Analysis Of Carl Zimmer's Essay 'Whose Life Would You Save'

“Most of us would like to believe that when we say something is right or wrong, we are using our powers of reason alone. But Greene argues that our emotions also play a powerful role in our moral judgments, triggering instinctive responses that are the product of millions of years of evolution.”

As science and technology have progressed, so has the understanding of evolution and progression of species. However, many people rarely consider the evolution that humans have undergone and continue to go through. Carl Zimmer poses a new idea to the evolution of mankind: the evolution of morality. In his article, “Whose Life Would You Save,” Zimmer introduces the idea that through time and evolution, humans have been wired to know what is right and wrong based on the effect …show more content…
Zimmer introduces this idea with an example of a subway. He shows that in the event of being on a runaway subway, people are willing to push a button to switch the track and save five men if it meant sacrificing one on the new route. However, people are not willing to push a man of a bridge to stop the train even if it would save five men. Zimmer uses this example to show that, throughout the years, humans have been taught to not cause harm to other people. He infers that humans have evolved to know that pushing a man off a bridge to his death is completely immoral, but simply pushing a button is not (Zimmer). There are several possible explanations to this phenomenon. One possible reason is humans, like all other organisms, want to ensure the survival of the species. The act of physically pushing a man to his death would be killing a fellow organism, no matter how many people it would save. Zimmer uses several more examples throughout his article to further demonstrate this idea and the scientific evidence behind his