Frederic R. Kellogg (George Washington University; Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (UFPE)) has posted Dewey to Parfit on the Trolley Problem: “So What?” The Continuum of Inquiry Trumps Moral Mathematics on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
Derek Parfit’s 1984 work, Reasons and Persons, is replete with examples similar to the famous trolley problem (see 170-184) where we confront the choice of letting a runaway trolley kill several individuals or diverting it into a track where it will kill only one. Parfit’s “moral mathematics” explores instances of uncertainty arising in an immediate and instantaneous context. For John Dewey, normative certainty derives not from such constructed puzzles but from experience, which is not revealed in one unique situation but rather from perceptions recognized in many instances over time. Successive instances reveal similarities of practice and of potential therapeutic responses. Dewey’s answer to the trolley problem is, perhaps, a banal “So what?” Surely, early instances of a problem often appear unresolvable. Actual trolleys, though, are subject to preventative practices based on actual situations and dangers, avoiding the unlikely trolley dilemma in real life.