I like this as a way to clarify my intuition. But I think (as some other commenters here and on the EA forum pointed out) it would help to extend it to a more realistic example.
So let’s say instead of hearing a commotion by the river as I start my walk, I’m driving somewhere, and I come across a random stranger who was walking next to the road, and a car swerves over into the shoulder and is about to hit him. There’s a fence so the pedestrian has no way to dodge. The only thing I can do is swerve my car into the other car to make it hit the fence and stop; this won’t be dangerous to me or the other driver, but it will wreck both cars. And I’m pretty sure it will work. But my car will cost $5,000 to replace (let’s leave insurance out of this hypothetical). Of course, I’ll do it—the poor guy’s life is at stake.
Then the next time I’m driving somewhere, I see this happen again. Would I do it the second time? I mean, yeah, probably. I technically can replace the car again, though it’ll strain things a bit. But I’m definitely going to start thinking about the other factors involved. Why do so many pedestrians feel like they have to walk on this shoulder? Could nobody build a goddamn sidewalk? And why do the other drivers have such poor steering? They’re obviously not trying to kill pedestrians but something has gone very, very wrong. The third time it happens, I think I’ll keep driving, and start looking for more systematic solutions. Throwing money at the problem is clearly better than nothing, up to a point, but it doesn’t seem like the best possible move.
I like this as a way to clarify my intuition. But I think (as some other commenters here and on the EA forum pointed out) it would help to extend it to a more realistic example.
So let’s say instead of hearing a commotion by the river as I start my walk, I’m driving somewhere, and I come across a random stranger who was walking next to the road, and a car swerves over into the shoulder and is about to hit him. There’s a fence so the pedestrian has no way to dodge. The only thing I can do is swerve my car into the other car to make it hit the fence and stop; this won’t be dangerous to me or the other driver, but it will wreck both cars. And I’m pretty sure it will work. But my car will cost $5,000 to replace (let’s leave insurance out of this hypothetical). Of course, I’ll do it—the poor guy’s life is at stake.
Then the next time I’m driving somewhere, I see this happen again. Would I do it the second time? I mean, yeah, probably. I technically can replace the car again, though it’ll strain things a bit. But I’m definitely going to start thinking about the other factors involved. Why do so many pedestrians feel like they have to walk on this shoulder? Could nobody build a goddamn sidewalk? And why do the other drivers have such poor steering? They’re obviously not trying to kill pedestrians but something has gone very, very wrong. The third time it happens, I think I’ll keep driving, and start looking for more systematic solutions. Throwing money at the problem is clearly better than nothing, up to a point, but it doesn’t seem like the best possible move.