How might libertarians solve the Trolley Problem?

They're both actions you can take to avoid something; both have the exact same result, but you want only to punish one.

How about this: what if I throw something at you and it bounces off you and hits a glass window, breaking it? Should you have to pay for it?

According to you, if you have "only negative obligations" in regards to ducking, why wouldn't the obligation be "don't duck, you know someone will get hurt"?

In reality, the only person who should be punished is the one throwing the brick.

 

Ego:

How about this: what if I throw something at you and it bounces off you and hits a glass window, breaking it? Should you have to pay for it?

 

No. Obviously something bouncing off of you is not an action and cannot be considered a crime.

Ego:

In reality, the only person who should be punished is the one throwing the brick.

 

Vicitms of crimes should have the right to punish anyone who commits a crime against them, regardless of whether that person is a victim of another crime. People do not have the right to externalize their costs of defense onto innocent parties. Why should someone be let off the hook if their defence includes aggressing against an innocent party? Why should the innocent parties rights by circumscribed? After all, they have done nothing wrong. Why shouldn't they be allowed to punish both aggressors?

Ego:

According to you, if you have "only negative obligations" in regards to ducking, why wouldn't the obligation be "don't duck, you know someone will get hurt"?

 

Because, I only look at the issue from a property rights perspective. A person only has the right to not have their property invaded. They do not have the right to not get "hurt" apart from their property titles.

When a person homesteads scarce standing room, they also homestead all unowned property necessary to make use of that property except what has already been homesteaded by someone else. If he feels threatened by someone who plans to throw a brick at him and stands behind a barrier that is unowned, he homesteads the barrier (temporarily at least). No one else has the right to remove that barrier. Now if that barrier happens to be another person's property, such as their body, it can not be homesteaded. The person can move freely about and dodge if they would like to.

See it all comes back to first principles.

Right to own body => Right to homestead

((Right to own body)AND(Right to homestead)) => NAP

NAP => (Right to duck)AND(NOT(Right to deflect))AND(NOT(Right to shoot through hostage))

NAP => (NOT(Right to cause collatoral damage))AND(NOT(Right to hit trolley switch)

NAP => Punishment theory

Punishment theory => (Right to self-defense)AND(Right to proportional restitution)AND(Right to proportional retribution)

So there's my case. What's yours? Why should resulting harm be considered the basis for rights instead of property?

Solid_Choke:

Imagine this scenario: I really dislike Bob. I dislike him so much that I want to kill him. I happen to be an active trader in prediction markets. I start a new contract that says Bob will not die in the next month. I put tons of money into this contract and bid up the price knowing that someone will short the contract, kill Bob, and make lots of money off of the deal. In this case there is no agreement between me and the hitman and I have never even communicated with him. Should I be prosecuted for the murder of Bob?

 

 

I thought about this for a while and it does seem like it's unpunishable. But I think the main reason why it is difficult to imagine this being criminal is that it wouldn't be an effective method of putting a hit on someone. For one, the information is public immediately. Bob could go into hiding. Also there may be alot of ppl who don't think that Bob will die next month and bid the price down. Another possibility is that some bodyguard or security agency may just decide to buy the contract at the high price and then protect Bob. It seems very hard to proove causal connection in this case because the causal connection is rather weak. You might as well fire a gun in the air and hope that the bullet will fall back on Bob.

No. Obviously something bouncing off of you is not an action and cannot be considered a crime.

What if you throw your hands up to shield your face and it bounces off of your forearms? I know that exact thing has happened to me!

Regarding homesteading: If you're in someone's room or on someone's property, you can't homestead anything. I don't really understand where you were trying to go with that point...

I'm not trying to be dense, but could you explain the difference between ducking and deflecting again? I'm not saying that you didn't give a perfectly good answer, but I didn't get anything from it.

In both cases, inaction will harm you; in both cases, you are taking action to avoid harm; in both cases, taking action will harm someone else; and in both cases, the person throwing the object should be the only person punished.

Ego:

What if you throw your hands up to shield your face and it bounces off of your forearms? I know that exact thing has happened to me!

The action was blocking yourself, not deflecting it.

I'm a bit late to this thread, but I wanted to mention something regarding the original idea of the Trolley Problem.

My normal response to this ethical question is that you are morally required to not act at all unless you are fully informed of all the variables.  For instance, you do not know if the five guys on the track are planning to violently gang-rape and then murder a woman later that evening.  You also don't know if that one person on the other track might cure cancer in 10 years.  You cannot simply state that five lives are worth more than one life because you do not have sufficient data to calculate the worth of those lives.

This also adds something to the current debate.  If that brick is coming at my head, and I need to determine whether to duck or not, I have an easy calculation to make.  I know the brick will hit me and cause harm.  I do not know what will happen if I duck...it might just hit a wall.  The current data suggest that ducking is a better solution.

Now if I know there is a baby behind me, and ducking will cause the baby to be killed when the brick hits it, I now have more data with which to make my decision.  I can still decide to duck, but my moral footing has changed with the new information.

 

No, that action was deflecting it, too.

If you want to use that logic, though, Stephen's entire argument falls apart.

I've been arguing that if someone holds a spinning chainsaw next to your genitals and coerces you into commiting a crime, that person should be charged with the crime instead of you; he has argued that any action taken by an individual should be punished, regardless of the reason behind taking it.

 I'm having trouble following your logic:

Jonas:

My normal response to this ethical question is that you are morally required to not act at all unless you are fully informed of all the variables. 

Ok, but then:

 

Jonas:

If that brick is coming at my head, and I need to determine whether to duck or not, I have an easy calculation to make.  I know the brick will hit me and cause harm.  I do not know what will happen if I duck...it might just hit a wall.  The current data suggest that ducking is a better solution.

Seems to me that, by your previous statement, a better thing to say here is that you are morally required to not act at all unless you are fully informed of all the variables.  In the trolley case, ignorance was a reason that I must NOT act, but now ignorance is being given as a reason that I may act.

Or, we can work it back the other way.  In the trolley case, I don't know what the 5 people are planning to do tonight.  Current data suggests that I should act - without any further information, all I have is 5 lives vs. 1.  Why do we give special consideration to the possibility that the 5 are bad and the 1 is good? Why not worry that the 1 is Hitler, by that token?

 

Yea, sorry.  Probably not the best analogy.  In the trolley example, you are not in any risk yourself.  So you have no need to act out of self preservation.  Not like the brick example at all.

JAlanKatz:

Or, we can work it back the other way.  In the trolley case, I don't know what the 5 people are planning to do tonight.  Current data suggests that I should act - without any further information, all I have is 5 lives vs. 1.  Why do we give special consideration to the possibility that the 5 are bad and the 1 is good? Why not worry that the 1 is Hitler, by that token?

We don't worry about either possibilty.  We can't know if the one is good, or the five is good.  It is exactly this unknown that means we should not act, since if we interfere in an existing situation we are doing so with incomplete data.

Ego:

No, that action was deflecting it, too.

If you want to use that logic, though, Stephen's entire argument falls apart.

I've been arguing that if someone holds a spinning chainsaw next to your genitals and coerces you into commiting a crime, that person should be charged with the crime instead of you; he has argued that any action taken by an individual should be punished, regardless of the reason behind taking it.

 

And I would argue this scenario is impossible.  Unless you were somehow tied down, you could just run away or fight back.  And if you were tied down, you would not be able to commit a crime.