Sarah owns a self-driving car. She has been using the car for about two months without experiencing

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Sarah owns a self-driving car. She has been using the car for about two months without experiencing any problems. Recently, however, she was confronted with the following dilemma. As her car started to descend a steep hill, she noticed that a school bus filled with children was stopped in the middle of the road about 150 feet in front of her. She quickly concluded that her self-driving car was on course to collide with the bus. In addition to herself, there were two other people in Sarah’s car. She had only two options at this point. She could take manual control of the car’s steering mechanism and swerve the car to the right to avoid hitting the bus. If she took this action, the car would careen over the edge of a cliff and fall about 500 feet, surely resulting in the death of the three occupants. Her other option was to allow the car to continue in its self-driving mode. Assume you are Sarah. What decision would you make? Do you take an action that will likely kill three people, including yourself, or take no action and allow the car to control itself, knowing that the car could possibly collide with the school bus and injure or kill many schoolchildren? Explain, using relevant ethical theories.

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The Legal And Ethical Environment Of Business

ISBN: 9781454893028

2nd Edition

Authors: Gerald R. Ferrera, Mystica M. Alexander, William P. Wiggins, Cheryl Kirschner, Jonathan J. Darrow

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