The Moral Dilemma
Hi lovely readers! I feel like it’s been an extra long time since I’ve written, since I measure time in Taylor Swift re-records and yet another one is already out. [Sorry, the part of me that’s seeing her in concert in two weeks is just so slightly freaking out and there’s simply nothing I can do….]. Today’s post is covering moral dilemmas! For those who don’t know, a moral dilemma is a thought-provoking, yet largely unrealistic scenario with no right or wrong answer, one that typically strikes up some voices around the dinner table. I’ve always been told that I’m relatively good at filling silent gaps (a nice way of saying I never shut up) and even asked for advice for what to do when there are lulls in conversations. If you’ve been looking for a conversation-starter- or keeper, depending on how bored you really are- look no further than these five “dilemmas”. They are guaranteed to fix up any awkward conversation and will give you something in common with people you didn’t think you could speak to for longer than five minutes. Without further ado, a few conundrums for you AND your next boring conversation:
1.) The Bridge Dilemma [I think this is the best one]:
Once upon a time, there was a land made up of two sides, connected to one another by a long and deep river. Atop the river was a bridge which allowed the people to get across. However, every night, a murderer came up on the bridge, and stabbed whoever tried to make the journey across (a fact well known by the village). The murderer was a psychopath- he has no ability to feel emotions and therefore kills without any form of empathy or motive. For this reason, we will also call the murderer “the fool”.
On one side of the bridge lived a woman, who was married to her husband – he worked in the nights and came back during the morning. The woman cheated on her husband with another man, the lover, who lived on the other side of the bridge. Her routine was simple: once her husband went off to work, she would sneak across the bridge before it got too dark and return at the crack of dawn the next day.
The woman also had a best friend, who knew of the woman’s affair and herself was very jealous of the woman’s marriage and thought it was internally very unfair that she was cheating on him. Finally, there is a boat man- the only person in the village with ties to a boat, who charges money only at night in exchange for rides across the river once the killer is on the loose. That brings us our six characters: the woman, the woman’s best friend, the lover, the boat man, the killer, and the husband. Keep these in mind.
One day, the woman’s husband goes off to work and she, as usual, made her way across the river to her lover’s house. However, on this night in particular, the lover’s wife (who is NOT a character in this story) is coming home early, so the lover kicks the woman out so he can keep it a secret from his wife. Because it is no dark out, the woman is very angry with the lover and tries to reason with him to let her stay, but he has none of it and kicks her out after a fight. The woman walks towards the bridge, but when she checks her purse, she makes the unfortunate discovery that she has forgotten her wallet back at home.
She promptly turns around to go ask her lover for the money, but upon arriving, sees that her lover is with his wife and very annoyed. He refuses to give her the money out of worry it will make his own wife suspicious and kicks her out once again. Turned away, the woman dials her best friend and clues her in to the situation, but her best friend rejects her request for money saying that it is her own fault for cheating. Out of options, the woman calls her husband, and attempts to lie to him about the reason she is on the other side of the river to get him to wire her the money. But he sees through her, and eventually, the woman is forced to reveal the truth of the affair. Angry and disappointed, the husband denies her request for money. Left empty-handed, the woman goes to the boat man and asks him to let her take the boat as an I-owe-you, but he insists that this business is the way he makes his living and if he allows her across for free he will have to do so for all the other villagers.
Ultimately, the woman decides to risk it and run across the bridge, hoping she can make it before the killer gets there. Unfortunately, the killer is already there, and he stabs her, ending the woman’s life and our story.
Gruesome, right? Here’s the dilemma. You’ve met the six characters and heard the story, now rank the six characters (including the woman and the killer) in the order of which they should be held responsible for the woman’s death. The meaning of the word responsible is up to you! This dilemma will teach you so much about how the people you are around perceive responsibility and think through blame.
2.) Mary’s Room – a great short dilemma😊
A girl named Mary is raised in a small black and white room, where she stays until she turns 18. In that time, she is given love and attention like any other child, including a full education where she learns about absolutely everything- history, science, art, dance, math, language, etc. When she turns 18, Mary is let out of the room for the first time in her life, and the first thing she sees is a red tomato (don’t question it, just go with it). Mary has already been taught, in her black and white room, that tomatoes are red, but this is her first time physically seeing the color. Has Mary learned anything new?
3.) The Perfect World
If you had the opportunity to live the perfect life, would you? This is the moral dilemma to wonder about it.
Imagine years from now, we have built a portal to the perfect life. Programmed like an advanced AI, you and everyone else has the option to “plug in” and program their life trajectory to go exactly the way you want it to. Want to have exactly four kids? To get married at 26? To travel the world with millions of dollars? You can program exactly that. Want to leave some things to the imagination and NOT program them? You can do that too. Want to NOT know you are in a simulation while you’re living your life? You can even do that too.
The only catch? It will be a simulation, whether you know it or not, and you commit to doing it for your whole life. Do you plug in?
4.) The Bystander Effect
One day, you (a college student on the brink of graduation in this scenario) are driving in your car, blasting the music at a loud volume. As you look at your phone to send a text to your friend whose house you are on your way to, you hit something solid and your car swerves to a stop. In the next few seconds, five other cars swerve to avoid hitting you, causing a mass accident in the middle of the intersection.
You get out of the car and check on what you hit, your breath stopping in its tracks when you realize it was another person who seems to be dead on the ground in front of you. Before you can do anything else, however, an elderly lady comes out of her car, petrified and crying, insisting it was her that caused the accident and hit the person. A few minutes later, the police are on the scene.
You understand that whoever is deemed responsible will be sent to jail for a long time, and the woman is sure it was her that is responsible, despite you being quite certain you were the actually guilty party. You also know that going to jail would likely cause huge damage to your professional career and the trajectory of your life. There are no security cameras or other witnesses on the scene. Do you admit fault and risk the consequences, or do you let the stranger take the fall?
5.) The Doctor’s Dilemma
Ah, the classic trolley problem. Unless you’re completely new to moral dilemmas (if that’s you, sorry you’re hooked now), you know of the trolley problem: two tracks, with a train headed down one and about to kill five people, but if you flip a lever, you can switch the track so that the train only kills one person instead. Feel free to pose this question as is, but I love a little variation, hence the more specific version.
Imagine you are a doctor, with none of the responsibilities or legalities associated with being a medical authority. In other words, like an episode of Grey’s Anatomy, where there sometimes seems like there is no hypocritic oath to swear or legal department to sue you.
On one particular day, you are held responsible for six patients. Five are dying because they need organ transplants, but due to their unique genetic requirements, they will likely not get the ones they need in time to make it. Luckily for them, the sixth patient is a match to what each one needs, and if they die, the five other patients may actually make it. Unluckily for them, the sixth patient is at the hospital with a treatable illness which requires a medication you already have on hand. So now it’s decision time: give the savable patient his medicine and likely end the lives of five vulnerable patients? Or end one life but save five others? The choice is yours.
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I’ve got an endless supply of these always tucked away in my brain, so if you enjoyed this list and want some more, feel free to DM me on Instagram or private message me so I can send along some of my other favorites. Next week, I’ll be back with a guide to what colleges are looking for in college admissions (talk about a total 180), so if you have any specific questions for me to answer, I’m just a message away!
If you’re an old fan, thanks for reading another one. And if you’re new, as always, I was enchanted to meet you😊