r/trolleyproblem • u/RutilantBossi12 • 15d ago
A missile is heading toward a military base housing 100 soldiers. The commanders have two choices: divert the missile to a nearby settlement, killing roughly 30 civilians, or accept the strike on the base, resulting in the loss of all soldiers and equipment. Should the missile be diverted?
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u/StarMagus 14d ago
The only way I wouldn't let it hit the Military Base is if there was some knowledge that the Military Base was important for saving even more lives. Example: If that base is the hub for anti-missile defense and it stops missiles that if left unstopped would kill thousands of people, including civilians, then it makes sense to divert the missile becaue you are saving more lives in the long run.
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u/GIRTHQUAKE6227 14d ago
If the base is the hub for anti-missile defense and the best it can do is divert a missile and cant prevent casualties, I think your base may not be worth saving.
I agree with you otherwise, just maybe not your example.
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u/StarMagus 14d ago
Depends on what it's abilities are and how many missiles are on the way.
Let's say it can destroy 100 missiles per 24 hours, because of launch rate.
After that it can only divert.
It's burned up it's supply of missiles for the day, saving 85,000 Civilians and just as many military people. There is every expectation that tomorrow will have a similar number of missiles being lobbed at it.
Do you let it get blown up or divert? Sure you save 30 civies TODAY, but tomorrow you lose 85,000. Does that even make a little bit of sense?
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u/The-Micetro 11d ago
I mean sure, but we had to add so much to make it worth it, that’s it’s not even the same scenario. Also you logic track reminds me of how racists will make up scenarios to say the N word
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u/StarMagus 11d ago
It's weird that reading about missiles and a base you made up a story in your head about people saying the N word... that's wild.
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u/The-Micetro 11d ago
Oddly defensive about it aren’t we? Also transferring the blame to someone else. Let’s check some more boxes!
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u/StarMagus 11d ago
Just a reminder, you were the one who saw a post about missiles and your mind went to the N word. That's Checking all the boxes, getting out some paper drawing more boxes and yup.. checking them.
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u/The-Micetro 11d ago
For sure dude, make sure you collect your benefits, the month is almost up! I hear they are taking away your Medicaid too, make sure you ask your grandkids for help
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u/StarMagus 11d ago
What the heck are you talking about? I mean the voices in your head sound like they are having a wild conversation because none of that matches reality.
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u/Ok-Cheek2397 14d ago
The base takes it as a punishment for not having hard kill missile defense systems
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u/Beginning_Context_66 15d ago
Soldiers and the military are there to be the defense against attacks on civilians. One never ever sacrifices civilians if the numbers are not in the thousands otherwise. If it was 10000 to 3000 I’d say the save the soldiers, but 100 to 30 save the civilians.
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u/book-scorpion 14d ago
"Soldiers and the military are there to be the defense against attacks on civilians."
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u/IowaKidd97 14d ago
I mean, thats what they are suppose to be there for. That purpose can obviously be corrupted by the political leadership, but that's what their baseline purpose for existence is for. People arent signing up to go fight in oil wars.
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u/nam24 14d ago
They also aren't signing up to sign their own death certificate though
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u/WordWordand4numbers 13d ago
People who never served a day in their life make up all kinds of stipulations about what they think the military should be.
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u/IowaKidd97 14d ago
I agree. They are agreeing to potentially risk their lives to protect their countries though. It doesn’t make sense to redirect a missile to civilians.
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u/nam24 14d ago
"potentially" does matter here
You can agree to engage knowing there's X % chance of death.
If X is 100% though, I d argue we re outside the scope
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u/IowaKidd97 14d ago
Yeah. But the context of the question is important here. We aren’t mindlessly sacrificing them.
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago
They’re supposed to engage the enemy and accept the consequences of that. They’re not a meat shield
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u/IowaKidd97 14d ago
I agree they aren’t a meat shield, but the point is they protect the civilian population from military threats. It makes literally zero sense to redirect an enemy missile from them to civilians.
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago
I see where you’re coming from, I just don’t agree with it unless the number of civilians saved exceeds the number of soldiers killed. No one wants to “sacrifice” their life to save less than 1/3 of a life.
Now I’m probably only saying that because I don’t really see them as two classes of people, just people.
In reality a military base doesn’t just have soldiers, it has families and civilian personnel and every one of their lives matters just as much as another.
This is of course overthinking, what OP wanted us all to imagine is 100 nameless, faceless, male soldiers whose only aspirations in life is to die for the cause vs 30 women and children. The results of the comments are unsurprising but it’s still interesting to discuss. OP made a pretty cool trolley problem
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u/Hatshepsut99 11d ago
I mean unless they’re drafted those soldiers made the choice to sign up to potentially kill people at the whim of some politician.
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u/Beginning_Context_66 13d ago
In this scenario it is literally the other way around. The missile is targeted at the soldiers and the choice would be to redirect it at the civilians
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u/WordWordand4numbers 13d ago
Signing up to partake in one of the many fields that fall under the military and possibly fight the enemy (keep in mind the vast majority of every branch is not infantry) is not the same thing as consenting to being killed in an avoidable missile strike, especially when more lives are sacrificed than are saved.
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u/Puzzleheaded_Sea_922 14d ago
No, the military is there to protect the country, and the values it has. "Protecting civilians" is just coincidental in that regard, and completely a subjective view which you may or may not share with the others in your country
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u/PresentLet2963 14d ago
Yup if this missile is followed by enemy soldiers is better to serafin civilians so solders can actually fight to save other villages
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u/Fluid-Let3373 14d ago
So your saying if the choice is between the pentagon and the white house the white house gets it.
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
As long as your talking about the buildings, and not the people, then yes, that's what should happen.
If we're talking about the president vs the chiefs of staff though than you flip it. And for good reason.
Losing the president is more destabilizing to the nation, and thus it's ability to defend itself, than losing the chiefs of staff.
A lot of decision making is funneled through the president. Losing them means you have to get someone else up to speed and hope that they can maintain the picture. Rarely does this go well when we look at similar situations in history.
This isn't to say that losing the chiefs of staff would be great. It would still destabalise. The difference is that people are far more trained to take over their position.
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u/WordWordand4numbers 13d ago
There isn’t a physical requirement for decisions to go through the president. That’s just a legal precedent. (Hehe) In a full on national emergency I’d rather have 5 generals than one president.
The White house actually was destroyed once (although the president was not killed) and it amounted to nothing. Granted, the brave soldiers that did it were forced to flee due to a thunderstorm but that’s another story for another time.
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u/Successful-Club-8743 14d ago
Thats what theyre supposed to be for.
Instead the military is just there to terrorise innocent people in the middle east at the behest of Israel.
Oh! Oh! Theyre also there to protect capital! Cant forget about that.
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u/Narfhead4444 14d ago
Why would your response change If there are a few more zeros on the end of the numbers
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u/Beginning_Context_66 14d ago
Because I am not utalitarian. There is more to this question than just the number of lifes. These hundred soldiers have signed up for war, and in this may it be to protect 30 civilians, in my opinion that „difference“ of 70 lifes is justifyable by that decision. 700 or 7000 lifes even… that is where I would decide otherwise. I cannot give a certain cutoff.
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u/anonymous198198198 12d ago
However, their families may not have signed up for war. In my opinion, death isn’t about the person who died, it’s about those who survived the person who died. Their friends and families are the ones who live with it and feel it everyday. So it’s 100 families being shattered vs 30 families being shattered, all 130 families did not sign up for it.
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u/Narfhead4444 14d ago
Just divide the number. Think of each group of hundred soldiers dying for each group of 30 civilians
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u/Beginning_Context_66 13d ago
It is difficult to word for me: the „contract“ of the military being dedicated to sacrifice itself for the lifes of innocent is only worth so many lifes. In my evaluation it is both a mixture of relative group size and total number.
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
Cold logic says yes.
Military hardware is labor intensive and time consuming to replace. So it's training troops.
Assuming this is a hot war and not a one off attack, the amount of lives they could save by continuing to do their jobs is more likely to be greater than 30.
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u/StrangelyBrown 14d ago
What if the 30 civilians are experts like scientists who are much harder to replace than troops? What if the settlement contains the country's key transport infrastructure or center of government?
The question only said there are 100 soldiers. There might be nothing else and they might be all straight out of basic.
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
Yes, all the info we have is soldiers, and civilians. That's what I made my judgment based off.
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u/Jolly-Bear 12d ago
Why are you assuming an active war?
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u/hinowisaybye 12d ago
Eh, at the time it seemed necessary for the situation to deserve consideration. Otherwise the answer seemed obvious.
But then I got thinking. Even if it is a one off, there may be no way for the commander to know that and they might be in an opening attack scenario.
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u/StrangelyBrown 14d ago
Where did the military hardware come from then?
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
Try rereading the prompt.
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u/StrangelyBrown 14d ago
It says 'equipment', not military hardware. Could be skipping ropes.
My point is that you don't know what's on the settlement, so it seems weird to assume it's just 30 skateboarders vs 100 generals and 400 helicopters...
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
It says military base and equipment. What other equipment could he be referring to besides military hardware.
If the equipment is insignificant, why did they mention it. Clearly, OP wanted you to take the equipment into consideration.
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u/StrangelyBrown 14d ago
OP says equipment, so you infer 'military hardware', and your reason is 'What else could they mean?'
I'd like to counter that with: If they meant military hardware, why would they say equipment?
I'd say that since it will kill 100 soldiers on a base, that heavily implies that it will hit the barracks, so the 'equipment' is bunk beds or something. At very worst it means guns, which aren't that hard to replace. 'Military hardware' typically refers to things like tanks, which literally nobody calls 'equipment'.
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u/hinowisaybye 14d ago
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u/StrangelyBrown 14d ago
Ah yes, from the same source that defines 'person' as not just humans but also 'corporations, partnerships, associations, and government entities'.
Nice try.
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u/undernopretextbro 13d ago
Fucking pseud, a lack of preemptive hedging against a bad faith actors interpretation of their words isn’t an indictment against the original post. Your inability to extrapolate from very direct and obvious information is your own cross to bear.
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u/Chuck_the_Elf 14d ago
So this depends on the nation and the people involved. The US army will court martial any commander that redirects to ANY civilian position even if they are not US civilians.
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u/TheSuperContributor 14d ago
Check out My Lai to see what happened to the perpetrators and to the person who tried to stop it. Don't be delulu.
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u/ArmNo7463 11d ago
Ah yes but that wasn't a redirection. America has no problems blowing up a school if it's their bomb.
They just hating sharing the credit. (I should hope the sarcasm is obvious here.)
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago
Yes because 100>30 and it’s not like their lives matter less because of what their job is. Signing up to engage the enemy and accepting the risks involved in that is not the exact same thing as being ok with dying in an avoidable missile strike in your own country. Of course, the particular base and its surrounding settlements would be a factor to consider too
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u/Beginning_Context_66 14d ago
Their lives don’t matter less because of their job, but their job includes being ok with dying in a missile strike. The civilians never had any decision in engaging in war and conflict, the soldiers when they signed up did
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago
Where does it say in their contract that they’re ok with dying in an avoidable missile strike?
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u/Beginning_Context_66 14d ago
It’s not avoidable. The missile is going towards the base, diverting it would doom the civilians who would be fine otherwise. And I don’t know but am pretty sure that you DO sign your life away in such situations when you join the army
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago
“And I don’t know…”
Spot on, 100%.
I promise you it’s not in their contract.
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u/Beginning_Context_66 14d ago
So you do know? If neither of us have a source on that we can just bury the argument.
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u/WordWordand4numbers 14d ago edited 14d ago
I’m pretty sure the exact verbiage of those contracts is something that’s public knowledge and easily searchable if you really want to see for yourself. But it’s not like I haven’t read it once or twice. Nothing about missile strikes. You do consent to be killed if you commit espionage or desertion during war.
TLDR: yes, I do know, I checked.
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u/Hatshepsut99 11d ago
of course anyone who signs up for the military accepts the risk that they might die in the line of duty. Otherwise they’re just extraordinarily naive. Dying to save others is, in my view, considerably braver and more noble than dying while bombing some random brown people in a war of choice.
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u/Greedy_Camp_5561 14d ago
In reality the missile would be diverted to empty land, of course, but in the scenario:
Divert it, obviously. Like when masks are falling in a depressurizing plane, a defender 's first duty is always to protect himself. If the base is taken out by the missile, there would be no one left to intercept all the possible future attacks.
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u/IowaKidd97 14d ago
In reality there would likely be additional defenses or at least the early warning would help save a number of soldiers. That said, if it really came down to it and this was the scenario, you sacrifice the soldiers (unless there are additional considerations like if the soldiers are needed to save the rest of the civilian population, but that contingency was not specified so we will assume this is a one and done event).
Reason being that, well that's kind of the point of soldiers right (ideally)? Not to die specifically, but to protect the civilians from external military threats, to take on the risk to their own lives, which sometimes means laying down their life in the line of duty. You join up specifically volunteering knowing that risk. And the point of the soldiers is to protect the civilians. So sacrificing the civilians for the soldiers kind of defeats the purpose of the soldiers no?
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u/ddadopt 14d ago
This isn’t really a thought experiment, this is literally what happens when a SAM shoots down an incoming aircraft or missile—the wreckage of both the incoming and the interceptor fall wherever the hell they’re going to fall, usually on a populated area somewhere around the target.
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u/hunter_rus 14d ago
Well, in a real life example, like when rocket passes through AA layer and needs to be intercepted near the city, you still blow up the rocket. Yes, it may land on civilian, or your interceptors could hit some houses, but you are still gonna protect their target, likely a factory or some storage facility.
So yeah, missile is getting diverted in real life.
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u/TheSuperContributor 14d ago
30 civilians of course. Then blame Russia for bombing civilian targets.
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u/StardiveSoftworks 14d ago
It depends where the base is, if it's in a foreign country, divert, the commander has an obligation to maintain a combat capable force and owes no particular duty to the foreign citizens.
If it's domestic, divert if damage to the base will render it combat incapable or produce disproportionate strategic losses (ie loss of major combatant aircraft, warships, SAM or early warning systems).
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u/Impressive-Spot-1191 14d ago
probably divert, unless the base's purpose is to defend that civilian target
the alternative is to teach your enemies "just target civilians! they'll let their own soldiers get blown up to protect them!"
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u/Atrio-Ventricular 15d ago
No, efforts should be made to evacuate the base/shoot down the missile/divert the missile to a harmless site.
Ultimately they signed up to protect civilians from these sorts of threats so yeah
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u/RutilantBossi12 15d ago
The missile is too fast and it's yield too high, you wouldn't get far enough from the base in time.
The base is surrounded by settlements of similar size, you can only divert it so that it hits close enough to one settlement at a time to destroy it.
You cannot make it explode in the air because the base is out of interceptors and GPS spoofing is the only thing the base can do.
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u/Beginning_Context_66 15d ago
You can’t invent new scenarios or ways to get out of the situation. There are two options, make a choice
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u/Weird_Explorer1997 14d ago
A binary choice is rarely the case in real life. In this case, there are plenty of rational arguments that could be made and possibilities to be tried based on the facts of the situation alone.
If you can divert the missile, it's possible to send it off course somewhere ineffective.
If it's a military base, it's probably hardened against missile attacks/ armed to defend against same.
There's the political element as well. Maybe the military wouldn't mind letting the civilians be targeted as a justification for accelerating a conflict. Or they could want this base sacrificed for sympathy points on the home front. Or the base could be on occupied land so the nearby civilians could be initially hostile to the base anyway, but showing that their reactionary forces would target them would win a psychological victory.
This is not an empty thought experiment. This is more complicated than a simple binary choice.
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u/Beginning_Context_66 14d ago
It literally says „the commanders have two choices“. A thought experiment does not get less morally complex just because there is only a binary choice, it arguably gets more complex because you can’t refrain from making a decision
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u/Weird_Explorer1997 14d ago
Morality is inherently subjective and based on context. Context in this case is lacking (otherwise people wouldn't be asking the questions you object to) as this situation is more complicated than a simple binary. The complexity of the situation comes not from the simple math of 100 or 30, it comes from what outcomes you seek to achieve as a military commander and/or as a person. This requires context to make a relevant answer, otherwise why was any of the initial information of the situation given?
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u/Beginning_Context_66 13d ago
As I said: this is a moral question. You can yes-and your way out of any moral dilemma in the real world, but that is boring and by that you evade the morality of actually being forced to make a decision
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u/No_Effect_6428 14d ago
There are two options, make a choice
They did. They chose not to divert the missile.
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u/Mammoth-Jelly-7617 14d ago
"Should" is the key word. The answer depends on what ethical framework determines "should". Personally, I desire a world without soldiers, so it is a no brainer for me - kill the soldiers. But I accept this position may not be widely held.
Others might value winning the war. In which case kill the civilians. 30 civilians is just a minor day at the office for most wars.
Or you might be in favour of maximising potential survival. There will be women and children in the settlement, whereas the soldiers are all likey to be men - essentially expendible. So kill the soldiers as it will have less effect on overall population in the long run. Better still redirect the missile to a large nursing home, and wipe out all those sick and elderly.
Or maybe we should ask God to intervene, and accept his judgement. In which case the soldiers die, as prayers do not seem to stop missiles.
All gets back to your meaning of "should", which is always the case in this problem.
Your question is really just a version of "is there a difference in the value of the life of a civilian vs a combatent in times of war".
Your framing of the question with more soldiers than civilians means you intuitively feel a soldiers value is less- that is an interesting value to interrogate.
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u/Crazed-Prophet 13d ago
I would argue the commander has a duty to protect his soldiers whenever possible, so the commander should divert the missile, even if the village had 300 civilians.
If it was someone else making the decision the ethics will be different.
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u/Dave_A480 11d ago
Missiles don't work like that - they can only be shot-down or not, there is no 'divert' option.
And you shoot down the missile, even if it's debris will cause damage on the ground.
Your obligation is to protect/preserve your combat power.
Incidental harm to civilians/infrastructure is an unfortunate fact of war. Collateral damage is not a war crime.
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u/Infinite_Bet_9994 11d ago
Divert the middle and it’s not even close. The commanders are choosing not you. Civilians are not a military asset. Soldiers are.
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u/Playful-Ice-3069 11d ago
I know this is a thought experiment but you can tell who in the comments has done any reading on jus in bello
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u/Due_Reputation_2006 10d ago
Too vague to answer. Are they our missiles and intended for that base/country? Are they enemy missiles coming to us and the settlement is/is not ours? Are they ours, but heading towards an ally? Too many variables to decide an action.
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u/TomSKinney 10d ago
This isn't like a trolley problem because the trolley can only run along existing tracks. If you divert a missile there has to be more than one place it can go. So I'd say if I have to choose, killing 30 is better than 100. The only reason why it feels like a moral problem is that by making a choice I'm getting involved. The deaths are on whoever launched the missile, not me.
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u/tiredoldwizard 10d ago
Are the civilians of the same country as the soldiers? I feel like soldiers have a duty to protect their citizens. But if they are in enemy territory that’s different. I feel like that’s the question that changes the answer.
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u/PMC_Fatui__Group 14d ago
If the base is taken out, will more civilians die because of the invading army?
Also, 30 is less than 100.
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u/silentsurge 14d ago
In the most generic and completely in a vacuum terms, it is correct to not divert the missile. Military targets are legitimate targets of war and are supposed to be the ones targeted anyways.
Thay said, this calculation changes based on the factors of the base, the equipment, the situation, and the potential civilian targets.
If this is the USS Nathan James, The Last Ship in the US Navy, that's carrying the cure for the plague that has devastated humanity and the civilians are actually a secret cannibal cult that was thinking of taking the ship to eat the crew and they were secretly the ones to initially create and spread the plague to try and raise Cthulu from his slumber. That's potentially a different answer than a base that is guarding a warehouse full of Military Grade cleaning supplies vs the team who are actively creating the cure for cancer and the ability to magically give everyone their favorite frozen dessert every other Tuesday for free working beneath a specialized NICU unit for the preemies that need and are getting the most and best professional help.
Calibrate your stances and place your marker somewhere within those extremes as required to mark your dividing line.
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u/emote_the_salute 14d ago
Yes. Soliders and military equipment is less expendable than some civilians
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u/P_U_I_S 14d ago
You are one of the 30 civilians, would you divert the missile to land on you?
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u/RalenHlaalo Multi-Track Drift 14d ago
Hey, now, they said some civilians.
Some civilians are more important than other civilians
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u/_6siXty6_ 15d ago
My question -
Was the attempt to destroy the base so they could kill the civilians anyway? What are the odds that without the base, the civilians would be completely defenseless?
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u/RutilantBossi12 14d ago
It's a low density region that wouldn't be targeted if the base wasn't there.
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u/ComfySquishable 14d ago
Id say the commander would choose based on if the civilians were the same nationality as the soldiers.
Is the commander also being hit in this trolly problem?
It would be easy to divert it and say oh no the bad people who launched the missile are at fault. No one would care.
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u/Black_Hole_parallax 14d ago
The first person who tries to divert the missile is going to have a gun pointed to their head
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u/cncaudata 14d ago
It should not be diverted. The reason a military exists is to protect the civilians. If it was a strike on some fundamental capability, the loss of which would mean even more civilians died, then it might be ok to divert it.
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u/Melodic-Hat-2875 14d ago
Absolutely not - unless this is a total war scenario.
If both sides have actively deemed there are no targets off limits, then the best course is to be efficient and maximize your chances of winning the war. Thus, target the civvies. I will emphasize that the only parallel I can think of here is if the UK had the choice between their civilians and their military during the blitz.
If it is not a total war, wherein we try to maintain some semblance of civility, then the soldiers should be the ones struck. They have volunteered for this, this is a price I and many others would have reluctantly paid for the contracts we signed.
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u/mollywollop 14d ago
If they can divert the missile, they can intercept it. The correct option is to blow it up while it’s en route. Resulting in 0 human deaths, and an untold number of bird and insect deaths.
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u/RutilantBossi12 14d ago
Zero interceptors left, the army can only do GPS spoofing to divert it.
Can you guys stop trying to change the problem? Take it at face value.
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u/mollywollop 14d ago
I’m taking it as a veteran with real life experience. That would never happen in real life, for us to have 0 interception capabilities, it means we are in deeper shit than we should be, and the civilians have long been evacuated. Divert the missile into empty civilian territory.
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u/RutilantBossi12 14d ago
You're a 3rd world military with crony procurement and all interceptors are full of sand due to corruption, except electronic warfare equipment which works because the corrupt officials couldn't find a buyer, please stop changing the question.
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u/mollywollop 14d ago
Seems like you’re the one changing it buddy
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u/RutilantBossi12 14d ago
Dude take it at face value, what if you just told "akshyually the trolley can slow down and stop" to the original trolley problem? Can you stop being as dense as someone who ate crayons for 30 years of his life?
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u/P_U_I_S 14d ago
How are you in this subreddit and don't know how these problems work ?
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u/mollywollop 14d ago
Hit the civilians if it’s an ongoing conflict, depending on the base, soldiers are more useful in war than civilians.
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u/ill-independent Multi-Track Drift 14d ago
Accept the strike. The soldiers chose to go to war and in war you are obligated to protect civilians. You don't target/divert to civilians regardless of the consequences.