Moral Reasoning Assignment

For our assignment this week, we will be looking at the complexities of moral reasoning. To begin, complete the interactive experiment, based on the famous Trolley Dilemma, from Philosophyexperiments.com (linked below). Be sure to keep a record of your answers as you work through the questions, and then read the analyses of your answers at the end of the experiment.

Note: The final page of this activity is titled: “Is it Because He’s Fat: A Piece of Bigotry” – you do not need to continue beyond that page.

http://www.philosophyexperiments.com/fatman/Default.aspx

For your essay this week, discuss what you learned about your own moral reasoning compared with the moral reasoning of others who participated in this experiment (this will be available to you in the analysis section).

The following questions should help guide your writing:

In the preliminary questions, what answers did you select and why did you select them?
In the scenario questions, (The Runaway Train, The Fat Man on the Bridge, The Saboteur, and The Fat Man and the Ticking Bomb), what answers did you select and why did you select them?
In the analysis section, were your preliminary answers and your scenario answers consistent? If not, why not?
How do your answers compare with the answers of others who also participated in this experiment?
What does this experiment tell you about yourself and others in terms of moral reasoning?

Your completed assignment should be written primarily in first person and should be 500-750 words in length. If you use sources in your writing, be sure to identify them. If you use any direct language from a source, be sure to place those words in quotation marks.

SAMPLE SOLUTION

Moral Reasoning Test
The Trolley Dilemma experiment aided me to understand my moral reasoning. The first preliminary question was whether torture is always morally wrong, which I answered no. The reason for responding no is because I could conceive of an instance where torturing an immoral person would help extract information that would help do a lot of good in the world. The second preliminary question was on whether the morality of an act should be determined by whether it maximizes the total of happiness of all people involved or not. I answered no because an action can be morally right even though it does not maximize the happiness of all people involved. My answer to the third preliminary question was yes because I think that if it is avoidable, it is wrong to cause the death of a…