DescriptionFinal Paper
Specifics: about 5 pages (not more than 6 full pages), double spaced, 12-point normal font,
regular margins, pages numbered, your name on the front page.
Before writing, read How to Write a Philosophy Paper:
http://www.sfu.ca/philosophy/resources/writing.html
Some things to focus on:
Have a clear thesis that you argue for.
Explain and use arguments, reasons, examples, etc. to support your view.
You should also consider possible objections and defend your view against them.
Write clearly.
Make the structure of your paper clear to your reader.
Make sure all of your claims are justified.
You can use ‘I’ must you must support your claims with reasons, not just opinions.
Plagiarism Policy: If you plagiarize by including material that is not in your own words
without quotation marks and a source, you will fail the assignment, it will be reported and
there may be other penalties. This includes using ChatGPT. If something is not your own
idea, include a citation saying where you found it. Cite in MLA, Chicago, or APA style (see
online guides or ask a librarian, TA, or me if you need help).
Given that grades need to be submitted shortly after papers are due, the following
Late Policy will apply:
If paper is late, but less than 24 hours late: -10%
24-48 hours late: -25%
48-72 hours late: -50%
72 or more: -100%
Final Paper Prompts
You may also choose your own paper topic. If you choose to do so you must have it OK’d
by me or your TA no later than Wednesday March 8.
1. It seems that people can change without going out of existence. For example, your
hair might be longer today than it was last month, but you still exist. Is this argument
correct? Justify. If yes, what sorts of changes can people persist through? What sorts
of changes would lead a person to go out of existence. Justify your arguments by
considering at least two views of the mind or personal identity.
2. Drones are used in contemporary warfare to remotely kill. Robot soldiers that can
kill autonomously are currently being developed. Is the use of drones or other
robotic devices to kill ever ethical? Is there a difference between using drones/robots
to kill and human soldiers killing? Use one or more ethical theories to argue for your
view.
3. Suppose Pat agreed to take care of your plants while you were out of town. Instead
of caring for them, Pat dumps poison on the plants and they die. Is Pat responsible?
Justify your conclusion based on views of freedom, determinism, and moral
responsibility. Next, suppose Pat agreed to water your plants while you were out of
town, Pat forgot to, and your plants died. Is Pat responsible for your plant’s death?
Justify your conclusions by considering the potential difference between action and
inaction as well as views of freedom, determinism and moral responsibility.
Euthyphro
EUQUFRWN
PLATO
PLATWN
euthyphrO
EUQUFRWN
PLATO
PLATWN
Translated by Cathal Woods and Ryan Pack
2007
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No
Derivative Works 3.0 License. To view a copy of this license, visit
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative
Commons, 171 Second Street, Suite 300, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.
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Euthyphro (Euth): What new thing has happened, Socrates, that
you have abandoned your stomping grounds in the Lyceum* and are now
spending your time here, around the porch of the king*? For surely you
too are not involved in some suit before the king*, as I am.
Socrates (So): The Athenians don’t just call it a suit, Euthyphro, but
a public indictment.*
Euth: What do you mean? Someone has indicted you, I suppose,
since I certainly wouldn’t condemn you of the opposite, you indicting
someone else.
So: Certainly not.
Euth: So someone else is indicting you?
So: Absolutely.
Euth: Who is this person?
So: I don’t know the man very well myself, Euthyphro; I think he is
a young and unknown person. Anyway, I believe they call him Meletos.
He is from the Pitthean deme*, if you know of a Meletos from Pitthos with
straight hair, not much of a beard, but with a hooked nose.
Euth: I don’t know him, Socrates. But what charge has he indicted
you on?
So: On what charge? It’s no minor charge, I think, as it’s no small
thing for a young man to be knowledgeable about so important an issue.
For he, he says, knows how the young are corrupted and who their
corruptors are. He’s probably somebody wise, and having seen how I in
my ignorance corrupt the people of his generation, he is coming to tattle
on me to the city, as though it were his mother. And he alone seems to me
to be starting out in politics correctly, because the correct way is to first
pay attention to how our young people will be the best possible, just as a
good farmer probably cares first for his young plants, and after this to the
others as well. And so Meletos too is presumably first rooting out us who
corrupt the sprouting young people, as he puts it. Then after this it’s clear
that, having turned his attention to the older people, he will become a
source of many great goods for the city, as is likely to happen to someone
who starts off in this way.
Euth: I wish it were so, Socrates, but I’m afraid that the opposite
might happen. Because it seems to me that by trying to wrong you he is
starting out by recklessly harming the hearth of the city. And tell me, just
what does he say you’re doing to corrupt the young?
So: Strange things, you marvelous man, at least to hear him describe
them, since he says I am a maker of gods, and because I make novel gods
and do not acknowledge the old ones, he indicts me for their sake, he says.
Euth: I understand, Socrates. It’s because you say the divine sign*
comes to you occasionally. He has lodged this indictment because of your
innovative religious ideas. And so he is obviously coming to the court
intending to slander you, knowing that such things are easily
misrepresented to the many. Indeed even in my case, whenever I say
something in the assembly about religious matters, foretelling the future
for them, they ridicule me as a madman, and yet I said nothing that was
not true in what I foretold. Even so, they envy all of us who are like this.
We should think nothing of them but fight them on their own ground.
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So: But my dear Euthyphro, being ridiculed is probably no big deal;
indeed it seems to me that it doesn’t matter much to the Athenians if they
think someone is wise, so long as he not capable of teaching his wisdom.
They become outraged with anyone they suspect of also trying to shape
others in some way, whether because they are envious, as you claim, or for
some other reason.
Euth: Which is why I have no great desire to have it put to the test,
how they feel about me.
So: It’s probably because you seem to rarely make yourself available
and appear unwilling to teach your wisdom, whereas I fear that, because
of my love of people, I strike them as someone who is bursting to talk to
everybody, and not just without demanding payment, but would even be
glad to compensate anyone who cared to listen to me. So as I was saying, if
they intend to laugh at me, as you said happened to you, there would be
nothing unpleasant about spending time in court playing around and
laughing. But if they are going to be serious, it’s unclear at present how
things will turn out, except to you prophets.
Euth: Well, it will probably be nothing, Socrates, and you will fight
your case satisfactorily, as I think I will fight mine, too.
So: What exactly is your suit, Euthyphro? Are you defending or
prosecuting it?
Euth: I am prosecuting.
So: Whom?
Euth: A man whom by pursuing I will again appear crazy.
So: But why? You’re pursuing someone who flies?
Euth: He is long way from flying. As a matter of fact he happens to
be well advanced in years.
So: Who is he?
Euth: My father.
So: Your father, you fantastic fellow?!
Euth: Absolutely.
So: But what is the charge, and what are the circumstances?
Euth: Murder, Socrates.
So: Heracles! I think most people wouldn’t know how to act
properly in such a case, since I don’t think that just anyone could take care
of this correctly, but only someone, I suspect, who has progressed a long
way in wisdom.
Euth: By Zeus, a long way indeed, Socrates.
So: Surely the person killed by your father is one of your relatives?
It must be, since you would not prosecute him for murder on behalf of a
stranger.
Euth: It’s ridiculous, Socrates, that you think that it makes a
difference whether the man killed is a stranger or a relative, and don’t
think it is necessary to watch only for this, whether the killer killed legally
or not, and if it was legal, to let him go, and if not, to prosecute him, if the
killer, that is, shares one’s hearth and eats at the same table. Because the
pollution is the same if you are aware that you share the guilt and do not
both purify yourself and prosecute him in law.
The victim, as a matter of fact, was a certain laborer of mine, and
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when we were farming in Naxos he was employed by us there. Drunk and
having been provoked by another one of our household, he slit this man’s
throat. So my father bound his feet and hands, threw him into some ditch
and sent a man here to inquire of the interpreter of religious law about
what should be done. But during that time he paid no attention to the
bound man and neglected him as a murderer and thought nothing of it if
he died too, which is in fact what happened, since he died of hunger and
cold and his bonds before the messenger returned from the interpreter.
That’s why both my father and my other relatives are angry, because I
am prosecuting my father on behalf of a murderer, when he didn’t kill
him, they say, or if he did in fact kill him, well, since the man he killed was
a murderer, one should not be concerned about such people—because,
they say, it’s unholy for a son to prosecute his father for murder, not really
knowing, Socrates, how the religious law stands with respect to holiness
and unholiness.
So: But by Zeus, do you, Euthyphro, think you have such accurate
knowledge about how the religious laws stand, about both piety and
impiety, that with these things having taken place in the way you describe,
you are not afraid that, prosecuting your father, you might be committing
another impiety in doing so?
Euth: I would be of no use, Socrates, and neither would Euthyphro
be better than the majority of men, if I did not have accurate knowledge of
all such matters.
So: Then it would be excellent for me to become a student of yours,
marvelous Euthyphro, and prior to this dispute with Meletos I will
challenge him in this very way, saying that while even in the past I used to
make knowledge of religious law my top priority, now, because he says I
err by judging rashly and innovating with respect to the religious laws, I
have also become your student. “And,” I would say, “if you agree, Meletos,
that Euthyphro is wise in such matters, then believe that I too worship
properly and do not charge me. If not, see about bringing a charge against
him, my teacher, rather than me, since he corrupts the elderly—me and his
father—by teaching me and by rebuking and chastising him.” And if he is
not convinced by me and doesn’t withdraw the charge or indict you in my
place, shouldn’t I say the exact same thing in court as I said in challenging
him?
Euth: Yes by Zeus, Socrates. If he tried to indict me I think I would
uncover in what way he is unsound and we would have found that the
discussion in court would have been about him long before it was about
me.
So: And indeed, my dear Euthyphro, I recognize this and want to
become a student of yours, seeing how practically everyone else and
Meletos himself pretends not to notice you, but he sees through me so
clearly and easily that he indicts me for impiety. So now, by Zeus, explain
to me what you were just now affirming to know clearly: what sort of
thing do you say holiness is, and unholiness, with respect to both murder
and everything else? Or isn’t the pious the same as itself in every action,
and the impious in turn is the complete opposite of the pious but the same
as itself, and everything that in fact turns out to be impious has a single
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form with respect to its impiousness?
Euth: It certainly is, Socrates.
So: So tell me, what do you say the pious is, and what is the
impious?
Euth: Well now, I claim that the pious is what I am doing now,
prosecuting someone who is guilty of wrongdoing, either of murder or
temple robbery or anything else of the sort, whether it happens to be one’s
father or mother or whoever else, and the impious is failing to prosecute.
For observe, Socrates, how great a proof I will give you that this is how the
law stands, one I have already given to others as well, which shows such
actions to be correct—not yielding to impious people, that is, no matter
who they happen to be. Because these very people also happen to worship
Zeus as the best and most just of the gods, and agree that he put his own
father in bonds because he unjustly swallowed his sons, and the father too
castrated his own father for other similar reasons.* Yet they are sore at me
because I am prosecuting my father for his injustice. And so they say
opposite things about the gods and me.
So: Maybe this, Euthyphro, is why I am being prosecuted for this
crime, that whenever someone says such things about the gods, for some
reason I find them hard to accept? On account of which, I suppose,
someone will claim I misbehave. So now if you also, with your expertise in
such matters, share these beliefs, it’s surely necessary, I suppose, that we
too must agree, for else what will we say, those of us, that is, who admit
openly that we know nothing about these matters? But by the god of
friendship tell me, do you truly believe these things happened like this?
Euth: These and still more amazing things, Socrates, that the many
are unaware of.
So: And do you believe there is really a war amongst the gods, with
terrible feuds, even, and battles and many other such things, such as are
recounted by the poets and the holy artists, and that have been elaborately
decorated for us on other sacred objects and especially the robe covered
with such designs which is brought up to the acropolis at the great
Panathenaea?* Are we to say that these things are true, Euthyphro?
Euth: Not only these, Socrates, but as I said just now, I could describe
many other things about the divine laws to you in addition, if you want,
which I am sure you will be astounded to hear.
So: I wouldn’t be surprised. But you can describe these to me at
leisure some other time. For the time being, however, try to describe more
clearly what I asked you just now, since previously, my friend, you did not
teach me well enough when I asked what the pious was but you told me
that what you’re doing is something pious, prosecuting your father for
murder.
Euth: And what’s more, I spoke the truth, Socrates.
So: Perhaps. But in fact, Euthyphro, you say there are many other
pious things.
Euth: Indeed there are.
So: So remember that I did not request this from you, to teach me
one or two of the many pious things, but to teach me the form itself by
which everything pious is pious? For you said that it’s by one form that
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impious things are somehow impious and pious things pious. Or don’t
you remember?
Euth: I certainly do.
So: So then tell me whatever this form itself is, so that, by looking at
it and using it as a paradigm, I can declare what you or anyone else might
do of that kind to be pious, and if it is not of that kind, that it is not.
Euth: Well if that’s what you want, Socrates, that’s what I’ll tell you.
So: That’s exactly what I want.
Euth: Well, what is beloved by the gods is pious, and what is not
beloved by them is impious.
So: Excellent, Euthyphro! With this you have answered in the way I
was looking for you to answer. Whether or not it’s true, that I don’t quite
know, but it’s clear that you will teach me how what you say is true.
Euth: Absolutely.
So: Come then, let’s look at what we said. An action or a person that
is beloved by the gods is pious, while an action or person that is despised
by the gods is impious. They are not the same, but complete opposites, the
pious and impious. Isn’t that so?
Euth: Indeed it is.
So: And this seems right?
Euth: I think so, Socrates.
So: But wasn’t it also said that that gods are at odds with each other
and disagree with one another and that there are feuds among them?
Euth: Yes, it was.
So: Disagreement about what is the cause of the hatred and anger,
my good man? Let’s look at it this way. If we disagree, you and I, about
quantity, over which of two groups is greater, would our disagreement
over this make us enemies and angry with each other, or wouldn’t we
quickly resolve the issue by resorting to counting?
Euth: Certainly.
So: And again if we disagreed about bigger and smaller, we would
quickly put an end to the disagreement by resorting to measurement?
Euth: That’s right.
So: And we would use weighing, I presume, to reach a decision
about heavier and lighter?
Euth: How else?
So: Then what topic, exactly, would divide us and what decision
would we be unable to reach such that we would be enemies and angry
with one another? Perhaps you don’t have an answer at hand, so see while
I’m talking whether it’s the just and the unjust, and the noble and
shameful, and the good and the bad. Isn’t it these things that divide us and
about which we’re not able to come to a satisfactory decision and so
become enemies of one another, whenever that happens, whether it’s me
and you, or any other men?
Euth: It is indeed this disagreement, Socrates, and over these things.
So: What about the gods, Euthyphro? If they indeed disagree over
something, don’t they disagree over these very things?
Euth: It’s undoubtedly necessary.
So: Then some of the gods think different things to be just,
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according to you, worthy Euthyphro, and noble and shameful and good
and bad, since they surely wouldn’t be at odds with one another unless
they were disagreeing about these things. Right?
Euth: You’re right.
So: And so what each group thinks is noble and good and just, they
also love these thing, and they hate the things that are the opposites of
these?
Euth: Certainly.
So: Then according to you some of them think that these things are
just, while others think they are unjust, the things that, because there’s a
dispute, they are at odds about and are at war over. Isn’t this so?
Euth: It is.
So: The same things, it seems, are both hated by the gods and loved,
and so would be both despised and beloved by them?
Euth: It seems so.
So: And the same things would be both pious and impious,
Euthyphro, according to this argument?
Euth: I’m afraid so.
So: So you haven’t answered what I was asking, you marvelous
man. Because I didn’t ask you for what is both pious and impious at once,
and as it appears, both beloved and despised by the gods. As a result,
Euthyphro, it wouldn’t be surprising if in doing what you’re doing now—
punishing your father—you were doing something beloved by Zeus but
despised by Kronos and Ouranos, and while it is dear to Hephaestos, it is
despised by Hera, and if any other god disagrees with another on the
subject, your action will appear the same way to them, too.
Euth: But I believe, Socrates, that on this matter at least none of the
gods will disagree with any other, that any man who has killed another
person unjustly need not pay the penalty.
So: What’s that? Haven’t you ever heard a human being arguing
that someone who killed unjustly or did something else unjustly should
not pay the penalty?
Euth: There’s no end to these arguments, both outside and inside
the courts, since people commit so many injustices and do and say
anything to escape the punishment.
So: Do they actually agree that they are guilty, Euthyphro, and
despite agreeing they nonetheless say that they shouldn’t pay the penalty?
Euth: They don’t agree on that at all.
So: So they don’t do or say everything, since, I think, they don’t dare
to make this claim nor do they argue that if they in fact are guilty they
should not pay the penalty, but I think they claim that they’re not guilty.
Right?
Euth: That’s true.
So: So they don’t argue, at least, that the guilty person shouldn’t pay
the penalty, but perhaps they argue about who the guilty party is and
what he did and when.
Euth: That’s true.
So: Doesn’t the very same thing happen to the gods, too, if indeed,
as you said, they are at odds about just and unjust things, some saying that
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a god commits an injustice against another one, while others deny it? But
absolutely no one at all, you marvelous man, either god or human, dares to
say that the guilty person need not pay the penalty.
Euth: Yes. What you say is true, Socrates, for the most part.
So: But I think that those who dispute, Euthyphro, both men and
gods, if the gods actually dispute, argue over the particulars of what was
done. Differing over a certain action, some say that it was done justly,
others that it was done unjustly. Isn’t that so?
Euth: Certainly.
So: Come now, my dear Euthyphro. So that I can become wiser,
teach me too what evidence you have that all the gods think the man was
killed unjustly, the one who committed murder while he was working for
you, and was bound by the master of the man he killed, and died from his
bonds before the servant could learn from the interpreter what ought to be
done in his case, and is the sort of person on whose behalf it is proper for a
son to prosecute his father and make an allegation of murder. Come, try to
give me a clear indication of how in this case more than all others the gods
think that this action is proper. If you could point this out to me
satisfactorily I would never stop praising you for your wisdom.
Euth: But this is probably quite a task, Socrates, though I could
show it to you very clearly, even so.
So: I understand. It’s because you think I’m a slower learner than the
judges, since you could make it clear to them in what way these actions are
unjust and how the gods all hate such things.
Euth: Very clear indeed, Socrates, if only they would listen to what I
have to say.
So: Of course they’ll listen, so long as they think you speak well.
While you were speaking the following occurred to me and I thought to
myself, “Even if Euthyphro convincingly shows me that all the gods think
this kind of death is unjust, what at all will I have learned from Euthyphro
about what the pious and the impious are? Because while this particular
deed might by despised by the gods, as is likely, it was already apparent,
just a moment ago, that the pious and impious aren’t defined this way,
since we saw that what is despised by the gods is also beloved by them.”
So I release you from this task, Euthyphro. If you want, let us allow that all
the gods think this is unjust and that all of them despise it. But this current
correction to the definition—that what all the gods despise is impious
while what they love is pious, and what some love and some hate is
neither or both—do you want us to now define the pious and the impious
in this way?
Euth: Well, what is stopping us, Socrates?
So: For my part nothing, Euthyphro, but you look out for yourself,
whether you will teach me what you promised as easily as possible by
adopting this definition.
Euth: I for my part affirm the claim that the pious is what all the
gods love, and the opposite, what all the gods hate, is impious.
So: Let’s see again, Euthyphro, whether it’s well stated. Or will we
be content and simply accept our own definition or the definition of others,
agreeing that it is right just because somebody says it is. Or must we
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examine what the speaker is saying?
Euth: We must examine it. But I’m quite confident that what we
have now is well put.
So: We’ll soon know better, my good man. Think about this: Is the
pious loved by the gods because it’s pious, or it is pious because it is
loved?
Euth: I don’t know what you mean, Socrates.
So: I’ll try to express myself more clearly. We speak of something
being carried and carrying, and being led and leading, and being seen and
seeing, and so you understand that all of these are different from one
another and in whay way they are different?
Euth: I think I understand.
So: So there’s a thing loved and different from this there’s the thing
that loves?
Euth: How could there not be?
So: Then tell me whether what is carried is a carried thing because it
is carried, or because of something else?
Euth: No; it’s because of this.
So: And clearly what is led because it is led, and what is seen
because it is seen?
Euth: Absolutely.
So: So it is not that, because it is something seen, it is seen, but the
opposite, that because it is seen it is something seen. And it is not because
it is something led that it is led, but because it is led it is something led.
And it is not because it is something carried that it is carried, but because
it is carried, it is something carried. Is it clear, what I’m trying to say,
Euthyphro? I mean this: that if something becomes or is affected by
something, it’s not because it is a thing coming to be that it comes to be,
but because it comes to be it is a thing coming into being. Nor is it affected
by something because it is a thing that is affected, but because it is
affected, it is a thing that is being affected. Or don’t you agree?
Euth: I do
So: And is a loved thing either a thing that comes to be or is affected
by something?
Euth: Certainly.
So: And does the same apply to this as the previous ones: it is not
because it is a loved thing that it is loved by those who love it, but it is a
loved thing because it is loved?
Euth: Necessarily
So: So what do we say about the pious, Euthyphro? Precisely that is
it loved by all the gods, according to your statement?
Euth: Yes.
So: Is it because of this that it is pious, or because of something else?
Euth: No, it’s because of this.
So: Isn’t it because it is pious that it is loved, and it’s not because it is
loved that it is pious?
Euth: It seems so.
So: It must be that it’s because it is loved by the gods that it is a
loved thing and beloved by the gods?
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Euth: How could it not?
So: So the beloved is not pious, Euthyphro, nor is the pious beloved
by the gods, as you claim, but the one is different from the other.
Euth: How so, Socrates?
So: Because we agree that the pious is loved because of this, that is,
because it’s pious, and we don’t agree that it is pious because it is loved.
Right?
Euth: Yes.
So: The beloved, on the other hand, because it is loved by gods, is
beloved due to this very act of being loved, and it is not because it is
beloved that it is being loved?
Euth: That’s true.
So: But if the beloved and the pious were in fact the same, my dear
Euthyphro, then, if the pious were loved because of being the pious, then
the beloved would be loved because of being the beloved, and again, if the
beloved was beloved because of being loved by gods, the pious would also
be pious by being loved. But as it is, you see that the two are opposites and
are completely different from one another, since the one is lovable because
it is loved, while the other is loved because it is lovable.
So it’s likely, Euthyphro, that when you were asked what in the
world the pious is, you did not want to reveal its nature to me, but wanted
to tell me some one of its qualities—that the pious has this quality: it is
loved by all the gods—but as for what it is, you did not say at all. So if I am
dear to you, don’t keep me in the dark but tell me again from the
beginning what in the world the pious is. And we won’t differ over
whether it is loved by the gods or whatever else happens to it, but tell me
without delay, what the pious is, and the impious?
Euth: But Socrates I have no way of telling you what I’m thinking,
because somehow whatever I put forward for us always wanders off and
doesn’t want to stay where we put it.
So: The things you say, Euthyphro, seem to belong to my ancestor
Dedalos.* And if I were saying them and putting them forward, perhaps
you would be joking about how my works made of words run away even
on me because he’s kin and don’t want to stay wherever a person might
put them. But at present these propositions are yours, and so we have to
find some other joke, since they don’t want to stay put for you, as even you
yourself admit.
Euth: It seems to me that pretty much the same joke applies to what
was said, Socrates, since I am not the inspiration for their wandering off
and their refusal to stay in the same place, but you seem to me to be the
Dedalos, since they would stay in place just fine for me, at least.
So: It’s likely, my friend, that I’ve become more skilled than him in
the craft, to the extent that while he could only make his own works move,
I can do so to others’ works as well as my own. And to my mind this is the
most exquisite thing about my skill, that I am unintentionally clever, since
I wanted the words to stay put for me and to be fixed motionless more
than to have the money of Tantalos and the skill of Dedalos combined. But
enough of this; I think you are spoiled. I am eager for you to show me how
you will educate me about the pious. So don’t give up the task. See
Euthyphro
12a
b
c
d
e
10
whether you believe that everything pious is necessarily just.
Euth: I do.
So: And is everything just pious? Or is every pious thing just but
not every just thing is pious, but some just things are pious, and some are
something else again?
Euth: I can’t keep up with what you’re saying, Socrates.
So: And yet you are younger than me by at least as much as you are
wiser than me! But, as I say, you are spoiled by your abundance of
wisdom. Put your back into it, you blessed man, since what I’m saying is
not difficult to get your head around. Surely I mean the opposite of what
the poet meant when he wrote: *
Zeus who created it and who produced all of these
You do not want to revile; for where there is fear there is also shame.
I disagree with this statement of the poet. Shall I tell you how?
Euth: Yes indeed.
So: I don’t think that “where there is fear there is also shame” since I
think many people who fear sickness, poverty and many other things feel
fear, but they do not feel shame at these things they fear. Don’t you think
so, too?
Euth: Certainly.
So: Where there is shame, though, there is also fear, for is there
anyone who feels shame and humiliation at something who doesn’t also
feel fear and dread a reputation for cowardice?
Euth: He does indeed dread it.
So: So it’s not right to claim that “where there is fear there is also
shame” but where there is shame there is also fear, for shame is not in fact
everywhere fear is. I think fear covers more than shame. Shame is a part of
fear, just as oddness is a part of number, so that it’s not the case that where
there is number there is also oddness, but where there is oddness, there is
also number. Do you follow now, at least?
Euth: I certainly do.
So: This is the kind of thing I was talking about earlier when I was
questioning you: where there is justice, is there also piety? Or is it that
where there is piety, there is also justice, but piety is not everywhere justice
is, since piety is a part of justice? Do you think we should speak in this
way or in some other?
Euth: No, in this way. I think you’re speaking properly.
So: Then see what follows this: if the pious is a part of the just, we
must, it seems, discover what part of the just the pious might be. If you
now asked me something about what we were discussing just now, such
as what part of number the even is, and what number it happens to be, I
would say that it would be the number that can be divided into two equal
and not unequal parts.* Doesn’t it seem so to you?
Euth: It does.
So: So try to teach me in this way, Euthyphro, what sort of part of
the just piety is, so that we can also tell Meletos not to do us wrong and
charge me with impiety, since I have already learned enough from you
about what is holy and what is pious and what is not.
Euth: It seems to me now, Socrates, that holiness and piety is the
Euthyphro
13a
b
c
d
e
11
part of justice concerned with attending to the gods, while the remaining
part of justice is concerned with attending to human beings.
So: I think you put that well, Euthyphro. But I still need just one
small thing: I don’t know quite what you mean by “attending”. Surely you
don’t mean that attending to the gods is like the other kinds of attending
even though we do say so, such as when we say that not everybody knows
how to attend to a horse, except the horse-trainer. Right?
Euth: Certainly.
So: Horse-training is attending to horses?
Euth: Yes.
So: And no one but the dog-trainer knows how to attend to dogs?
Euth: Right.
So: And dog-training is attending to dogs?
Euth: Yes.
So: And cattle-herding is of cattle?
Euth: Absolutely.
So: Naturally, then, piety and holiness are of the gods, Euthyphro?
That’s what you mean?
Euth: I do.
So: Does all attending bring about the same effect? Something of the
following sort, the good and benefit of what is attended to, in just the way
you see that horses being attended to by horse-trainers are benefited and
become better? Or don’t you think they are?
Euth: They are.
So: And dogs by the dog-trainer somehow, and cattle by the cattleherder, and all the others similarly? Or do you think the attending is aimed
at harming what is attended to?
Euth: By Zeus, I do not.
So: But at benefiting them?
Euth: How could it not be?
So: And since piousness is attending to the gods, does it benefit the
gods and make the gods better? Do you agree to this, that whenever one
does something pious it results in some improvement of the gods?
Euth: By Zeus, no, I don’t.
So: Nor did I think that that’s what you meant, Euthyphro—far
from it, in fact—and so that’s why I was asking what in the world you
meant by “attending to the gods”, because I didn’t think you mean this
kind of thing.
Euth: And you’re right, Socrates. Because I mean no such thing.
So: Alright then. But what kind of attending to the gods would
piousness be, then?
Euth: The kind, Socrates, when slaves attend to their masters.
So: I understand. It would be a kind of service to gods, it seems .
Euth: Certainly.
So: Can you tell me about service to doctors, what end result is it a
service aimed at? Don’t you think it’s at health?
Euth: I do.
So: And what about service to shipbuilders? What end result is it a
service aimed at?
Euthyphro
14a
b
c
d
e
12
Euth: Clearly it’s at aimed at sailing, Socrates.
So: And service to house-builders, I suppose, is aimed at houses?
Euth: Yes.
So: Tell me then, best of men, what end result is service to the gods
a service aimed at? It’s obvious that you know, since you claim to have the
finest religious knowledge, at least, of any human.
Euth: And as a matter of fact, Socrates, I speak the truth.
So: So tell me, by Zeus, what in the world is that magnificent task
which the gods accomplish by using us as servants?
Euth: Many fine tasks, Socrates.
So: Well, and so do the generals, my friend. But nevertheless one
could easily say what their key purpose is, that they achieve victory in
war. Or not?
Euth: How else could it be?
So: And I think the farmers accomplish many fine tasks. And yet
their key purpose is nourishment from the soil.
Euth: Very much so.
So: So what, then, about the many fine things that the gods
accomplish? What is the key purpose of their labor?
Euth: I said a little earlier, Socrates, that it is a great task to learn
exactly how all these things are. But I will put it for you generally: if a man
knows how to speak and act pleasingly to the gods in his prayers and
sacrifices, those are pious, and such things preserve both his own home
and the common good of the city. But the opposites of these pleasing
things are unholy, which obviously overturn and destroy everything.
So: If you were willing, Euthyphro, you could have told me the
heart of what I was asking much more briefly. But in fact you are not eager
to teach me, that much is clear. Since now when you were just about to do
so, you turned away. If you had answered, I would already have gotten a
satisfactory understanding of piousness from you. But for the present, the
lover must follow his beloved wherever he might lead. So what do say the
pious and piousness are, again? Don’t you say it’s a certain kind of
knowledge, of how to sacrifice and pray?
Euth: I do.
So: And sacrificing is giving to the gods, while praying is making a
request of the gods?
Euth: Very much so, Socrates.
So: Based on this, piousness would be knowledge of making
requests and giving things to the gods?
Euth: You have understood my meaning very well, Socrates.
So: It’s because I am eager for your wisdom, my friend, and pay
close attention to it, so that nothing you might say falls to the ground. But
tell me, what is this service to the gods? You say it is making requests of
them and giving to them?
Euth: I do.
So: And proper requests would be requests for what we need from
them, asking them for these things?
Euth: What else?
So: And again, giving properly would be giving what they happen
Euthyphro
15a
b
c
d
13
to need from us, to give these things to them in return? Since to give a gift
by giving someone what he has no need of would not be too skillful, I
suppose.
Euth: That’s true, Socrates.
So: So piousness for gods and humans, Euthyphro, would be some
skill of trading with one another?
Euth: If naming it that way is sweeter for you, call it “trading”.
So: As far as I’m concerned, nothing is sweeter unless it is true. Tell
me, how do the gods benefit from the gifts they receive from us? What
they give us is clear to everyone, since every good we have was given by
them. But what they receive from us, what good is it? Or do we fare so
much better than them in the trade that we get everything that’s good from
them, while they get nothing from us?
Euth: But do you think, Socrates, that they gods are benefited by
what they receive from us?
So: Well then what in the world would they be, Euthyphro, these
gifts from us to the gods?
Euth: What else, do you think, but honor and admiration and, as I
said just now, gratitude?
So: So being shown gratitude is what’s pious, Euthyphro, but it is
neither beneficial to the gods nor dear to them?
Euth: I think it is dear to them above everything else.
So: So the pious is once again, it seems, what is dear to gods.
Euth: Very much so.
So: Are you at all surprised, when you say such things, that your
words seem not to stand still but to move around? And you accuse me of
making them move around like a Dedalus when you yourself are much
more skilled than Dedalus, even making things go around in circles? Or
don’t you see that our discussion has gone around and arrived back at the
same place? You remember, no doubt, that previously the pious and the
beloved by the gods seemed to us not to be the same but different from
one another. Or don’t you remember?
Euth: I certainly do.
So: Well, don’t you realize now that you’re saying that what is dear
to the gods is pious? But is this anything other than what is beloved by the
gods? Or not?
Euth: It certainly is.
So: So either what we decided then was wrong, or, if we were right
then, we are wrong to think it now.
Euth: So it seems.
So: We must begin again from the beginning to examine what the
pious is, since as far as I am concerned, I will not give up until I
understand it. Do not scorn me, but applying your mind in every way, tell
me the truth, now more than ever. Because you know it if anybody does
and, like Proteus,* you cannot be released until you tell me, because unless
you knew clearly about the pious and impious there is no way you would
ever have tried to pursue your aging father for murder on behalf of a hired
laborer, but instead you would have been afraid before the gods, and
ashamed before men, to run the risk of conducting this matter improperly.
Euthyphro
e
16a
14
But as it is, I am sure that you think that you have clear knowledge of the
pious and the impious. So tell me, great Euthyphro, and do not conceal
what you think it is.
Euth: Well, some other time, then, Socrates, because I’m in a hurry
to get somewhere and it’s time for me to go.
So: What a thing to do, my friend! By leaving, you have cast me
down from a great hope I had, that I would learn from you what is pious
and what is not, and would free myself from Meletos’ charge, by showing
him that, thanks to Euthyphro, I had already become wise in religious
matters and that I would no longer speak carelessly and innovate about
these things due to ignorance, and in particular that I would live better for
the rest of my life.
NOTES
A star (*) in the text indicates a note.
2a
2a
2a
2a
2b
3b
6a
6c
11c
12a-b
12d
15d
Lyceum. A gymnasium outside the walls of Athens.
the porch of the king. The “porch” is a covered walkway in the Athenian
agora (marketplace or forum. See the “Stoa Basileios” on the map at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Agora_of_Athens .)
before the king. The ‘king’ was one of nine archons or magistrates. At this
stage of the proceedings, accusations would be lodged and testimony
recorded from those involved and from witnesses. The king archon was in
charge of religious matters. Socrates is there because he has been charged
with a religious crime—of not acknowledging the gods of the city;
Euthyphro is there because he believes that his father, as a murderer, is
polluting the religious spaces of the city, which then needs to be purified.
(See 4c and Athenian Constitution 57. (On-line at
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/medieval/athe6.htm#57 .)
a public indictment. It was up to individuals (in Socrates’ case, Meletos,
along with Anytos and Lycon) to bring cases on behalf of the city.
deme. An administrative region of Attica.
divine sign. See Socrates’ Defense 31b and 41a-c.
Zeus … his father … his father … . For the stories of Zeus, Kronos and
Ouranos, see Hesiod’s Theogony lines 154-182 and 453-506. (On-line at
http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/hesiod/theogony.htm )
robe … great Panathanaea? The Panathanaea was a celebration of Athena’s,
birthday, held annually, with a larger (“great”) celebration every four
years. A new robe would be presented to the statue of the goddess Athena.
Dedalos. The statues of the mythical Dedalos were said to be so life-like that
they appeared to move. Dedalos is most famous for making wings for
himself and his son Icaros to use to escape from Crete.
The quote is from Stanisos’ Cypria, a collection of tales describing the
events prior to where the Iliad begins. (Not available on-line.)
divided into two equal and not unequal parts. Literally “isosceles and not
scalene”. Presumably because isosceles triangles have two equal legs.
Proteus. A mythical sea god who could change shape. Menelaus had to
hold on to Proteus as he changed shape in order to get him to prophesy.
(See Odyssey 4.398-463. For an on-line version, see
www.tonykline.co.uk/PITBR/Greek/Odyssey4.htm#_Toc90267397 )
The Trolley Problem
Author(s): Judith Jarvis Thomson
Source: The Yale Law Journal , May, 1985, Vol. 94, No. 6 (May, 1985), pp. 1395-1415
Published by: The Yale Law Journal Company, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.com/stable/796133
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Comments
The Trolley Problem
Judith Jarvis Thomsont
I.
Some years ago, Philippa Foot drew attention to an extraordinarily interesting problem.’ Suppose you are the driver of a trolley. The trolley
rounds a bend, and there come into view ahead five track workmen, who
have been repairing the track. The track goes through a bit of a valley at
that point, and the sides are steep, so you must stop the trolley if you are
to avoid running the five men down. You step on the brakes, but alas they
don’t work. Now you suddenly see a spur of track leading off to the right.
You can turn the trolley onto it, and thus save the five men on the straight
track ahead. Unfortunately, Mrs. Foot has arranged that there is one
track workman on that spur of track. He can no more get off the track in
time than the five can, so you will kill him if you turn the trolley onto
him. Is it morally permissible for you to turn the trolley?
Everybody to whom I have put this hypothetical case says, Yes, it is.2
Some people say something stronger than that it is morally permissible for
you to turn the trolley: They say that morally speaking, you must turn
it-that morality requires you to do so. Others do not agree that morality
t Professor of Philosophy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. B.A., Barnard College 1950,
Cambridge University 1952; M.A., Cambridge University 1956; Ph.D., Columbia University 1959.
Many people have given me helpful criticism of this essay’s many successive reincarnations over the
years; I cannot list them all-for want of space, not of gratitude. Most recently, it benefited from
criticism by the members of the Yale Law School Civil Liability Workshop and the Legal Theory
Workshop, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto.
1. See P. FOOT, The Problem of Abortion and the Doctrine of the Double Effect, in VIRTUES AND
VICES AND OTHER ESSAYS IN MORAL PHILOSOPHY 19 (1978).
2. I think it possible (though by no means certain) that John Taurek would say No, it is not
permissible to (all simply) turn the trolley; what you ought to do is flip a coin. See Taurek, Should
the Numbers Count?, 6 PHIL. & PUB. AFF. 293 (1977). (But he is there concerned with a different
kind of case, namely that in which what is in question is not whether we may do what harms one to
avoid harming five, but whether we may or ought to choose to save five in preference to saving one.)
For criticism of Taurek’s article, see Parfit, Innumerate Ethics, 7 PHIL. & PUB. AFF. 285 (1978).
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The Yale Law Journal Vol. 94: 1395, 1985
requires you to turn the trolley, and even feel a certain discomfort at the
idea of turning it. But everybody says that it is true, at a minimum, that
you may turn it-that it would not be morally wrong in you to do so.
Now consider a second hypothetical case. This time you are to imagine
yourself to be a surgeon, a truly great surgeon. Among other things you
do, you transplant organs, and you are such a great surgeon that the organs you transplant always take. At the moment you have five patients
who need organs. Two need one lung each, two need a kidney each, and
the fifth needs a heart. If they do not get those organs today, they will all
die; if you find organs for them today, you can transplant the organs and
they will all live. But where to find the lungs, the kidneys, and the heart?
The time is almost up when a report is brought to you that a young man
who has just come into your clinic for his yearly check-up has exactly the
right blood-type, and is in excellent health. Lo, you have a possible donor.
All you need do is cut him up and distribute his parts among the five who
need them. You ask, but he says, “Sorry. I deeply sympathize, but no.”
Would it be morally permissible for you to operate anyway? Everybody to
whom I have put this second hypothetical case says, No, it would not be
morally permissible for you to proceed.
Here then is Mrs. Foot’s problem: Why is it that the trolley driver may
turn his trolley, though the surgeon may not remove the young man’s
lungs, kidneys, and heart?” In both cases, one will die if the agent acts,
but five will live who would otherwise die-a net saving of four lives.
What difference in the other facts of these cases explains the moral difference between them? I fancy that the theorists of tort and criminal law will
find this problem as interesting as the moral theorist does.
II.
Mrs. Foot’s own solution to the problem she drew attention to is simple, straightforward, and very attractive. She would say: Look, the sur-
geon’s choice is between operating, in which case he kills one, and not
operating, in which case he lets five die; and killing is surely worse than
letting die4-indeed, so much worse that we can even say
(I) Killing one is worse than letting five die.
3. I doubt that anyone would say, with any hope of getting agreement from others, that the
surgeon ought to flip a coin. So even if you think that the trolley driver ought to flip a coin, there
would remain, for you, an analogue of Mrs. Foot’s problem, namely: Why ought the trolley driver
flip a coin, whereas the surgeon may not?
4. Mrs. Foot speaks more generally of causing injury and failing to provide aid; and her reason
for thinking that the former is worse than the latter is that the negative duty to refrain from causing
injury is stricter than the positive duty to provide aid. See P. FOOT, supra note 1, at 27-29.
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Trolley Problem
So the surgeon must refrain from operating. By contrast, the trolley
driver’s choice is between turning the trolley, in which case he kills one,
and not turning the trolley, in which case he does not let five die, he
positively kills them. Now surely we can say
(II) Killing five is worse than killing one.
But then that is why the trolley driver may turn his trolley: He would be
doing what is worse if he fails to turn it, since if he fails to turn it he kills
five.
I do think that that is an attractive account of the matter. It seems to
me that if the surgeon fails to operate, he does not kill his five patients
who need parts; he merely lets them die. By contrast, if the driver fails to
turn his trolley, he does not merely let the five track workmen die; he
drives his trolley into them, and thereby kills them.
But there is good reason to think that this problem is not so easily
solved as that.
Let us begin by looking at a case that is in some ways like Mrs. Foot’s
story of the trolley driver. I will call her case Trolley Driver; let us now
consider a case I will call Bystander at the Switch. In that case you have
been strolling by the trolley track, and you can see the situation at a
glance: The driver saw the five on the track ahead, he stamped on the
brakes, the brakes failed, so he fainted. What to do? Well, here is the
switch, which you can throw, thereby turning the trolley yourself. Of
course you will kill one if you do. But I should think you may turn it all
the same.5
Some people may feel a difference between these two cases. In the first
place, the trolley driver is, after all, captain of the trolley. He is charged
by the trolley company with responsibility for the safety of his passengers
and anyone else who might be harmed by the trolley he drives. The bystander at the switch, on the other hand, is a private person who just
happens to be there.
Second, the driver would be driving a trolley into the five if he does not
turn it, and the bystander would not-the bystander will do the five no
harm at all if he does not throw the switch.
I think it right to feel these differences between the cases.
Nevertheless, my own feeling is that an ordinary person, a mere bystander, may intervene in such a case. If you see something, a trolley, a
boulder, an avalanche, heading towards five, and you can deflect it onto
5. A similar case (intended to make a point similar to the one that I shall be making) is discussed
in Davis, The Priority of Avoiding Harm, in KILLING AND LETTING DIE 172, 194-95 (B. Steinbock
ed. 1980).
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The Yale Law Journal Vol. 94: 1395, 1985
one, it really does seem that-other things being equal-it would be permissible for you to take charge, take responsibility, and deflect the thing,
whoever you may be. Of course you run a moral risk if you do, for it
might be that, unbeknownst to you, other things are not equal. It might
be, that is, that there is some relevant difference between the five on the
one hand, and the one on the other, which would make it morally preferable that the five be hit by the trolley than that the one be hit by it. That
would be so if, for example, the five are not track workmen at all, but
Mafia members in workmen’s clothing, and they have tied the one workman to the right-hand track in the hope that you would turn the trolley
onto him. I won’t canvass all the many kinds of possibilities, for in fact
the moral risk is the same whether you are the trolley driver, or a bystander at the switch.
Moreover, second, we might well wish to ask ourselves what exactly is
the difference between what the driver would be doing if he failed to turn
the trolley and what the bystander would be doing if he failed to throw
the switch. As I said, the driver would be driving a trolley into the five;
but what exactly would his driving the trolley into the five consist in?
Why, just sitting there, doing nothing! If the driver does just sit there,
doing nothing, then that will have been how come he drove his trolley into
the five.
I do not mean to make much of that fact about what the driver’s driving
his trolley into the five would consist in, for it seems to me to be right to
say that if he does not turn the trolley, he does drive his trolley into them,
and does thereby kill them. (Though this does seem to me to be right, it is
not easy to say exactly what makes it so.) By contrast, if the bystander
does not throw the switch, he drives no trolley into anybody, and he kills
nobody.
But as I said, my own feeling is that the bystander may intervene. Perhaps it will seem to some even less clear that morality requires him to
turn the trolley than that morality requires the driver to turn the trolley;
perhaps some will feel even more discomfort at the idea of the bystander’s
turning the trolley than at the idea of the driver’s turning the trolley. All
the same, I shall take it that he may.
If he may, there is serious trouble for Mrs. Foot’s thesis (I). It is plain
that if the bystander throws the switch, he causes the trolley to hit the
one, and thus he kills the one. It is equally plain that if the bystander does
not throw the switch, he does not cause the trolley to hit the five, he does
not kill the five, he merely fails to save them-he lets them die. His choice
therefore is between throwing the switch, in which case he kills one, and
not throwing the switch, in which case he lets five die. If thesis (I) were
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Trolley Problem
true, it would follow that the bystander may not throw the switch, and
that I am taking to be false.
III.
I have been arguing that
(I) Killing one is worse than letting five die
is false, and a fortiori that it cannot be appealed to to explain why the
surgeon may not operate in the case I shall call Transplant.
I think it pays to take note of something interesting which comes out
when we pay close attention to
(II) Killing five is worse than killing one.
For let us ask ourselves how we would feel about Transplant if we made
a certain addition to it. In telling you that story, I did not tell you why the
surgeon’s patients are in need of parts. Let us imagine that the history of
their ailments is as follows. The surgeon was badly overworked last
fall-some of his assistants in the clinic were out sick, and the surgeon
had to take over their duties dispensing drugs. While feeling particularly
tired one day, he became careless, and made the terrible mistake of dispensing chemical X to five of the day’s patients. Now chemical X works
differently in different people. In some it causes lung failure, in others
kidney failure, in others heart failure. So these five patients who now need
parts need them because of the surgeon’s carelessness. Indeed, if he does
not get them the parts they need, so that they die, he will have killed
them. Does that make a moral difference? That is, does the fact that he
will have killed the five if he does nothing make it permissible for him to
cut the young man up and distribute his parts to the five who need them?
We could imagine it to have been worse. Suppose what had happened
was this: The surgeon was badly overextended last fall, he had known he
was named a beneficiary in his five patients’ wills, and it swept over him
one day to give them chemical X to kill them. Now he repents, and would
save them if he could. If he does not save them, he will positively have
murdered them. Does that fact make it permissible for him to cut the
young man up and distribute his parts to the five who need them?
I should think plainly not. The surgeon must not operate on the young
man. If he can find no other way of saving his five patients, he will now
have to let them die-despite the fact that if he now lets them die, he will
have killed them.
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The Yale Law Journal Vol. 94: 1395, 1985
We tend to forget that some killings them
do include them where the act by which the agent kills takes time to cause
death-time in which the agent can intervene but does not.
In face of these possibilities, the question arises what we should think
of thesis (II), since it looks as if it tells us that the surgeon ought to operate, and thus that he may permissibly do so, since if he operates he kills
only one instead of five.
There are two ways in which we can go here. First, we can say: (II)
does tell us that the surgeon ought to operate, and that shows it is false.
Second, we can say: (II) does not tell us that the surgeon ought to operate,
and it is true.
For my own part, I prefer the second. If Alfred kills five and Bert kills
only one, then questions of motive apart, and other things being equal,
what Alfred did is worse than what Bert did. If the surgeon does not
operate, so that he kills five, then it will later be true that he did some-
thing worse than he would have done if he had operated, killing only
one-especially if his killing of the five was murder, committed out of a
desire for money, and his killing of the one would have been, though misguided and wrongful, nevertheless a well-intentioned effort to save five
lives. Taking this line would, of course, require saying that assessments of
which acts are worse than which other acts do not by themselves settle the
question what it is permissible for an agent to do.
But it might be said that we ought to by-pass (II), for perhaps what
Mrs. Foot would have offered us as an explanation of why the driver may
turn the trolley in Trolley Driver is not (II) itself, but something more
complex, such as
(II’) If a person is faced with a choice between doing something
here and now to five, by the doing of which he will kill them, and
doing something else here and now to one, by the doing of which he
will kill only the one, then (other things being equal) he ought to
choose the second alternative rather than the first.
We may presumably take (II’) to tell us that the driver ought to, and
hence permissibly may, turn the trolley in Trolley Driver, for we may
presumably view the driver as confronted with a choice between here and
now driving his trolley into five, and here and now driving his trolley into
one. And at the same time, (II’) tells us nothing at all about what the
surgeon ought to do in Transplant, for he is not confronted with such a
choice. If the surgeon operates, he does do something by the doing of
which he will kill only one; but if the surgeon does not operate, he does
not do something by the doing of which he kills five; he merely fails to do
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Trolley Problem
something by the doing of which he would make it be the case that he has
not killed five.
I have no objection to this shift in attention from (II) to (II’). But we
should not overlook an interesting question that lurks here. As it might be
put: Why should the present tense matter so much? Why should a person
prefer killing one to killing five if the alternatives are wholly in front of
him, but not (or anyway, not in every case) where one of them is partly
behind him? I shall come back to this question briefly later.
Meanwhile, however, even if (II’) can be appealed to in order to explain why the trolley driver may turn his trolley, that would leave it en-
tirely open why the bystander at the switch may turn his trolley. For he
does not drive a trolley into each of five if he refrains from turning the
trolley; he merely lets the trolley drive into each of them.
So I suggest we set Trolley Driver aside for the time being. What I
shall be concerned with is a first cousin of Mrs. Foot’s problem, viz.: Why
is it that the bystander may turn his trolley, though the surgeon may not
remove the young man’s lungs, kidneys, and heart? Since I find it particularly puzzling that the bystander may turn his trolley, I am inclined to
call this The Trolley Problem. Those who find it particularly puzzling
that the surgeon may not operate are cordially invited to call it The
Transplant Problem instead.
IV.
It should be clear, I think, that “kill” and “let die” are too blunt to be
useful tools for the solving of this problem. We ought to be looking within
killings and savings for the ways in which the agents would be carrying
them out.
It would be no surprise, I think, if a Kantian idea occurred to us at this
point. Kant said: “Act so that you treat humanity, whether in your own
person or in that of another, always as an end and never as a means
only.” It is striking, after all, that the surgeon who proceeds in Trans-
plant treats the young man he cuts up “as a means only”: He literally
uses the young man’s body to save his five, and does so without the young
man’s consent. And perhaps we may say that the agent in Bystander at
the Switch does not use his victim to save his five, or (more generally)
treat his victim as a means only, and that that is why he (unlike the
surgeon) may proceed.
But what exactly is it to treat a person as a means only, or to use a
person? And why exactly is it wrong to do this? These questions do not
have obvious answers.6
6. For a sensitive discussion of some of the difficulties, see Davis, Using Persons and Common
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The Yale Law Journal Vol. 94: 1395, 1985
Suppose an agent is confronted with a choice between doing nothing, in
which case five die, or engaging in a certain course of action, in which
case the five live, but one dies. Then perhaps we can say: If the agent
chooses to engage in the course of action, then he uses the one to save the
five only if, had the one gone out of existence just before the agent started,
the agent would have been unable to save the five. That is true of the
surgeon in Transplant. He needs the young man if he is to save his five;
if the young man goes wholly out of existence just before the surgeon
starts to operate, then the surgeon cannot save his five. By contrast, the
agent in Bystander at the Switch does not need the one track workman on
the right-hand track if he is to save his five; if the one track workman goes
wholly out of existence before the bystander starts to turn the trolley, then
the bystander can all the same save his five. So here anyway is a striking
difference between the cases.
It does seem to me right to think that solving this problem requires
attending to the means by which the agent would be saving his five if he
proceeded. But I am inclined to think that this is an overly simple way of
taking account of the agent’s means.
One reason for thinking so7 comes out as follows. You have been thinking of the tracks in Bystander at the Switch as not merely diverging, but
continuing to diverge, as in the following picture: pick up figure 1
Consider now what I shall call “the loop variant” on this case, in which
the tracks do not continue to diverge-they circle back, as in the following
picture:
Sense, 94 ETHICS 387 (1984). Among other things, she argues (I think rightly) that the Kantian idea
is not to be identified with the common sense concept of “using a person.” Id. at 402.
7. For a second reason to think so, see infra note 13.
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Trolley Problem
Let us now imagine that the five on the straight track are thin, but thick
enough so that although all five will be killed if the trolley goes straight,
the bodies of the five will stop it, and it will therefore not reach the one.
On the other hand, the one on the right-hand track is fat, so fat that his
body will by itself stop the trolley, and the trolley will therefore not reach
the five. May the agent turn the trolley? Some people feel more discom-
fort at the idea of turning the trolley in the loop variant than in the original Bystander at the Switch. But we cannot really suppose that the presence or absence of that extra bit of track makes a major moral difference
as to what an agent may do in these cases, and it really does seem right to
think (despite the discomfort) that the agent may proceed.
On the other hand, we should notice that the agent here needs the one
(fat) track workman on the right-hand track if he is to save his five. If the
one goes wholly out of existence just before the agent starts to turn the
trolley, then the agent cannot save his five8-just as the surgeon in Transplant cannot save his five if the young man goes wholly out of existence
just before the surgeon starts to operate.
Indeed, I should think that there is no plausible account of what is
involved in, or what is necessary for, the application of the notions “treating a person as a means only,” or “using one to save five,” under which
the surgeon would be doing this whereas the agent in this variant of Bystander at the Switch would not be. If that is right, then appeals to these
notions cannot do the work being required of them here.
V.
Suppose the bystander at the switch proceeds: He throws the switch,
thereby turning the trolley onto the right-hand track, thereby causing the
one to be hit by the trolley, thereby killing him-but saving the five on the
straight track. There are two facts about what he does which seem to me
to explain the moral difference between what he does and what the agent
in Transplant would be doing if he proceeded. In the first place, the bystander saves his five by making something that threatens them instead
threaten one. Second, the bystander does not do that by means which
themselves constitute an infringement of any right of the one’s.
As is plain, then, my hypothesis as to the source of the moral difference
between the cases makes appeal to the concept of a right. My own feeling
8. It is also true that if the five go wholly out of existence just before the agent starts to turn the
trolley, then the one will die whatever the agent does. Should we say, then, that the agent uses one to
save five if he acts, and uses five to save one if he does not act? No: What follows and is false. If the
agent does not act, he uses nobody. (I doubt that it can even be said that if he does not act, he lets
them be used. For what is the active for which this is passive? Who or what would be using them if
he does not act?).
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