The Trolley Problem Summary

1. In The Trolley Problem by Thomson she says that she feels a bystander may intervene in a situation such as the trolley problem. She believes if they don’t intervene they aren’t causing the men any harm by not throwing the switch. However, she argues that the driver of the trolley does cause harm if he does not throw the switch. Her feelings lead her to an incorrect conclusion because there is no difference in the intentions or means of the bystander and the driver. If the bystander sees the trolley coming and chooses not to pull the switch they do no harm because they don’t intend the harm that is to come to the 5 men at the end of the track, which is their death. Contrary to what Thomson argues, the driver of the trolley also does no harm because he is not the cause or means of the harm. He did not rig the trolley to stop functioning properly so that he could have an excuse and ram into the men to kill them. Nor did he intend to kill them or be in the trolley that ran into them, it was just by chance. He

In The Trolley Problem Revisited, Costa says he feels that Double Effect justifies some evil means in order to bring about a good action. By using this belief, he argues that the killing of F in the trolley case is morally justified by double effect because the evil means, the killing, is justified in order to save the lives of the 5 men. In this sense, Costa’s feelings prevent him from seeing that the point of Double Effect is that unintended side effects are morally okay to get to a good action. Double Effect, does not, as Costa suggests, condone using evil means and therefore he is wrong in his interpretation of the morality of the Trolley Problem. Double Effect allows for the trolley problem to be morally permissible because the death of F is an unintended side effect to the means of turning the trolley by flipping the switch that comes about with trying to save the lives of the men, which is the intention and therefore the act is morally