Investigating Moral Dilemmas

A moral dilemma is a situation where:

1.) You   have to choose  between two or more actions.

2.) There are moral reasons for you to choose each of the actions.

3.) You cannot do all of the actions and have to choose which action (or actions when there are three or more choices) want  to made. The agent thus seems condemned to moral failure; no matter what she does, she will do something wrong (or fail to do something that she ought to do).

Some moral Dilemmas

In the novel Sophie's Choice, by William Styron (Vintage Books, 1976 -- the 1982 movie starred Meryl Streep & Kevin Kline), a Polish woman, Sophie Zawistowska, is arrested by the Nazis and sent to the Auschwitz death camp. On arrival, she is "honored" for not being a Jew by being allowed a choice: One of her children will be spared the gas chamber if she chooses which one. In an agony of indecision, as both children are being taken away, she suddenly does choose. They can take her daughter, who is younger and smaller. Sophie hopes that her older and stronger son will be better able to survive, but she loses track of him and never does learn of his fate. Did she do the right thing? Years later, haunted by the guilt of having chosen between her children, Sophie commits suicide. Should she have felt guilty?  Taken  of page 

Task: We read the definition of  Moral Dilemma. What do you think about  it.

After that we are going to search for a real example on Internet, better, if it is possible, a video to show in class.