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10 months agoThe real ethical question here is, is there only one round of trolleys?
Because if this is a one and done question, then obviously I go for the one person.
But if it’s possible at any point somebody comes along and has to run the experiment again after me, then if I leave an infinitely expanding number on one side, all it would take is one sadistic person to wipe out a incalculable amount of life.
In which case, I take the track with two people. And again, it is a question of repetition whether or not doing it once means that it won’t happen next time or if this will continue with every cycle.
How many phone numbers can you remember?
You used to be required to memorize a bare minimum number of phone numbers to survive. Now, you’re lucky if people know their spouse’s and their own.
Cognitive offloading results in an atrophy of the skill and retention. There is a similar phenomena with people who watch 1000 tutorial videos but never implement anything or do it themselves. This is not “deep learning”, and its entertainment masquerading as productivity.
GPS is undeniably the same, and it’s easily observable between generations. AI LLM search queries are already resulting in a disturbing amount of people accepting what is presented non-critically. These people are sadly atrophying whatever critical analysis skills they had to vet information and links.