Decision Making

Here's the dilemma: A runaway train will kill five people unless you flip a switch sending it onto another track where it will kill only one. Most people say flipping the switch is moral.

But what if the only way to stop the train is to push a passer-by onto the track? You still save a net of four lives, but most people say that's not moral.

Why people have such different reactions to the same end has long puzzled philosophers. Now Princeton University researchers have scanned volunteers' brains while they pondered similar ethical dilemmas and found that a key to tough moral judgments is emotion, not logical or analytical reasoning.

Read the rest of this story from the Associated Press....
Brain scanning shows emotion key in how people make tough moral decisions