Professional Ethics

Assignment 1
The ‘Lifeboat’ Dilemma

Hasan Ahmed
321600
BESE-10A
 Answer
Firstly, keeping the “women and children first” code of conduct in mind where, the lives of
women and children are to be saved first in a life or death situation, I choose the woman
who is six weeks pregnant and the 13 year old twins. It would not be right to break the twins
up and only choose one of them and being thirteen years old their life has just started in a
way as they have yet to experience many things in life, and same goes for the child the
pregnant women will give birth to. Secondly, I would choose the two young adults who just
got married because they are just starting an important part of their life and will probably
enter parenthood as well. The future of their lives has just started, and it would not be fair
to keep just one of them and would not be right to choose neither of them as well. Lastly,I
would choose the veteran surgeon simply because it would be a good idea to have someone
with medical experience on the lifeboat and if a situation occurs which requires a medical
professional. So the six chosen individuals to be saved are the 13 year old twins, the
pregnant women, the newly married couple, and the veteran surgeon.

It is never our decision to choose who deserves to live and who doesn’t, but with that being
said, now keeping the “the captain and crew goes down with the ship” code of conduct in
mind, the captain, the lifeguard or anyone in position of authority, has the obligation to
ensure the evacuation of everyone under them. So with this I choose to sacrifice the captain
and the lifeguard. As for the senior citizen, although he has fifteen grandchildren, he has
lived his fair share of life when there are more people on the list that are just starting their
lives. Which leaves us with the university professor, I didn’t choose the university professor
because I didn’t feel as though he was as high up in the priority list to be saved and I think
he can be replaced by another professor at the university. So the four individuals to be
sacrificed will be the captain, the lifeguard, the senior citizen, and the university professor.