Scenario 1: It is difficult, but not impossible to free the man from his chains or otherwise disrupt the functions of the trolley. You can eventually save him, so switching the trolley to his track is morally correct.
Scenario 2: The man cannot be freed from the track, the trolley will never stop running him over, and his suffering will never end. From a purely mathematical standpoint, he will eventually experience more suffering than the mortals tied to the track, so it would be more moral to allow the trolley to kill them and end their suffering immediately. ON THE OTHER HAND, if he’s immortal and can’t be freed, he will also experience infinite suffering just from being forever tied to an empty track, so it’s arguably no different if he’s being run over or not, so it would be more moral to give him the trolley and then let the other people go free so they can go out and enjoy their lives.
Scenario 1: It is difficult, but not impossible to free the man from his chains or otherwise disrupt the functions of the trolley. You can eventually save him, so switching the trolley to his track is morally correct.
Scenario 2: The man cannot be freed from the track, the trolley will never stop running him over, and his suffering will never end. From a purely mathematical standpoint, he will eventually experience more suffering than the mortals tied to the track, so it would be more moral to allow the trolley to kill them and end their suffering immediately. ON THE OTHER HAND, if he’s immortal and can’t be freed, he will also experience infinite suffering just from being forever tied to an empty track, so it’s arguably no different if he’s being run over or not, so it would be more moral to give him the trolley and then let the other people go free so they can go out and enjoy their lives.
So infinite suffering is worse than taking 5 lives, but finite suffering isn’t.
Then, where’s the cutoff? Would it be fine if he can be saved after 1 week? A year? A millennium?
how much work will it take? who will organize it? who will pay for it? will my taxes go up?
Not infinite suffering, as the trolley battery will only last for 10,000 years.
Sigh… unzips solar panels