Ethics

Well besides the obvious answer that it would be murder, what do we know about the lives of any of these people besides these scant, and in reality insignificant facts?

Call the tree surgeon.

hahah my bad, three pasients

so did they intentionally kill this homeless man? Or did he die as a result of the tranquillizers that they might have been giving him to calm him.

It seems your english isn't the best so that is why I am asking.

In this example - I would simply remove any personal background of any of the individuals involved including the homeless man. Every human is created equal so take anything else away other than their medical details.

Now you should be able to answer the question ethically.

So you have three patients waiting transplants - someone dies who has healthy organs - you contact next of kin and see if they agree to the donations. You keep the dying person on life support until you reach next of kin or find a donor card.

You do not kill another person to get the organs so if that is how you would get these organs from a person with bone fractures you do not do this.

This exact issue is covered brilliantly in The Good Place



Then watch the practical application

Yes, they intentionally kill the guy to save the other three. If they dont do it, the other three will die. There is a kid, cancer researcher and red cross worker.

Thank you for the videoes, they were really helpful

What is so special about these 3 people, over someone who just happens to not have a home?

You make a lot of assumptions about someone who doesn't have a home.
You also make many about someone who, in this case, spends their day that in the big picture, has minimal impact.

What if after you kill the homeless person you find out he actually worked a full time job helping others learn skills they need, and chose to not have a home because it wasn't personally important to him. In addition, he had money in the bank, a lot of money, and left it all to cancer research.

Then, you give the organs to 2 adults who are (and you never know this) having incest with all their children, beating their spouses, embezzling money and belong to the KKK?
The child grows up and becomes a sexual predator and sadist, who takes advantage of many people, is addicted to drugs and runs his car into a crowd of people while under the influence?

What exactly do you have against this homeless person?

How is he not the equal of any of the others?

You're saving 3 lives?

Then why not just go into the next bay in the ER and kill whoever is in there?
Because they're a father? So? Do you know if his children might not be better off without him?

Are the 2 "worthy" adults less than a week away from retirement, and during these last days they're just saying goodbye and filling out forms?

Is the homeless person 19, and just gotten a job at a starbucks, and within a short time will be able to rent a place with roommates, get back to school etc?

Why would one assume one persons life is less worthy than anothers on such superficial qualities as they don't have a bed, as oppossed to spending most of your day spinning centrifuges or packaging up boxes of mylar blankets?

What if the kid had the broken leg and the homeless guy was in the group that needed organs.

Why not tranq and kill the kid and use his young and healthy organs to save the 3 adults?

That makes sense to me. Kids are a dime a dozen. People drop them like litters of puppies. Let the other 3 continue their lives.

exactly - that is why in solving this issue, you take away all the personal stuff. You have the medical diagnosis only.

In this case the "homeless" man should not even be considered as part of determining the three individuals who need transplants.

Change the homeless man to - a person who has fractures that come into a hospital to get care. What do you do?

In regard to the individuals that need transplants - there is pretty much always someone that requires a transplant - what do you normally do in this case? When someone comes in that is dead from trauma or dying/brain dead, etc. and is an organ donor or doctors reach out to family and ask for organ donation - then those on the donor list up next if they match there is an organ donation.

In the case of someone coming in with fractures - it is not even a consideration as they are treated for their fractures... they are not even considered.

A hospital/doctor's obligation/oath is to heal - you do not kill someone to heal someone else..period. Doctors and medical facilities are not "God" or judges - they do not determine who deserves to live or not live. They try to heal all.

It really is not a difficult dilemma ethically.

--- I did not view the videos --- not sure what went on there.

It is a version of the trolley problem. If you can choose to kill one person to save five... this is ethical under Utulitarianism.

This thread is the trolley problem.

mark

And yet there are various aspects of modern societies/economies that could be eliminated/reduced that would reduce risk of harm, which aren't because they aren't done with the intent of harming others.

E.g. 16 year-old kids are allowed to drive cars, are a known high-risk for crashes, but instead of raising the driving age, the insurance companies just charge them more money and those who survive get to enjoy the spoils of an economy where the dead effectively transfer their money/resources to those who survive them.

All harm-risk works this way, really, if you think about it. Those who are unlucky and die from the risks they take leave money and resources over for those who survive them. It is like war and pillaging except the violence is unintentional and indirect instead of intentional and direct.

If you really think its right to sacrifice one to save three you could donate your organs rather than a homeless mans.

Or go live in a tent so three homeless people can live in your home.

Or stay in your home and invite the 3 homeless people to live with you.

Doesn't have to be a win/lose.

No, of course not. I only said it as a response to the OP's implication that sacrificing a homeless person for others who pay more for housing is somehow justifiable based on the principle that the homeless person's life is worth less than others.

The point is that if someone lived in a tent to provide a home for some homeless people, that person would be considered exceptionally charitable for giving up his or her home for others.

Yet when a person is deemed homeless not by choice, some people consider that person not as being charitable for leaving a home vacant for others but rather as a 'waste of human life.'

It's ironic that becoming homeless to provide a home for others would be selfless, but yet someone could consider a homeless person's life worthless enough that it would be better to kill them to harvest their organs for other people who aren't homeless than to let them live and go on leaving a house empty for those other people who get to live in it.