Comic #3745: the-ethical-fourier-transform

View Original Comic

Description

Here’s a transcription of the text from the comic:

Panel 1
Character 1: I call it “the ethical fourier transform.”

Character 2: Suppose you’ve got an ethical conundrum. Instead of solving it, convert it to the realm of economics. Having solved it there, declare it to be a solved ethical problem.

Panel 2
Character 1: Example: suppose you’re piloting a trolley. It’s headed toward five people. You can change course to kill only one. What do you do?

Character 2: I don’t know. Life is special. It’s like asking whether one infinity is as big as five infinities.

Panel 3
Character 1: Exactly. Unsovable. But we can calculate the damage to the trolley, which is derived from the mass of the special human lives.

Panel 4
Character 2: This is a terrible method! It doesn’t even solve basic virtue problems, like whether you can steal bread to feed your family.

Panel 5
Character 1: Let me check today’s grain market prices… and…

Panel 6
Character 2: It’ll be ethical to steal bread to feed your family until mid-November.

Panel 7
Character 1: It should always be ethical to steal to eat!

Character 2: It is! For potatoes, and some varieties of rice.

Panel 8
Character 3: This is dumb. Moral truth doesn’t hinge on commodity pricing!

Panel 9
Character 2: Let me ask you this: Is it ethical to steal truffle mushrooms and champagne to feed your family?

Panel 10
Character 3: I don’t… well… honestly, that somehow does feel like a different matter than the bread.

Panel 11
Character 1: This is weirding me out.

Character 2: Come to the dark side.

Panel 12
Character 3:

If you need further assistance with the comic, let me know!