MovieChat Forums > I Am Mother (2019) Discussion > What is the doctor's best course of acti...

What is the doctor's best course of action?

posted 6 years ago by zeesha (1826)
25 replies | jump to latest

Imagine a doctor has five patients, all in need of different organ transplants, but no compatible organs are available. One day, a sixth patient enters the doctor's office with a life-threatening condition. The new patient is curable, but also an organ match for the five other patients. If the doctor simply delays treatment, the new patient will die, but their organs could be used to save the other five patients. If the doctor treats the new patient, one life will be saved, but five others will be lost.
What is the doctor's best course of action?

Now, consider that you are the doctor and also the only organ match for your patients.
What then is the right choice?

This is an alternative to "trolley problem". Some philosophers argue that it would be wrong if you give inconsistent answers to those two questions. The daughter mentions Bentham and Comte, just to prove she has done her reading, but her real thought is - it depends on "Do I know these five patients" and "Are they good humans?"

Do you agree with her? What do you think should be the right answers and why?

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

All six of them are ill and thus completely useless. The Good Doctor should allow all of them to die, then start breeding new healthy humans out of the embryos.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

I am waiting to see who else will agree with you.

[–] ExTechOp (2770) 6 years ago

I have a feeling Mother would agree with whalewithhands

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

I don't think so. There is a practical problem with the daughter's answer - how would she know for sure that the patient she wants to save is a good human? The mother allows the wounded woman to come through the heavily guarded entry of the bunker is obviously a test for the daughter. The daughter takes a big risk to save that woman who she knows nothing about. And then she passes her exam with the highest score.

[–] ExTechOp (2770) 6 years ago

I was being facetious, as I suspected whalewithhands was being - I or we were poking fun at Mother's apparent ruthlessness in weeding out "inferior" humans

[–] scannerdarkly (1397) a year ago

You've given me new thoughts to consider. At the end the AI said Daughter no longer needed her and that was a good thing. Did the AI want a human race that could overpower the AI? Was the real test to show that Humans can and must overcome its dependency on AI?

The Woman told Daughter that "You cannot trust the Machines, they are the ones who did this to us". But what if none of that was even true? We know that from the opening day count, that daughter wasnt the first one Mother tried to raise and that Hilary Swank was probably one of her children that was sent out to live with surviving humans in the cave.

The AI may have been made to run the day to day activities for humans, and then a major disaster happens, humans over-reliance on the AI had them unable to help themselves and most humans perish. The AI Mother is so advanced yet couldnt help the human race. It decided that it needed to restart humanity but instill the correct teachings to ensure humans lived again but the right way this time and to learn that AI is not the answer to their problems.

The AI could have attacked the human settlement in the caves only to instill the correct teaching of fear about the use of AI technology for Daughter.

I enjoyed this movie and its a good Netflix film.

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

Treat the new patient. It would be wrong to intentionally delay treatment and let the new patient die unnecessarily.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

What if the new patient learns about the situation and decides to sacrifice himself/herself to save the others, could the doctor let the new patient die? (Mother's following question is very similar to this.)

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

If the patient refuses care and is willing to die, the doctor should respect their wishes and not force a cure on them.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

What if all five patients learn about the new patient's intention and refuse his organ donation?

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

I would tell the new patient so he/she could be informed and decide accordingly.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

When the new patient first come, you could tell him about his/her organs match for saving other 5 patients or say nothing. Will you tell him? Also, when the new patient decides to save the others. You could tell those 5 patients about his sacrifice or say nothing. Will you tell them?

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

I wouldn't tell the new patient about the others or the others about the new patient's choice.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

One person's organs match 5 patients usually because they are his/her close relatives. Will you reconsider your choice?

[–] [deleted] 6 years ago

I wouldn't tell other party about the other's decisions unless they asked me to.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

If the patient refuses care and is willing to die, the doctor should respect their wishes and not force a cure on them.

Thanks for your answers, Allaby. The fact is no doctor allow to let a curable patient die under his/her watch regardless the patient wants to live or die (think about those attempting suicide patients). So, your answers indicate that you are willing to give up your career and accept the legal consequence to save those 5 patients. I think that would be as noble as the new patient.
I also understand why you don't want to tell the new patient about the others. But if they are indeed his/her family then he/she probably would ask about them, and you might have to tell the truth.

[–] Jeepster (1159) 6 years ago

You treat the new patient which can be helped, as a doctor you would have to. It's part of the hippocratic oath. "Do no harm" You can't intentionally harm someone, even if it's to help others. You have NO right to play God, & say if I turn down helping you, THEY can live. It's not your right or call. You do what you can for who you can. That'd only make you a murderer. So the last choice is the only viable choice.

[–] ExTechOp (2770) 6 years ago

Suppose the new patient is a convicted serial killer visiting from death row. The five other patients run group homes for foster kids (they just happened to have been involved in the same car accident).

Also, say you're not a doctor. You're an electrician who sees a fault in the serial killer's life support system, a fault you can easily fix but could also be easily overlooked. Overlook it, and five "nice" people live while one "bad" person dies.

So now there's no Hippocratic oath binding you.

I feel like a "principled" person would still refuse to let the serial killer die. But I also don't think it's as simple as that, given the bigger picture.

Mother in this film is playing god, and encouraging Daughter to do the same. It may not jive with most of our personal principles, but it's also more likely to result in the longterm survival of our species. At the very least, it's a course of action designed to ensure such survival.

The question is whether we're still "human" afterwards.

[–] zeesha (1826) 6 years ago

I was hoping someone will come up to say "philosophers can have their debate but this is what a professional doctor will do..." Thanks, Jeepster. If I may ask, are you a doctor? What is your opinion on "presumed consent”?

[–] ExTechOp (2770) 5 years ago

Professional doctors’ input probably isn’t helpful here, because the situation is ridiculously improbable, medically speaking

Organs don’t “match” that easily

It’s meant to be an abstract moral thought experiment

That’s why the Hippocratic oath shouldn’t be invoked in this discussion. You’re supposed to think the problem through, not fall back on a rule, however well-founded

That’s why I posited the electrician in the same position

[–] zeesha (1826) 5 years ago

"You’re supposed to think the problem through, not fall back on a rule, however well-founded"

Morality is one of the standards that we highly value in a civilized society. It's not the only one and it's not above others. From my discussion with Allaby, I was trying to imply that the solution to this problem, to make the right decision, is not to just think about moral aspect and then play god, but also consider other aspects like "equal right to live", "free will", "individual's privacy", "law obedience" etc. "Hippocratic oath" happens to cover much of the considerations, that's why it is a good ethical guideline to follow. But, if you have good justification, then break the rule and openly take responsibility for the consequence, as a noble person would do.

"Suppose the new patient is a convicted serial killer visiting from death row....a fault in the serial killer's life support system"

You are pushing the "odd thing happens" beyond "ridiculous impossible". It would be only fair that every patient's life-supporting system has that same fault. And then the electrician has to decide who's machine he is going to fix.

[–] ExTechOp (2770) 5 years ago

Nah, just the serial killer's system - the dilemma isn't one of triage. It's whether it's moral to let a single "bad person" die so that multiple "good people" can live.

[–] asom (6881) 5 years ago

Yeah, it is.

[–] asom (6881) 4 years ago

No, it's not.

You have 6 patients, 5 will die, one can survive. Triage alone dictates to save the one.

The problem is: do you have the "power" to be the judge if killing the one would save all others?

There was an interesting k-drama series which i enjoyed (Black) that has the problem in a bit different context:

SPOILER:
One son has a heart problem and will die soon because there are no compatible donors. The other son gets into an accident and there are very high chances that even if he survives he would be brain dead.

And the mother is a surgeon that can do the heart transplant. The decision must be taken fast.
END SPOILER.

[–] jriley555 (8391) 2 years ago

It depends...