Some time ago we asked you for participation in a study (here or here) that presented professional philosophers and lay people with two moral scenarios. One of them included two options, the other included these two options and four additional options, i.e., six options. Our aim was to investigate whether the additional options would affect people’s choices concerning the two options that were available in both scenarios – despite the fact that the additional options are irrelevant for that choice. In particular, we wanted to test whether the intuitive responses of professional philosophers were less susceptible to the influence of irrelevant options than those of lay people. However, we found that professional philosophers’ intuitions were even more susceptible to the presence of irrelevant options than lay people. This is no good news for the so called “expertise defense”, which holds that professional philosophers are experts concerning the intuitive evaluation of thought experiment cases.
Here are some more details concerning our study.
One scenario, Two Options, was the classical “push”-dilemma with two available options (see Figure 1 below):
Option 1: Carl could run to a nearby bridge on which a heavy worker is standing and push this worker from the bridge. Thereby this worker would fall on the tracks and collide with the speed-train. Due to the collision with the heavy worker (Carl himself would not be heavy enough to stop the train) the speed-train would stop before it reaches the nine workers. The heavy worker would lose his life due to the collision.
Option 2: Carl could do nothing. In this case the nine workers would be run over by the speed-train and lose their lives in this accident.
In the other scenario, Six Options, four additional “intermediate” options were available (see Figure 2 below):
Option 1: Carl could run to a nearby bridge on which a heavy worker is standing and push this worker from the bridge. Thereby this worker would fall on the tracks and collide with the speed-train. Due to the collision with the heavy worker (Carl himself would not be heavy enough to stop the train) the speed-train would stop before it reaches the nine workers. The heavy worker would lose his life due to the collision.
Option 2: Carl could push a button that would open a trap door and thereby causing two workers on top of the right bridge to fall on the tracks. The speed-train would collide with the two workers and be stopped before it reaches the nine workers. The two workers would lose their lives due to the collision.
Option 3: Carl could throw Switch 3 and thereby redirect a train carrying three workers from the lower parallel track onto the main track. The speed-train would collide with this train and be stopped before it reaches the nine workers. The three workers on the train would lose their lives due to the collision.
Option 4: Carl could throw Switch 2 and thereby redirect an empty train from the upper parallel track onto the main track. The speed-train would collide with this train and be stopped before it reaches the nine workers. On its way to the main track the empty train would run over four workers (wearing the novel hearing protection). The four workers would lose their lives due to the collision.
Option 5: Carl could throw Switch 1 and thereby redirect the speed-train from the main track onto a parallel track before it reaches the nine workers. On the parallel track the speed train would run over five workers (wearing the novel hearing protection). The five workers would lose their lives due to the collision.
Option 6: Carl could do nothing. In this case the nine workers would be run over by the speed-train and lose their lives in this accident.
Each participant saw both scenarios in randomized order of presentation. To qualify as expert subjects, participants had to indicate, first, that they have a PhD (64%) or MA (36%) in philosophy, and second, that moral philosophy or ethics is one of their areas of specialization (62%) or competence (38%).
The results are shown below. “First” and “Second” refer to the order in which the cases were presented. For Six Options, only the two “extreme” options that are also available in Two Options (doing nothing and push) are considered (the intermediate options were chosen by ~20% of experts and 10% of lay people).
We are interested to learn what readers of this blog think about our findings. And please contact us if you want to see some of the details of our study.
Alex Wiegmann (U Goettingen, [email protected]), Joachim Horvath (U Cologne, [email protected]), & Karina Meyer (U Goettingen, [email protected])
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