[dukey]

There are 10 people in a lifeboat. There is a small child, some teenagers, some adults, and a old man. The problem is, the boat only holds 9 people, so who do you throw out and leave to die ?

[KhanCEO]

There are 10 people in a lifeboat. There is a small child, some teenagers, some adults, and a old man. The problem is, the boat only holds 9 people, so who do you throw out and leave to die ?

Is there a limited supply of food/water? If so, throw everyone off the lifeboat.
Or just make sure your not the one getting thrown off the boat, one of the two.

[jeezlouise]

I say chuck an adult (or two, for company). Can't toss a child, IMHO, for ethical reasons, the old guy is more likely to have experience at something useful, and the teens will at least be willing to learn, help out, and be flexible. The adults will just bicker and clusterf*ck cuz they'll each think they're right about what to do.

[emersonbiggins]

Wait, 10 people are already in the lifeboat, and it hasn't sunk yet? Doesn't look like a problem to me.

Now if 10 are on the island, and the boat only holds 9, it really doesn't matter who you leave. Tossing a teenager, though, is my opinion - too old to starve, too young to miss sex.

[kevincarter]

You don't kick anyone out of a boat trough a democratic process, you don't vote on it and you don't expect the person who has been choosen to leave the boat to actually cooperate and leave the boat without putting up a fight.

You can conspire with the teenagers and the old man to kick out an adult at night while he is asleep or distracted, you should choose the biggest adult since he is the one most likely to choose YOU as a candidate for leaving the boat.

[paimei01]

I know the answer ! This is a test of thinking outside the box
You take turns swimming outside the boat, the ones who can. Anyway the one who you throw off the boat will do just that, so why not take turns.
The initial problem does not say that the boat has to go somewhere and the one outside will not be able to swim as fast as the boat or something
Public Education

[grabby]

Children playing with gasoline and matchers and just ignorant.
sigh.

Only answer: Put child in the lap of the adults, and wait to be rescued. Anything else in making the choice makes you subhuman animals or nazis. You NEVER throw anyone out of the boat, you ALWAYS let nature take its course or we are nazis. This question is the fery first step of the slippery slope argument and thinking about it means the problem already exists. Some lunatic psychiatrist invented it.

The Nazi euthanasia program, code-named “Operation-T4,” set out to eliminate “life unworthy of life.” It RAPIDLY expanded to include individuals with mental illness, with Hitler’s 1939 decree allowing physicians to decide that certain individuals “be accorded a mercy-death.” (Doing them a favor)These patients included those with schizophrenia, the criminally insane, and the chronically hospitalized.

The euthanasia program became the Nazi regime’s first campaign of mass murder against specific populations whom it considered inferior (also Jews, Jehovahs witnesses and Conservative christians) and threatening to the well-being of the Aryan race and the first time in history where psychiatrists sought out to systematically exterminate their patients, with several prominent psychiatrists playing central roles (1–4). By 1940, six killing centers designated as euthanasia

Our society has already passed a crossroads on humanity for many years now when talking about right-to-die. T'all grew up with it and think that there is nothing wrong with it. But someday soon there will be talk of killing off all who don't believe like some, and you will agree, if you think nothing wrong with euthenasia.

But don't worry, peak oil will get us before society finallly would, but just barely. We are well-oiled and decrepid as a society.

So here is some more , interesting how fast it went and that the DOCTORS PROMOTED IT dude, you let this happen the DOCTORS WILL BE KILLING YOU if you are not normal, or if you have insurance, whatever. we cannot function normally with such power as to be able to kill without retribution.

By 1940, six killing centers designated as euthanasia institutions
were established at Brandenburg, Grafeneck, Hartheim,
Sonnenstein, Bernburg, and Hadamar. The Hadamar Psychiatric
Institute near Wiesbaden, Germany, code-named “Facility-E,”
was refashioned for use as a psychiatry euthanasia facility in November
1940. From mid-January 1941 under Dr. Ernst Baumhard’s
direction, with a staff of approximately 100, busloads of patients
arrived daily at the killing operation. The patients were
offloaded, weighed, photographed, and led to the gas chamber
disguised as a shower room in the cellar. At least 10,000 mentally
ill adults were gassed and cremated at Hadamar in the first 9 months of
1941. In August 1942, after a short break, the facility again functioned
as a euthanasia center, using lethal medication doses or
starvation. After removal of various organs for medical research,
the bodies were buried in mass graves located on the hospital
grounds. The killing center remained operational until its liberation
by American troops on March 26, 1945 (4).
Operation-T4 claimed approximately 200,000 lives. Psychiatric
euthanasia institutions served as training centers for the
Schutzstaffel (SS) who used the experience to construct larger
killing centers (Auschwitz, Treblinka, etc.). The psychiatrist Dr.
Imfried Eberl, Treblinka’s first commandant and the only physician
to command a death camp, established the facility following
his experience as superintendent of Brandenburg Psychiatry
Hospital (2).

LET ME REPEAT THAT

The psychiatrist Dr. Imfried Eberl, Treblinka’s first commandant and the only physician to command a death camp, established the facility following his experience as superintendent of Brandenburg Psychiatry Hospital (2).

LET ME REPEAT THAT

The psychiatrist Dr. Imfried Eberl, Treblinka’s first commandant and the only physician to command a death camp, established the facility following his experience as superintendent of Brandenburg Psychiatry Hospital (2).

Vomiting lines form to the right...

Soon, if you post incorrect things on the internet, belong to the wrong party, or are a minority of some kind, you will get a shower.

[seahorse]

The only moral dilema is the fact that you are unwilling to sacrifice yourself. There's enough space for everyone but you.

[grabby]

Volunteering without co-ercion is moral, and the next best answer.

[dukey]

yes paimei01 was right
It was a thinking out of the box excercise.
I gave everyone the illusion of choice.

You can do whatever you want to solve this problem, as long as you choose something out of this box of choices.

If I had just said the boat only holds 9 people, think of a solution. You guys would have invented all sorts of answers, chuck out any uncessary stuff. Hold tight and hope the boat holds all 10 etc

It is a way of getting people to do what you want, but at the same thing they think they have come to this solution on their own. The illusion of free choice.

[seahorse2]

The swimming outside the boat was not a reasonable choice, its about as reasonable as saying let's solve our prison overpopulation problem by letting all the prisoners live on the moon. For all kinds of reasons, one will not be able to "swim" outside the boat or even tread water outside the boat, at a minimum, you will cause everyone to starve and dehydrate quicker - not an option if you are actually trying to survive as long as possible. The risk of serious injury or death is increased exponentially by being outside the boat, shark, jelly fish, etc, and you have no way of treating those injuries. And, without a rope, the person will be separated from the boat due to currents etc.

So, if you "think outside the box", come up with something reasonable.

This "lifeboat" question is often used as a question to cause people to think about morality. However, the morality of the question has already been ruled on by the courts. The English Courts have ruled it is murder to kill someone in a lifeboat to save the lives of the others. In fact, they say what I told you before, the duty is not to save yourself, but to save others by throwing yourself out of the boat.

At the Divisional Court of the Queen’s Bench Division, the panel of judges found that there was insufficient 'necessity' for the killing. The judges argued that allowing an exception to murder for certain perilous circumstances would set a dangerous precedent for the future, as courts could interpret the decision to acquit other forms of killing. The presiding justice, Lord Coleridge, went as far as to call Dudley and Stephens' actions inconsistent with the morals of civilized societies, pointing out the virtues of Greco-Roman literature and the Biblical story of Jesus. Other quotes include:

To preserve one's life is generally speaking a duty, but it may be the plainest and the highest duty to sacrifice it. [...] It is not correct, therefore, to say that there is any absolute or unqualified necessity to preserve one's life.

Regina vs. Dudley wikipedia

In other words, throw yourself from the boat. Those who are unfamiliar with history, i.e. the above case, are doomed to repeat it.

[kevincarter]

The problem is, the boat only holds 9 people

If I had just said the boat only holds 9 people, think of a solution

Sorry, I don't get it, I'm trying but I don't, can anyone explain it to me? Is there a boat or not? Is the boat in the middle of the ocean? What's happening? Why are you looking at me?

the duty is not to save yourself, but to save others by throwing yourself out of the boat.

Excuse me? What about the drive for survival? Through yourself to save the rest? My God, that is so PC. And so unreal unless they are your kids or someone you are in love with. Man is an animal and animals fight for survival (unless they have been in captivity for too long).

Wake up man, the boat only holds 9.

[seahorse]

Kevin,

It may seem PC to you, but people sacrifice themselves or put their lives at risk everyday for strangers, i.e. firemen, policemen, soldiers, rescuers who just happen by. The captain and most of the crew on the Titanic went down with the ship, as well as most of the male passengers who allowed others to get in lifeboats. These are but a few of the examples.

The moral dilema you and others have with the lifeboat hypothetical is this belief that somehow you can cheat death by sacrificing others. The court ruling above and most morality (east and west) realizes that one cannot cheat death, and thus, accepting your own mortality, you act for the benefit of the common good, not yourself. I suggest reading "Code of the Samurai" to better understand that the moral dilema is posed by life, not the lifeboat. You are in that lifeboat now, whether you realize it or not.

[Jack]

There are 10 people in a lifeboat. There is a small child, some teenagers, some adults, and a old man. The problem is, the boat only holds 9 people, so who do you throw out and leave to die ?

Simple. Whoever is the greatest threat to my survival. Other attributes are irrelevant.

[Eli]

I know the answer ! This is a test of thinking outside the box
You take turns swimming outside the boat, the ones who can. Anyway the one who you throw off the boat will do just that, so why not take turns.
The initial problem does not say that the boat has to go somewhere and the one outside will not be able to swim as fast as the boat or something
Public Education

This is exactly right we all agree to take turns swimming and Pamei is the first one to take a turn.

Once she is in the water wham! Smash her with the oar no fuss no muss problem solved.

[seahorse2]

Jack loves children.

[paimei01]

This is exactly right we all agree to take turns swimming and Pamei is the first one to take a turn.

Once she is in the water wham! Smash her with the oar no fuss no muss problem solved.

I am a he ! Good ideea, fight for a place in the boat , in case of thrown overboard make sure you sink the boat

[I_Like_Plants]

OK the 10 in the boat are Americans - 2/3 are overweight, 1/3 obese. A good portion, out of the ten likely 2 or 3, are dependent on drugs, maybe royally fucked without their injectable insulin, Haldol-type substances, etc.

First low-blood-sugar event, one passes out - this can take place just hours after ending up in the lifeboat - someone fitter can swim for that long unless the water's very cold (are we talking tropics or temparate region?) so that settles it or someone just says, "Hey, I'm fucked without my medicine anyway, so in about 2 hours I'll get woozy, another hour I'll be in a coma, just heave me overboard that that happens ok?" and problem solved.

[kevincarter]

but people sacrifice themselves or put their lives at risk everyday for strangers, i.e. firemen, policemen, soldiers, rescuers who just happen by.

Even though we all have a drive to "help" others that does not mean we are ready to commit suicide to save a complete stranger. You can die trying to pull a stranger out of the water, you see he needs help, you get into the water and take your chances in order to save him, you may die or you may survive and save him (wee see it every year, people drowning in the ocean and strangers trying to rescue them). But that's very different from beeing in a boat and volunteering to commit suicide to save the stranger next to you. I doubt even the best fire fighter on a boat would volunteer to commit suicide to save the group.

one cannot cheat death, and thus, accepting your own mortality, you act for the benefit of the common good, not yourself.

That defeatism is quite depressing, suicide again, Kamikazes did it too. Sacrifice for the common good of their group. So do human bombs way too often to.

People who were on United 93 were diffrent though, they knew for certain that they were ALL going to die so they did something about it. If you have to choose among "dying now" or "dying now and killing a 1.000" people it is ovious you'd choose number 1.

I'll try to find that book anyway

[max_power29]

People who were on United 93 were diffrent though, they knew for certain that they were ALL going to die so they did something about it.

Flight 93 was actually shot down by a local air national guard unit who refused Cheney's orders to stand down. None of the phone calls from any of the hijacked planes were real.

The "heroic story" is just a made-up propaganda myth.

I agree with Jack's and I like plants answers as the best ones.