Alex St-John
Jul 27, 2017 · 1 min read

IF I were the fat man [in this case no different from the lever itself] I WOULD jump because what is a lever (assuming it is one which was effectively built for that purpose) than to be used for what it was built for. I mean, the fat man (assuming he were heavy enough) would have been there for the sole purpose (operational) of observing „an imminent event resulting in the demise of its own kind“. Which also means that those five people are also arguably “levers” out of order. The Confusian way I suppose would be equivalent to the utilitarianist way of taking action. The daoist, on the other hand, I imagine* is NOT to do anything coercively. So let the course of action (the trolley bus) BE.

*mind you, I’m only halfway through reading „a philosophical translation of Daodejing —Making this life significant“ by R.T. Ames & D.L. Hall, which I highly recommend.

    Alex St-John

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