List of Ethical Dilemmas and Thought Experiments, page 2:
16. Visiting an impoverished nation while on vacation, you come across a small child and witness them steal something from a wealthy tourist. Do you ignore it? Lecture the child privately? Chase them down? What would Jesus do?
17. You have proof your Father is guilty of sexual assault. Currently, you depend on him for financial support. Do you report the crime?
18. A strange child asks you if you believe in Santa Clause. Do you have a moral obligation to lie?
19. You are being sexually assaulted and although you have a gun, the attacker does not seem phased and continues. You know the location well and police will arrive any minute and be able to help. Do you kill the attacker? Does it matter if you know them to have a tragic background that inevitably made them unable to stop becoming the monster you see before you?
20. A rare quantum anomaly occurs and someone is born who can miraculously heal hundreds of ill children a day. However, they are unable to do this unless they physically assault you on a daily basis. Do you let this occur? Would society be justified in allowing it to happen even if you objected?
21. With a background in evolutionary biology, you have been assigned with the important task of categorizing new species on the planet Norrichuck. You spot two species that both look beautiful, but you realize one is a predator and the other is the prey. If the prey is in danger, should you come to its defense? If not, why?
22. The newest scientific breakthrough is about to occur. A machine will inward upon itself and the energies involved will create a portal into the past. Billions of dollars have went into the project, and a mother believes her child is stuck in the machine. While her claim is unlikely, the child would be sent with a team of scientists were her claim true. Presuming they decide to help him, he can return in ten years. Should they stop the machine? What if they knew the child was in there?
23. Society has developed a strange custom where individuals play the lottery in unique ways. With growing food shortages and widespread poverty, people are putting tickets into a machine. The more tickets one places in the machine, the more likely they are to win. However, as tickets are added to the machine, a higher percentage of the population is killed. They are the "soylent green" prize that the winner receives. Most people who do not win will eventually die of starvation. How many tickets should one put in the lottery, if any?
24. You have discovered that you alone have the ability to travel through time. For simplicities sake, there is only one "real" time-line. You can experience time periods where Shakespeare was a fisherman, but whatever time period you are currently participating in has "become" the real world. Many injustices have occurred throughout history. Should you stop them? Why or why not? And does any suffering entailed by your changes still matter if you change the world an additional time?
25. A tree falls in the forest and falls on a young Hitler. Do you help him?
26. You have a banana, but you don't like bananas. There is a monkey who likes bananas and a crocodile that likes monkeys but not bananas. The crocodile appears to be quite desperate for food as there are Arby's boxes floating around. Do you save the monkey then let him go with the banana, knowing you are costing the crocodile a meal? Alternatively, do you save the monkey, give him the banana, then throw him to the crocodile? Or do you do something else entirely?
27. It turns out all this time, every step you take reaches a microscopic civilization under the earth, one of even greater sophisticated than our own. They live in peace and have nice foliage. Do you kill yourself or continue on your evil path of destruction? Or is it evil at all? Ponder that.
28. There is a spider on the neck of someone you care about. You remove it, and they ask what you were doing. They are terrified of spiders and would likely become rather scared and mortified. Do you tell the truth?
29. You see Glenn Beck swimming in the ocean, apparently with his boat capsized. There is a high shark population, but they are usually quite calm. Do you help him? Do you leave him there? Do you "accidentally" drop a bucket of bloody fish guts into the water and pretend you couldn't hear because you were listening to your favorite Lady Gaga song (hopefully you fall into the water too, if that's the case). What would you do?
30. On vacation, you're mistaken for a famous celebrity. This happens all the time, but now you have the opportunity to play an exciting game of "table tennis" with a beautiful young women. Knowing she only wants to play "table tennis" because she thinks you're a celebrity, can you justify lying to her? Why or why not? If not, could the law justify charging you with a sex-crime because she consented to relations with who she thought was the celebrity rather than you?
1 comments:
I'll Eat the Banana, and watch the crocodile eat the monkey...
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