The Economics of the Everyday and the Extraordinary

In my free time, which does exist, I do things I do not need to do. Actually, I usually think of something while I’m doing something I do need to do and end up doing the thing I don’t need to do instead of the thing I need to do. In other words, I was doing my economics homework, and here’s what popped into my cafeteria turkey pot pie soup (by this I mean my brain; I actually did eat turkey pot pie soup a few days ago and I got the feeling the cafeteria staff was trying to pass off sludgy scrambled leftovers as “soup”).

Would you save your own child or let him die to save a thousand people? It’s a question of risk, because only God can know the future for sure. You could save the child, and have saved one person, or let him die and save either a thousand or none. However, there is a fourth option that comes in to play. Since you do not know whether the death of your child will without doubt lead to the salvation of a thousand people, you also do not know whether saving your child will without doubt lead to the death of a thousand. If you let your child die, you risk losing a thousand and one people, or saving a thousand. If you save your child, you risk losing a thousand people, or saving a thousand and one. The negative risk if you let your child die is higher than the negative risk if you save him, and the positive risk or possibility if you save your child is higher than if you let the child die, so the right answer must be to save your child.

I was told that this paradox is commonly used to refer to matters such as stem cell research and free will. Apparently I don’t think it is a paradox, but I’m being cautious about taking myself too seriously. I could just be making an error or playing a cruel mental joke on myself. Either way, I will probably figure it out with myself, we’ll come to some mutual agreement, and then myself and I will be friends again.

On a different note (I wasn’t aware writing involved making music but this cliché is so…cliché so I’ll draw a bass clef and jump for C to C sharp, a minor half step), I improved my Writing II grade (see previous post if you don’t know what I’m talking about). I guess the little bit of effort I expended in my last paper rewarded me with an A. It may also have been that I chose the topic which my teacher had said he personally thought would be the most interesting. Sometimes the best answers come from listening to the authorities, and other times the best answers are those you determine yourself.