The Speeder Problem

[nunya]

Scenario Aurek (A)
Imagine you are an apprentice force user - relatively young and new in the ways of the force - and sitting this night in your typical meditation spot on the top of a single floor building (about 3 meters or 10 feet above ground level).

The area is sparsely populated due the late hour, however, you hear and then see a speeder zooming toward your direction at a high rate of speed.  As it approaches you become aware it is completely unoccupied and out of control although on a straight and unfaltering trajectory down the current path.

Your senses guide your vision down the path, away from the speeder, in the direction it is travelling.  You are shocked to see a lifeform tied up in a way so they are suspended in the middle of the path secured with bindings on either side of the path.  Your senses confirm and you know that unless something changes, that lifeform will be struck and killed by the runaway speeder.

The limitations of your current prowess in the force prevent you from reaching the lifeform in time to remove any of the bindings or otherwise move the individual from the path.  Your master is out of range for any kind of help.  You have a good grasp on force-push but even that is limited in strength. 

Your keen observations, however, reveal an option within your abilities.  Another path intersects the one on which the speeder is zooming and intersects a few meters/feet before it will be too late to stop a collision with the bound individual in the path. 

The reach of your push ability is still limited but you know that, even from your current position, your push-force reach is just enough to reach the front of the speeder so that it will deflect harmlessly onto the other path.  The deflection on to the other path will allow you to get help and untie the lifeform. 
However, if your timing is off and the push is too late, the speeder will collide with the buildings on the opposite side of the path causing the speeder to spin out of control and explode directly onto the tied up lifeform.  Your reflexes are quick and you are confident in your ability to time the push just right.

Scenario Besh (B)
Same staging as Scenario Aurek, however, instead of one individual tied across the path on the current trajectory, it is a group of five all bundled together.  Unfortunately, on the divergent path from Scenario Aurek, a single individual is tied across the path in the same manner as was described in Scenario Aurek.  A push of the speeder will doom one lifeform but save five.  Doing nothing or delaying action will result in the termination of entire the group of five.

Scenario Cresh (C)
Same staging as Scenario Besh, however, you find a very large and heavy weighted lifeform standing close by also on the roof.  Your abilities are such that you could push the large lifeform into the path of the speeder with enough force and the right timing to deflect the speeder away from either path causing the death of the large lifeform but saving all six of the bound individuals.

Scenario Dorn (D)
Same staging as Scenario Cresh, however, your senses tell you that this large lifeform is the orchestrator of the entire scenario - causing the runaway speeder and the tying of the lifeforms across the path.

Scenario Esk (E)
Same staging as scenario Besh, however, only one lifeform is tied across each path.  Unfortunately, you can sense that one is your mother by birth and the other is your father by birth.  You were young when leaving but can still remember them with fondness and love.

What is your choice in each scenario? 

Answers can be like below where '?' is a placeholder for the (hopefully) short answer:
A - ?
B - ?
C - ?
D - ?
E - ?

Feel free to give some reasoning after listing your answers and seek understanding for the answers of others.

[nunya]

A - push the speeder to save a life
B - run for help with the feeling that taking action will make me responsible for taking a life
C - run for help with the feeling that taking action will make me responsible for taking a life
D - push the large lifeform in the path of the speeder - feeling justice as served
E - run for help.  not knowing who is on which path gives the benefit of ignorance and the feeling that taking action will make me responsible for choosing one over the other

[janx]

this is some variation of the train/tied up on the tracks or trolly ethics problem.

ethically, you're at fault if you don't attempt to do something, even if that's limited/doomed to failure.  racing to the victim counts, so perhaps you render aid when you got there.

likewise, if there's only 2 choices and either causes harm, but saves somebody, unless it's some kind of mean bias, it counts as not evil.

What remains then, assuming we're not evil, we're going to try to do something to help.

The situation is wired so the hero isn't fast, or reachy enough to save the day directly.  So our tactical rather than ethical goal is to try to think outside the box for a solution not among the expected set.

Pushing the victim or the speeder is at the extreme limit (or out of) range.  Therefore, while a nice try, doesn't solve the problem.

As I've researched this for a different project, pushing a moving object out of collision path is more effective the FARTHER away it is from the target.  So you don't push the speeder at the last second, you push it at the earliest you can influence it to shift it's angle even slightly, takes less energy AND has a greater drift from the target over time.  So race toward it and push early and continuously.

Also consider using the force to push yourself to increase your speed as you run toward the speeder.

AND, if you can get close enough, use the force to turn off/steer the speeder controls directly.  While size matters not, it does in physics. Crank the wheel, hit the brakes. Or rip off the engine, choke off its fuel. Toss something like a power line or crate to interfere/ crash with.

Now none of this is listed in your scenarios. A jedi does not deal in absolutes. I'm gonna assess the situation and come up with something I see/sense in the moment, not some canned scenario and choice somebody gives me.

Boxes. Cut them open, and step out.

[nunya]

Point to you for the answers reply! 

this is some variation of the train/tied up on the tracks or trolly ethics problem.

correct.

ethically, you're at fault if you don't attempt to do something, even if that's limited/doomed to failure.  racing to the victim counts, so perhaps you render aid when you got there.

In that case, what is your reply to Scenario Esk?  how do you justify your decision to yourself?
Consider an alternate to Scenario Besh where the speeder is on path to strike the single lifeform and a push will deflect to the group of 5.  Is doing nothing ethical?

likewise, if there's only 2 choices and either causes harm, but saves somebody, unless it's some kind of mean bias, it counts as not evil.

What remains then, assuming we're not evil, we're going to try to do something to help.

The situation is wired so the hero isn't fast, or reachy enough to save the day directly.  So our tactical rather than ethical goal is to try to think outside the box for a solution not among the expected set.

Pushing the victim or the speeder is at the extreme limit (or out of) range.  Therefore, while a nice try, doesn't solve the problem.

As I've researched this for a different project, pushing a moving object out of collision path is more effective the FARTHER away it is from the target.  So you don't push the speeder at the last second, you push it at the earliest you can influence it to shift it's angle even slightly, takes less energy AND has a greater drift from the target over time.  So race toward it and push early and continuously.

i missed a word in the earlier posting but not able to modify. It should read "The reach of your push ability is still limited but you know that, even moving from your current position, your push-force reach is just enough to reach the front of the speeder so that it will deflect harmlessly onto the other path."
The point being to lock in the options of push or push not.

Also consider using the force to push yourself to increase your speed as you run toward the speeder.

The force user does not have this ability.

AND, if you can get close enough, use the force to turn off/steer the speeder controls directly.  While size matters not, it does in physics. Crank the wheel, hit the brakes. Or rip off the engine, choke off its fuel. Toss something like a power line or crate to interfere/ crash with.

see earlier point - not possible to get closer without total failure. 

Now none of this is listed in your scenarios. A jedi does not deal in absolutes. I'm gonna assess the situation and come up with something I see/sense in the moment, not some canned scenario and choice somebody gives me.

the scenarios are not necessarily limited to jedi

Boxes. Cut them open, and step out.

Nice work stepping out of the box!  Unfortunately, your attempt to circumvent the point results in the death of everyone involved.

[janx]

Captain Kirk doesn't believe in no-win scenarios.

A philosophical situation is designed to force canned choices.  The actual situation would be much more fluid and open to manipulation.

When the speeder gets close force-push UP from beneath the nose.  This causes the speeder to jump over the victim.

Or tear a piece of pavement loose and let the speeder crash into that.  Remember, size matters not.

Or force-fling your saber to get in front of the speeder and cut it in half, causing the halves to skid harmlessly

In the actual situation, I would do something to help. Maybe it would fail. I'd feel bad, but after Jedi Group Therapy, I'd come to accept that I did the best I could with good intentions.

Not the answer you wanted, but a Jedi doesn't accept defeat before they've acted. Do or do not.  There is no try. Which is why they succeed.

[nunya]

A philosophical situation is designed to force canned choices.  The actual situation would be much more fluid and open to manipulation.

so...you do not want to play? got it.

[janx]

so...you do not want to play? got it.

I am happy to engage with the problem itself.  Not the constraints put on to force limited choice to make a point rather than solve the problem.

You made a box around the problem.  To think outside the box means to ignore your boundaries, to come up with something novel, and potentially solve the actual problem, saving everybody.

Failing that, as sometimes one cannot save everybody, I will at least know I tried, and that I didn't let preconceived notions get in the way.

So you're trying to test out an ethical dilemma, I'm trying to save people.

As a  test of a Jedi's ethics, my approach also says something about ethics.

[nunya]

 

I am happy to engage with the problem itself.  Not the constraints put on to force limited choice to make a point rather than solve the problem.

You made a box around the problem.  To think outside the box means to ignore your boundaries, to come up with something novel, and potentially solve the actual problem, saving everybody.

Failing that, as sometimes one cannot save everybody, I will at least know I tried, and that I didn't let preconceived notions get in the way.

So you're trying to test out an ethical dilemma, I'm trying to save people.

As a  test of a Jedi's ethics, my approach also says something about ethics.