In response to a post about the trolley problem

There’s a story I like where a lifeboat is sinking because too many people are on it. One person organizes two others to throw people off until it stabilizes. Then, after the boat is stabilized, the two others find a guy who hid at the bottom of the boat, and they throw him off even though they don’t need to, because they like throwing people off. The one who initially organized this is charged with murder, and he doesn’t contest the charge, but he receives a lesser sentence compared to the other two.

The organizer’s actions are a trolley problem, but the court’s decision is also a trolley problem. Do you let this man go, because he wanted to prevent at least some deaths? Or do you punish him, in the hopes that fear of unavoidable punishment will prevent people from killing needlessly like the other two did? The court judges him for doing the same thing it does every day, and that’s why it can’t judge him too harshly.