The Role of Self-Sacrifice in Moral Dilemmas

Abstract

Centuries’ worth of cultural stories suggest that self-sacrifice may be a cornerstone of our moral concepts, yet this notion is largely absent from recent theories in moral psychology. For instance, in the footbridge version of the well-known trolley car problem the only way to save five people from a runaway trolley is to push a single man on the tracks. It is explicitly specified that the bystander cannot sacrifice himself because his weight is insufficient to stop the trolley. But imagine if this were not the case. Would people rather sacrifice themselves than push another? In Study 1, we find that people approve of self-sacrifice more than directly harming another person to achieve the same outcome. In Studies 2 and 3, we demonstrate that the effect is not broadly about sensitivity to self-cost, instead there is something unique about sacrificing the self. Important theoretical implications about agent-relativity and the role of causality in moral judgments are discussed.

Human Decisions in Moral Dilemmas are Largely Described by Utilitarianism: Virtual Car Driving Study Provides Guidelines for Autonomous Driving Vehicles

“…These studies point out, that the general population seems to favor utilitarian decisions (Bonnefon et al, 2015;Li et al, 2016;Malle et al, 2015). This applies even to cases, where the driver has to sacrifice himself for the greater good (Sachdeva, Iliev, Ekhtiari, & Dehghani, 2015). Such behavior is in line with the general philosophers' opinion (Fischer & Ravizza, 1992) and can be understood as an act of maximizing utility (Thomson, 1985).…”

Moral Judgements on the Actions of Self-driving Cars and Human Drivers in Dilemma Situations from Different Perspectives

“…We consider the use of animations to be a natural extension of the combination of simplified images and textual vignettes, as used in previous studies (Bonnefon et al, 2016;Li et al, 2016;Awad et al, 2018). As such a combination has been shown by Sachdeva et al (2015) to sufficiently manipulate perspective in moral dilemmas, simplified animations should similarly prompt participants to consider situations from the presented perspective. Nevertheless, a manipulation check was included in the analysis to confirm that such an effect occurred.…”

The Origins of Self

“…A similar study by Sachdeva et al (2015) looked at a variation of the trolley problem, in which the trolley is stopped by either throwing a person off a bridge over the track, or throwing yourself off. It offers the same choice between inaction, self-preserving action and self-sacrifice.…”