It always bothers me that ethics and moral classes seem to concentrate on these kinds of difficult questions. It has been a while since I’ve had to make the choice between killing 1 person or allowing 5 to die. The more important moal questions that we have to deal with are ones like “should I fudge my income on the tax form?” or “is it really wrong to sleep with a married women if we’re really in love?” Let’s get the simple stuff right before we even start looking at the hard stuff.

Michael Sandel is one of the most important political philosophers of our time.  His book, Liberalism and the Limits of Justice is a direct challenge to John Rawls’ notion of a justice that operates abstractly of the communities in which people actually learn how to live just lives.

I cannot imagine that Professor Sandel’s course would focus on the kind of quandary ethics that is illustrated in the “money quote” from this article.  It seems at odd with his approach.

Just a thought, but if I could “push” someone in front of the speeding trolley to somehow save the five passengers…couldn’t I jump in front of the trolley myself?  Shouldn’t I jump in front of the trolley myself?

I can tell you, no one would regard a soldier with anything but contempt if he pushed a fellow soldier on top of a grenade to save himself and another four soldiers in a foxhole.  Everything changes though, if the soldier sacrifices himself by jumping on the grenade to save his fellows.  In fact…no greater love hath man than that he lay down his life for another.

Call me old fashioned, but I think the ethical situations used as an illustration have missed something important.  Selfless devotion, self sacrifice, putting others first all seem conspicuously missing from my vantage point.