comment: >
  
  Let me show this to my granny
context: I’m so confused by this. Are you saying they’re expendable or is this just a rephrasing of the cable car ethical question?
  Should you save a young person or an old person? Should you cause the death of 1 person if it means saving 5? >
  
  Honestly, I hate these types of questions, because no matter what you say, someone will be upset, and it doesn't actually do anything, considering you rarely know how someone is actually going to react.
  Just like the question of 'your pet or a random stranger' it only serves to get people upset when someone answers differently :P >
  
  They are thought experiments. The point is to create discussion and elicit emotions >
  
  Yeah, but only among people who *want* them, these questions are just being basically used, on places like Reddit, to show one side or the other as 'horrible people'.
  If you are in a philosophy class or something like that, where such a question is relevant? sure, but on a site like Reddit, it just causes arguments and bad feelings. >
  
  I never thought I'd hear the argument made on Reddit that we should avoid certain topics because they lead to arguments.  Having an argument is basically half the reason to be on this site. On this particular sub, it's closer to 100%. >
  
  I don't really think they should be avoided, I just don't see the point of this particular argument.
  It is entirely hypothetical
  It probably also has nothing to what would actually happen in real life (ie, who would you rescue? probably no one in real life)
  The scenarios are typically set up to get *someone* upset.  The most popular I have seen is 'would you save your pet or a random stranger' and the minute someone says 'pet' they immediately get jumped and told they are a bad person for putting an animal's life over a human (which then gets counter jumped by the 'humans aren't inheritally more valuable crowd) and it just goes over and over.
  I prefer arguments where the sides are willing to listen to the other side is saying rather. (which granted most people don't want to, but this particular argument seems to get them even more entrenched)
  Edit: Basically I feel these are just low effort karma farms/rage bait...