Would You Kill the Fat Man by David Edmonds Read Free Book Online Page A

ahead of you. On the spur you see one person tied to the track: changing direction will inevitably result in this person being killed. Behind the one person are six people, also tied to the track. The one person, if hit, will stop the trolley. What should you do? This example is from Otsuka 2008.
     
    But we can’t say the same of Six Behind One. In Six Behind One we want and need the trolley to hit the one. If it doesn’t do so, if the one escapes, the trolley will roll on to kill six. There would be no point turning the trolley unless it hit this one.
    So does that mean that if we turn the trolley in Six Behind One, we intend to kill the one? And are we thus to deduce that turning the trolley in Six Behind One is morally unacceptable? That doesn’t seem right, not least because hitting the one is not used as a means to saving the five. We didn’t turn the trolley so that we can hit the one.
    It’s here that Kamm’s distinction trundles to the rescue. I can say about the Six Behind One case that if I turn the trolley, I do so not in order to hit the one, but because it will hit the one—and that’s what makes it alright.
    As with so many of the scenarios, intuitions about the Six Behind One case will hinge on what the intention is in turning the trolley. Perhaps, then, we should try to clarify what we mean by intention. And we can illustrate the difficulties with a genuine train problem that beset Philippa Foot’s most illustrious relation.

CHAPTER 7
     
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    Paving the Road to Hell
     
What is left over if I subtract the fact that my arm goes up from the fact that I raise my arm?
     
—Ludwig Wittgenstein
Even a dog knows the difference between being kicked and being stumbled over.
     
–Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
     
    IN MID-1894, GROVER CLEVELAND had personal and public preoccupations on his mind. There was concern about his health and suspicion that he had a malignant tumor. More happily, his family was expanding. His young wife had eight months earlier given birth to a second child, Esther, the only presidential child to this day to be born in the White House itself (Esther would eventually move to England, where her daughter Philippa, would grow up). Meanwhile, seven hundred miles away, in Chicago, the president had a looming and very public trolley problem: an industrial relations crisis that threatened the economic and social stability of the nation.
    It had been a boom period for the railroads—Chicago was the railroad capital of the United States, the Pullman PalaceCar Company was about the most prosperous company in the land, and George Pullman, its austere founder, was one of America’s wealthiest citizens. Pullman was an architect of our modern rail system. He built sleeping cars, renowned for their sleek design and opulence. Some of his trains offered exquisite food prepared by revered chefs, and there was attentive service from staff, many of them freed slaves (in the post–Civil War period, Pullman became the largest employer of African Americans). Traveling in a Pullman car was considered the height of luxury.
    Working for Pullman was less of a privilege. His rail company had an undeserved reputation for compassionate paternalism. In order to house his thousands of employees, George Pullman came up with the notion of building a model city (one that, today, you can visit and tour), just south of Chicago. The city had all the amenities Pullman deemed necessary—parks, shops, a kindergarten, a library—and he was hailed nationwide as a tremendous benefactor and visionary. He himself said he loved the town like one of his children, and there were a few things to be said in its favor: decent health facilities, for example. But behind the façade, the truth was nastier. Some of the houses were no better than shacks, and often overcrowded: poverty was rife. Pullman ran the place like a despot and not a nickel was donated in charity. The town was expected to pay its way; there were rents and fees