Student Assembly, Wednesday afternoon, September 9, 2020

[sith_happened]

Well, there wasn't an obstacle course this week, so things were looking up, right, students? Maybe? A little?

Anakin made his way to the front of the stage, holding out a piece of paper he'd received from the office. "Today we have some very special guests," he began, "so everyone shut up and listen to them, right? We have--" he read from the paper, "--Mikhail Robespierre and Janet, presenting about moral philosophy. Ethics students, I very much expect you to be paying attention."

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Lecture!

[demonic_cockroach]

An older man in a lavender suit and a peacock bow tie took the stage followed by a woman dressed in a purple dress and shirt.

Neither of them were a man or a woman. One was actually a demon and the other was a mainframe interface to universal knowledge but unless you can see in nine dimensions you might not pick up on that.

“Hello, My name is-”

There was a slight pause there as the man struggled to remember his name and the other person began to shake their head back and forth sensing oncoming doom.

“-Mikhail Robespierre.”

The person who had been shaking her head just closed their eyes and sighed.

“And this is my assistant-”

“Janet!” They said cutting him off entirely but with a cheerful smile. “My name is Janet.”

“Mikhail” smiled and continued on. “Today we are going to talk a little bit about moral philosophy. Not in an abstract way but how in each of our lives we face choices every day and how we resolve those choices. We all have a voice in our head. That voice doesn't tell us what to do or not do, but it does warn us when we do things that don't feel good or right. We’re going to explore that today with something called ‘The Trolley Problem’. Could we have our volunteers come up?”

As the volunteers made their way up, “Mikhail” continued to talk. “The Trolley problem was first introduced by Philippa Foot in 1967. In this thought experiment we are in control of a runaway trolley headed toward five people who will be killed by the collision, but it could be steered onto a track on which there is only one person. Today with the help of my assistant here we’re going to experience a little more interactive-"

“But wholesome!” Janet interjected

“-but wholesome version of this little experiment. Now, there are many variations of the trolley problem and we’re going to walk through a couple of them Janet? If you don’t mind.”

“Of course not,” Janet said and gave a simple nod of their head.

As Janet nodded their head, the auditorium changed slightly and there was an audible "ding". Now instead of the stage there was a giant view screen for all in the auditorium to see. But now the voluntolds were standing on a trolley that was running out of control down the street to a set of five large teddy bears which were all in the middle of the road having a picnic. To the right was another teddy bear sitting on a separate track and waving cheerfully at the trolley.

"Let's get started shall we?"