The Train Track Dilemma
Rea,
Yesterday we were watching that SNL sketch about the “Trolley” problem. That’s actually a famous thought experiment that helps people think about the hardest kinds of choices we face.
A thought experiment is like a puzzle used to explore ideas by imagining a situation that might not happen in real life, but helps us understand important concepts. The best thought experiments reveal that some decisions aren’t simply between right and wrong—they’re between different kinds of right, or different kinds of wrong.
In 1967, a philosopher named Philippa Foot created this scenario that has made people think deeply about impossible choices. She described a runaway trolley heading toward five people who can’t escape the tracks. You’re standing by a lever that can switch the trolley to a different track. The problem? There’s one person on that other track. Do you pull the lever, saving five but causing one death? Or do you do nothing, letting five die but keeping your hands “clean”?
What makes this problem so powerful is that both choices feel wrong in some way. Pull the lever, and you’ve actively caused someone’s death. Don’t pull it, and you’ve allowed five deaths you could have prevented.
This thought experiment quickly spread beyond philosophy classrooms. Scientists at MIT created the “Moral Machine” experiment that presented similar dilemmas to over 50,000 people across 42 countries. They found that about 90% of people choose to divert the trolley to save more lives, but the percentage changes depending on who is on the tracks and which culture you ask.
The trolley problem has real-world applications too. Engineers programming self-driving cars face similar questions: If a crash is unavoidable, how should the car choose who to protect? Mercedes-Benz for example said their cars would prioritize saving the passengers.
What started as a thought experiment now helps people design technology that makes life-or-death decisions. It reminds us that some problems don’t have perfect solutions—just trade-offs.
These dilemmas are like balancing scales where different values—like protecting many lives versus not causing direct harm—sit on opposite sides. There’s no way to make both sides perfectly equal. The important part isn’t finding the “right” answer, but thinking carefully about what values matter most in each situation.
What do you think? If you were standing at that switch, what would you choose to do, and why?
Love, Abba
