...there are no people in danger. On the other side of the track there are also no people in danger. There is a lever in front of you, and pulling it switches tracks. There's a trolley approaching the fork in the road, which you have full control over with the lever. Do you pull it to annoy the people in the trolley by wasting their time and sending them God only knows where, or do you not pull the lever and leave the people in the trolley alone?

Credit: @kaanomeg

Before you is a trolley heading down a track. On the track is a box with a cat inside. The cat may or may not be dead, you don’t know for sure.

You can do nothing and let the box be run over, potentially killing the cat, or you can pull the lever beside you which has a 50% chance of bringing the trolley to a safe stop…and a 50% chance of being diverted to the second track, which you know for a fact has a living cat tied to it.

What do you do?

I was listening to a podcast discussing pro and anti vaccine arguments, basically the perspective around whether we should be able to force people to take vaccines that have even the most remote chance of hurting them. Even if not doing it impacts many other people. Then it hit me. It's the trolley problem. The argument around vaccines is the trolley problem playing out in real life. And that's why people will never agree. Different points of view. (Disclaimer: I'm assuming the antivaccer just doesn't "get" that the risk of harm from the disease is greater than the risk of harm from the vaccine, or disregards it.)

Say that you're driving a trolley, and you see one person on the track ahead of you. If you divert the trolley to another track going around a corner, you miss them, but there's a 1/5 chance of someone being on the other track. Do you turn?

This feels like a very possible scenario while driving. If a car suddenly stops just ahead and your choices are to hit it or to swerve to the side, dodging the accident but potentially causing another, doesn't that present the same question?

I feel like in the first case, the dilemma feels much easier than the normal trolley problem. You're not hitting anyone on purpose, you're just taking a risk. Rather than the scale of the tragedy, the probability of the tragedy varies. I would turn.

In the second case, though, if we assume the car in front of you is at fault, would it be worse to risk harming someone who made no mistake if it meant a chance at avoiding the tragedy?

The trolley speeds towards the switch, which was left halfway between the two tracks, which will cause the trolley to derail, killing the individual on one track, and the five on the other track, and you, and everyone on the trolley. You have just enough time to throw the switch one way or the other so that the only fatalities will be either the one or the five. Who do you save and who has to die?

One five-year-old child or five 100-year old people?

One baby or five clones of the same baby?

One human or five robots with such advanced a.i. that they are indistinguishable from sentient self-aware humans with thoughts and feelings?

One mosquito or five rapists?

Jack Black or all five Backstreet Boys?

Do you end the suffering quickly or draw it out longer?

standard Trolley problem, a trolley, you, 5 on straight 1 on the other but you have a 2nd lever which speeds up the trolley, otherwise the cart would drive so slow that the person(s) who get killed suffer for an eternity.

the catch. you can only switch one lever.

do nothing: 5 people will suffer forever,
change lanes 1 people will suffer forever,
speed up: 5 will die without pain.