A way of thinking about the most brutal moral problems of our time? Well, any time, really.

Your basic trolley problem (invented by British philosopher Philippa Foot in 1967) is laughably simple. You’re out for a walk when you see five people tied to a train track. The train is coming – right now. Luckily there’s a lever nearby that switches the train on to another track – on which ONE person is tied up. Whatcha gonna do? One or five?

In my philosophy class (ie, real life) people’s trolleys go off in all directions. ‘I’d untie the people!’, ‘I’d fix the track!’, ‘I’d notify the rail authority!’ I mean for fuck’s sake people!

But this is not real life. Or is it? Actually, only the other day in my job as a CIA agent, I had to decide whether to torture a guy to get him to reveal a plot to blow up the Oil Magnates Annual Christmas Party. Oh the agony…waterboard one guy, or allow the gruesome death of hundreds of oil company executives?

What would you do?

Or take Israel and Hamas. Israel’s clearly decided that killing 20,000 or more Palestinians is ‘worth it’ in order to destroy Hamas and thus deter future attacks. Hamas, equally clearly, has decided that the ‘martyrdom’ of 20,000 Palestinians is worth it in order to bring the world’s attention to the injustices perpetrated by Israel on the Palestinians. The only people who don’t seem to get much of a say are the Palestinians, who might, conceivably, disagree.

So who’s right? Well, Immanuel Kant would say that people can never be merely a means to an end. So if killing people is wrong, it’s wrong, whatever it may or may not achieve. What I’d say to Kant is, ‘Immanuel, the means IS the end.’ If the means feels icky, the end’s not worth it.

Said someone in my class, ‘All this talk of what’s ‘better’ (five or one, dead Palestinians or dead Israelis) is beside the point. We’re in no position to judge – it’s up to the nation involved.’ Which is certainly true so far, since for all the international finger shaking Hamas and Israel are still proceeding on their merry way.

But God don’t you hate relativism?

Anyways, the point is that a lot of moral decisions are a choice between bad and worse. And often we don’t even realise we’re making them. Next year, for instance, I’m having a holiday in Greece for eight weeks. Not only is this killing the planet, but also, by spending the money on flights, accommodation, etc, I’m NOT spending it on rescuing animals, starving children, etc. My philosophy group members square their own selfish spending decisions up with themselves by saying stuff like, ‘But I’m a volunteer life saver, isn’t that enough?’ and ‘You’ve got to be kind to yourself to be kind to others’. I on the other hand just give up and admit I’m a bad person. As Annie Lennox says ‘if I had a dollar for every sin I’d have a mountain of money up to my chin.’ Great song!

Is it ok to be a bad person, sometimes? Can I have a dollar?

Anyway, here’s what I think the Israelis and Palestinians should do. First, stop dropping bombs. Then just like, walk up to each other, you know, one at a time, hold out their hands, and say something like, Hi, I’m Joachim, I’m sorry this all seems to have gone to shit. Would you like a coffee and baklava? That way, the means and the end are both fine. And peace will come. Fuck governments, let’s leave them to play in their blood-stained sandpits all by themselves.

PS this month’s free curated literary fiction, at The Selective Bookworm. My favourite (short) read is The Giant Comes, by AJ Saxma. Part fable, part social commentary with a flavour of the Arabian nights (no harem pants though) it’s definitely worth a download.