not because you are deciding who lives or who dies (although that's the context of most Trolley problems).
Killing one to save the lives of two is a trolley problem. Killing one to raise two from the dead is not. And killing one to raise two of your friends from the dead is just fucked up levels of immoral.
This is your personal answer, based on your personal moral compass. You think it's immoral, and it's based on the context of the situation and your own background. I am asking you to recognize that if you were to present this problem, or a similar problem among a cohort of your peers, that the percent who would make each side of the binary decision is likely to be non-zero.
In the situation where one is asked to smother their own baby in order to save themselves and a village, it's around 50% (plus or minus a wide margin, but it hovers near 50%), for example.
There is no morally right or wrong answer in this. It will be morally wrong either way because someone is going to be harmed by your agency. The context and justification from one's own background are the only things that make people decide one way or another, and even then, they probably would second-guess those decisions. On the example from Radiolab, Jad Abumrad said that he would smother his own baby, when talking about the MASH finale. There will be other babies, and everyone else would live. Months later, when he had a child of his own, he had changed his mind and said he cannot do it.
To put that last point in the trolley framework you so enjoy, if you do end up reading the Trolley problem page you'll get to one called "the mother", which asks "would you kill one to save five if the one you had to kill was your mother". This episode, if it were a trolley problem, would be the opposite one, asking "would you kill five to save your mother", and answering it with an emphatic "yes". Now there's a reason that scenario is not in the list of trolley problems: it's because it's not an actual moral dilemma.
This is incorrect. It's an actual moral dilemma, and people would lump that into the Trolley problem, which is why it exists on the same wikipedia page and more importantly, on any relevant discussion of such ethics. It's not morally just to kill 5 people for your own mother any more than it is to kill your mother for the benefit of 5 strangers. In either case, someone is being harmed by your agency. Or to put it another way, you won't have people say 100% of the time that they would save their mother. They will probably joke and say "It depends on the mother", but this is entirely true. You need that context to make the decision.
It's just straight up immorality and selfishness. Which, to be fair, a lot of people would give into. I myself don't know what I'd do if I ever were in this situation, and I hope I never am. But giving into it doesn't make it right, nor does it make it a moral dilemma. And in the context of Star Trek, it shouldn't be an issue at all since Roddenberry Humans are supposed to have evolved beyond that.
You have a very different definition of an ethical/moral dilemma than most people who normally discuss such matters. Maybe just leave it at that instead of telling everyone who disagrees with you that they are morally wrong by extension of your own personal moral compass (which is the hostility that I'm getting... if it is wrong, maybe take care to clarify it as such?).
hahaha that really is the best page.
"The federation is gone, Riker's beard is everywhere!"
They should have made it so that, in the mirror universe, everyone had a beard. Even the women.
Hey I thought only wookieepedia had one of these pages
I guess all scifi fandoms are weird
Pretty much. The bigger or more popular a franchise is the weirder the fandom becomes. There are exceptions sometimes with cult fandoms, they can get weird as well.
The Trolley problem isn't a litmus test. It's not designed to determine "who is what" of anything. It simply frames the ethical problems of unjustly penalizing one or more individuals to positively impact the outcome of another more numerous set of individuals.
"In the Pale Moonlight" involves much more than just a Trolley problem. It is a character study of an individual, and the lengths he would go to ensure the safety of an extended community. In the case of a Pale Moonlight, the stakes are weighted HEAVILY more toward the multiple individuals, because the death of one Romulan Senator (who already is "an enemy" of the Federation, despite being reluctant allies) will manipulate the Romulans to assist in the war, which will determine the fate of all races and governments in the Alpha Quadrant. Sisko also tried to use deceptive means first, and he wasn't the direct agent of the actual killing (although he assumed responsibility because of his moral character). But despite his moral objections and guilty conscience, he states very plainly that he would do it all again in a heartbeat.
But this is NOT agonizing for the viewer. As guilty as Sisko may feel, his actions are entirely justified by the observers. He is trying to do the most good, by deceiving and ultimately eliminating a villain who is in his way. You won't find many people who would say "Oh, but you should not deceive/assassinate that poor innocent Romulan." The ends sometimes do justify the means, and television viewers recognize this difference. "In the Pale Moonlight" isn't interesting because of its Trolley problem (which, when it comes to the death of the individual, is downplayed to Act 5, after the climax), it's interesting because it's about Ben Sisko.
"Tuvix" and its Trolley problem are more grey and muddled than "In a Pale Moonlight". It involves a smaller group of people (Tuvok and Neelix) who are beloved as a member of an extended family. The "greater good" amounts to a bare majority, 2 versus 1. Again, the fewer people in the majority, the more grey the answers are. The closer the relationship to the potential victims, the more grey it is. The deck isn't "stacked too far to one side", it's balanced in such a way as to cause strife and division, unlike "In a Pale Moonlight". The decision SHOULD be agonizing, and it clearly was. This is not a decision that any of the characters state that "they would do again in a heartbeat", although we really aren't privy to what their thoughts were afterwards. I find "Tuvix" to be more thought-provoking than "In the Pale Moonlight", precisely because the ethical dilemma is more jarring and less clear-cut, but it is less compelling because it isn't about someone as interesting as Ben Sisko.
Yeah, "In The Pale Moonlight" is about Sisko and HIS dilemma on the issue. It's about how far he's willing to give up on his morals to save the Federation.
The Trolley problem isn't a litmus test. It's not designed to determine "who is what" of anything. It simply frames the ethical problems of unjustly penalizing one or more individuals to positively impact the outcome of another more numerous set of individuals.
"In the Pale Moonlight" involves much more than just a Trolley problem. It is a character study of an individual, and the lengths he would go to ensure the safety of an extended community. In the case of a Pale Moonlight, the stakes are weighted HEAVILY more toward the multiple individuals, because the death of one Romulan Senator (who already is "an enemy" of the Federation, despite being reluctant allies) will manipulate the Romulans to assist in the war, which will determine the fate of all races and governments in the Alpha Quadrant. Sisko also tried to use deceptive means first, and he wasn't the direct agent of the actual killing (although he assumed responsibility because of his moral character). But despite his moral objections and guilty conscience, he states very plainly that he would do it all again in a heartbeat.
But this is NOT agonizing for the viewer. As guilty as Sisko may feel, his actions are entirely justified by the observers. He is trying to do the most good, by deceiving and ultimately eliminating a villain who is in his way. You won't find many people who would say "Oh, but you should not deceive/assassinate that poor innocent Romulan." The ends sometimes do justify the means, and television viewers recognize this difference. "In the Pale Moonlight" isn't interesting because of its Trolley problem (which, when it comes to the death of the individual, is downplayed to Act 5, after the climax), it's interesting because it's about Ben Sisko.
"Tuvix" and its Trolley problem are more grey and muddled than "In a Pale Moonlight". It involves a smaller group of people (Tuvok and Neelix) who are beloved as a member of an extended family. The "greater good" amounts to a bare majority, 2 versus 1. Again, the fewer people in the majority, the more grey the answers are. The closer the relationship to the potential victims, the more grey it is. The deck isn't "stacked too far to one side", it's balanced in such a way as to cause strife and division, unlike "In a Pale Moonlight". The decision SHOULD be agonizing, and it clearly was. This is not a decision that any of the characters state that "they would do again in a heartbeat", although we really aren't privy to what their thoughts were afterwards. I find "Tuvix" to be more thought-provoking than "In the Pale Moonlight", precisely because the ethical dilemma is more jarring and less clear-cut, but it is less compelling because it isn't about someone as interesting as Ben Sisko.
Yeah, "In The Pale Moonlight" is about Sisko and HIS dilemma on the issue. It's about how far he's willing to give up on his morals to save the Federation.
That was kinda my point in bringing it up. Hahnsoo said there are no unsuccessful trolley problems, and that's my Star Trek example of one. That episode is not about the problem itself because it is so one-sided pretty much no one is going to say Sisko was wrong (except in the sense that it could have backfired). The episode works because it's all about Sisko accepting what he has done and why it needed to be done. If the episode tried to play up the "what would you do!?" question, the episode would have failed.
Tuvix is very much about the problem, and like the "In the Pale Moonlight" situation, the Trolley problem is weighted to one side making it a terrible moral dilemma. It's no where near as extreme as Sisko's problem, but I'm not sure how many people are going to walk away from Tuvix thinking Janeway and crew made the right call. I feel that the pleading for his life, the resurrection of the dead, and the selfishness of the crew really overshadow the simple one life vs. two that's the heart of the trolley problem.
I suppose what I am saying is, that in terms of episodes of Trek that make you think about the right and wrong of a situation. "Tuvix" is pretty low on the list, but if handled better would have been much higher.
Posts
In the first season she actually had points where she was useful. But those first season episodes are dubious.
Ahh, so the problem is you either didn't watch the episode closely at all or don't actually know what the Trolley Problem is, despite my linking it.
There is no way in which the Tuvix episode is not a Trolley Problem. It's about choosing whether 2 people live or one person lives. If you say "But Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, so it doesn't count", you are again wrong since as Hahnsoo1 points out just above you, that's also a formulation of the trolley problem. The episode is designed to be one. It's fucking shoe-horned into being one.
No, he is still correct. Your counter-argument is based on the fact that there is no argument to be made at all. You are trying to say that it's a stupid debate just like all these other stupid internet debates that exist, and none of those other debates make the topic worthy of debate.
And the only way this works is if you either:
a) don't think there's more then one answer to the Trolly Problem
b) don't think it's actually a Trolley Problem (ie - it's not a meaningful argument in the first place)
We all thought it was a), since b) seemed absurd. But since you've claimed it's b) well, you are still wrong, just for different reasons. Now it seems you are refusing to believe there's another answer to the dilemma because you refuse to even admit it's a dilemma.
There's no right answer, even within the context of Voyager and Star Trek. They've waffled on both sides of the decision (Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?), depending on the context and episode. :-P
Tuvix is more like if someone, possibly someone with horns and goat-legs, told you that if you shoot this perfectly nice man you met a couple weeks ago, who's pleading for his life, in the face, he'll bring your two dead friends back to life. Only on a very superficial level is that choosing who lives and who dies. It really is much more than that, and much darker morally to pick the 2 over 1.
Or to put it another way it's a more twisted version of pushing the one fat man in front of the train to save two others that would be hit by it. It's more akin to murder than simply throwing a switch, but there is still a lot of grey to argue over. Tuvix pushes it farther, and imo goes too far into the black preventing it from being a good morality problem.
Their deceased status is irrelevant if it can be reversed. Nothing you've said here changes the fundamental facts:
Janeway has a choice. She can push the button which kills Tuvix and Neelix and Tuvok are alive, or she doesn't and Tuvix is alive and Neelix and Tuvok are dead.
It's straight up Trolley Problem. Act or don't, differing numbers of people are dead as an end result of the two possible scenarios.
It's reworded in different contexts based on how you want to draw the line. The Fat Man (which you pointed out) is a Trolley problem, too. It's a matter of degrees and context, and people make different decisions based on the context and their own background to justify the answer. This is why it's an ethical dilemma.
It's not like saying that "It's a Trolley problem" means we are saying "So the answer is therefore this..." In fact, stating that it's a Trolley problem is the opposite; it means that there is no right answer to it. Even now, you will get a varying number of people who will say "Yes, I will pull the switch" based on rewording the problem, and it's almost never 100% one way or the other.
You may personally believe it to be more morally unjust to choose the two over one. This isn't based on "truth" or "absolutes", but on your own background and how you interpret the context of the situation. The problem gets more grey and muddled the closer you are to the subjects affected by the decision (The Mother variant: "Would you kill your mother to save multiple strangers?") and the fewer people on the "multiple people" side of the balance ("Would you kill a person who is going to murder millions of people someday? Maybe you would." "Would you kill someone to prevent him from killing two strangers? Maybe not."). It also is more muddled when you formulate it as "one person saves multiple people by his death or vice versa" than "You must choose who dies!" (it may sound like the same problem, but surveys have shown that it is not).
EDIT: This is totally going on my "Circle of Life: Star Trek PA Forums" thingy, whenever I get around to making it.
Additional context matters. Beyond the dark magic aspect their motivation for killing Tuvix is purely selfish. They want Tuvok back, and for some bizarre reason Neelix. They go against their own Federation code of ethics simply to bring their friends back. The Trolley problem is based on cold numbers. You can still see it that way, but the crew didn't, which is why they look away in shame when it happens.
Yeah they were totally going for a trolley problem, but they muck it up too much for it to be a successful one.
Edit: I should add this isn't entirely the writer's faults and that they are stupid dumbshits. You don't get into specifics with the trolley problem for good reason. If the two are old ladies, and the one is an attractive 18 year-old super genius, the thought experiment isn't going to require a lot of thought for the majority of people. Tuvix simply failed to boil the problem down far enough to it's base elements to be effective.
Maybe you feel that your answer to the Trolley hitting 1 man by flipping a switch to save 5 men is different from the problem posed by Tuvix. This is fine. The context is what matters, as you said. Changing the context may change your personal answer. Everyone has a different answer.
Also, right now, you are adding additional details to the episode that don't exist: "possibly someone with horns and goat-legs, told you that if you shoot this perfectly nice man you met a couple weeks ago, who's pleading for his life, in the face, he'll bring your two dead friends back to life." Jesus, man. You are literally adding religious imagery involving the devil, and you are invoking imagery of cold-blooded point-blank murder shots to the problem. Also, I ask you what "Federation Code of Ethics" would say "You should absolutely not unfuse two lifeforms from an amalgamation of multiple lifeforms" or "You should not revert transporter accidents".
Consider this: would you choose the life of your lover or best friend over the life of 10 random strangers? I don't think anyone would blame you for not being able to sacrifice someone you were so intimate with. Intimacy makes things much fuzzier.
Well that too, but Braga has actually written good stuff (on occasion) and I have been given the (possibly mistaken) impression that a lot of the "just plain awful" writing was Rick "Anti-taste" Berman. The thing is, Braga has the attention span of a gnat, and anytime he comes up with something that has potential to be interesting it is dropped after 5 episodes (or five MINUTES) in favor of something else. I like to call it "Jeph Loeb Syndrome," in honor of the man who can't stop retconning his own retcons.
Agreed. I find those choice difficult in video games, so I couldn't imagine having to make it as a REAL decision.
Mass Effect: Bring Down the Sky spoilers
Braga does his best work co-writing with Moore. They were partners for years until Voyager IIRC. Berman & Braga bring out the worst in each other, as well. Without Berman Braga is a decent showrunner (re: Threshold tv series).
Loeb's retcons are the least of his flaws now. His writing abilities flatlined after his son died and never recovered. Now he's the head of Marvel's television division.
Would you consider "In the Pale Moonlight" to be the same? The episode really doesn't. Sisko struggles with the choices he's made, feels terrible about it, but ultimately accepts it as something that needed to be done. Not because it was really okay, but because of the sheer scale involved. He sees it as saving billions of lives, the entire alpha quadrant. Against that, the life a Romulan Senator, a criminal, and the conscience of one starfleet officer were acceptable losses. The episode nor it's fans/detractors don't consider Sisko's choice to actually be wrong; the debate is always whether such an episode should exist in Trek at all. I don't think I've ever seen anyone try to say Sisko made the wrong call. Tuvix is of a similar nature just not as extreme and one-sided (and thus there are some who will defend it). The circumstances involve don't make for any compelling moral dilemma, as the deck is stacked too far to one side. The trolley of "In the Pale Moonlight" would only determine is who are the uncompromising Rorschachs, which if that's all your trolley problem is going for, it'd consider it a failure and a waste of time. Tuvix may not be that far, but far enough that it fails to be thought provoking. Thus, making the crew of Voyager look like a bunch of selfish possibly murderous asses.
Also I can't think of any other really comparable transporter accidents. Scotty did it to cheat death, but he didn't die. The Thomas Riker problem wasn't reversed though, and when Picard and the others were de-aged, I believe they had the choice to reverse it. When I said Federation Code of Ethics, I meant they don't seem to be okay with taking measures to bring back the dead like this, as they certainly would have the tech to do so all the time if it was acceptable. Not to mention they'd probably totally consider it murder, what with the prime directive frequently being crazy and pro-genicide.
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Beard
The Federation needn't know about Tuvix. What happens in the Delta Quadrant, stays in the Delta Quadrant.
Guess that also explains Janeway's promotion to Admiral.
She got her ship home with some cool future-tech. Promotions for some, posthumous commendations for others.
"In the Pale Moonlight" involves much more than just a Trolley problem. It is a character study of an individual, and the lengths he would go to ensure the safety of an extended community. In the case of a Pale Moonlight, the stakes are weighted HEAVILY more toward the multiple individuals, because the death of one Romulan Senator (who already is "an enemy" of the Federation, despite being reluctant allies) will manipulate the Romulans to assist in the war, which will determine the fate of all races and governments in the Alpha Quadrant. Sisko also tried to use deceptive means first, and he wasn't the direct agent of the actual killing (although he assumed responsibility because of his moral character). But despite his moral objections and guilty conscience, he states very plainly that he would do it all again in a heartbeat.
But this is NOT agonizing for the viewer. As guilty as Sisko may feel, his actions are entirely justified by the observers. He is trying to do the most good, by deceiving and ultimately eliminating a villain who is in his way. You won't find many people who would say "Oh, but you should not deceive/assassinate that poor innocent Romulan." The ends sometimes do justify the means, and television viewers recognize this difference. "In the Pale Moonlight" isn't interesting because of its Trolley problem (which, when it comes to the death of the individual, is downplayed to Act 5, after the climax), it's interesting because it's about Ben Sisko.
"Tuvix" and its Trolley problem are more grey and muddled than "In a Pale Moonlight". It involves a smaller group of people (Tuvok and Neelix) who are beloved as a member of an extended family. The "greater good" amounts to a bare majority, 2 versus 1. Again, the fewer people in the majority, the more grey the answers are. The closer the relationship to the potential victims, the more grey it is. The deck isn't "stacked too far to one side", it's balanced in such a way as to cause strife and division, unlike "In a Pale Moonlight". The decision SHOULD be agonizing, and it clearly was. This is not a decision that any of the characters state that "they would do again in a heartbeat", although we really aren't privy to what their thoughts were afterwards. I find "Tuvix" to be more thought-provoking than "In the Pale Moonlight", precisely because the ethical dilemma is more jarring and less clear-cut, but it is less compelling because it isn't about someone as interesting as Ben Sisko.
There is no formulation of the Trolley problem that involves raising the dead. The problem is that you didn't read the Trolley problem page you're so proud of having linked to. I guess you should. Here, I'll be nice and link it for you again:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem
You'll notice perhaps that the formulations of the problem all have something in common: you have to decide who gets to live and die. Your action means some people die and your inaction means other people die. In this episode Janeway has no such decision to make. Neelix and Tuvok are already dead, and Janeway didn't kill them. A transporter accident "made" the decision already at the beginning of the episode. Janeway's inaction means no one else has to die.
Killing one to save the lives of two is a trolley problem. Killing one to raise two from the dead is not. And killing one to raise two of your friends from the dead is just fucked up levels of immoral.
To put that last point in the trolley framework you so enjoy, if you do end up reading the Trolley problem page you'll get to one called "the mother", which asks "would you kill one to save five if the one you had to kill was your mother". This episode, if it were a trolley problem, would be the opposite one, asking "would you kill five to save your mother", and answering it with an emphatic "yes". Now there's a reason that scenario is not in the list of trolley problems: it's because it's not an actual moral dilemma. It's just straight up immorality and selfishness. Which, to be fair, a lot of people would give into. I myself don't know what I'd do if I ever were in this situation, and I hope I never am. But giving into it doesn't make it right, nor does it make it a moral dilemma. And in the context of Star Trek, it shouldn't be an issue at all since Roddenberry Humans are supposed to have evolved beyond that.
The problem here is that you misread a critical part of my post before replying. I bolded the crucial part. Please read it more closely before replying again, and notice how it has exactly jack shit to do with the trolley problem.
"The Federation gone, Riker's beard is everywhere."
hahaha that really is the best page.
"The federation is gone, Riker's beard is everywhere!"
They should have made it so that, in the mirror universe, everyone had a beard. Even the women.
This is your personal answer, based on your personal moral compass. You think it's immoral, and it's based on the context of the situation and your own background. I am asking you to recognize that if you were to present this problem, or a similar problem among a cohort of your peers, that the percent who would make each side of the binary decision is likely to be non-zero.
In the situation where one is asked to smother their own baby in order to save themselves and a village, it's around 50% (plus or minus a wide margin, but it hovers near 50%), for example.
There is no morally right or wrong answer in this. It will be morally wrong either way because someone is going to be harmed by your agency. The context and justification from one's own background are the only things that make people decide one way or another, and even then, they probably would second-guess those decisions. On the example from Radiolab, Jad Abumrad said that he would smother his own baby, when talking about the MASH finale. There will be other babies, and everyone else would live. Months later, when he had a child of his own, he had changed his mind and said he cannot do it.
This is incorrect. It's an actual moral dilemma, and people would lump that into the Trolley problem, which is why it exists on the same wikipedia page and more importantly, on any relevant discussion of such ethics. It's not morally just to kill 5 people for your own mother any more than it is to kill your mother for the benefit of 5 strangers. In either case, someone is being harmed by your agency. Or to put it another way, you won't have people say 100% of the time that they would save their mother. They will probably joke and say "It depends on the mother", but this is entirely true. You need that context to make the decision.
You have a very different definition of an ethical/moral dilemma than most people who normally discuss such matters. Maybe just leave it at that instead of telling everyone who disagrees with you that they are morally wrong by extension of your own personal moral compass (which is the hostility that I'm getting... if it is wrong, maybe take care to clarify it as such?).
Eh? EH?
Mind you, that's not saying much in this case.
Airy Kim (as a cloud) and Harey Kim (as a rabbit).
That's got to be Harry Kim from the Mirror Universe. :twisted:
Beards are cool, and by association they make other things cool, but their power is not so great as to make a block of wood into a real boy.
Hey I thought only wookieepedia had one of these pages
I guess all scifi fandoms are weird
Edit: I'm starting to think we need a photoshop thread just with Vary(ations) Kim.
I know, he's not actually a Kim, but he is a fat little piggie.
Pretty much. The bigger or more popular a franchise is the weirder the fandom becomes. There are exceptions sometimes with cult fandoms, they can get weird as well.
Yeah, "In The Pale Moonlight" is about Sisko and HIS dilemma on the issue. It's about how far he's willing to give up on his morals to save the Federation.
That was kinda my point in bringing it up. Hahnsoo said there are no unsuccessful trolley problems, and that's my Star Trek example of one. That episode is not about the problem itself because it is so one-sided pretty much no one is going to say Sisko was wrong (except in the sense that it could have backfired). The episode works because it's all about Sisko accepting what he has done and why it needed to be done. If the episode tried to play up the "what would you do!?" question, the episode would have failed.
Tuvix is very much about the problem, and like the "In the Pale Moonlight" situation, the Trolley problem is weighted to one side making it a terrible moral dilemma. It's no where near as extreme as Sisko's problem, but I'm not sure how many people are going to walk away from Tuvix thinking Janeway and crew made the right call. I feel that the pleading for his life, the resurrection of the dead, and the selfishness of the crew really overshadow the simple one life vs. two that's the heart of the trolley problem.
I suppose what I am saying is, that in terms of episodes of Trek that make you think about the right and wrong of a situation. "Tuvix" is pretty low on the list, but if handled better would have been much higher.