Yep, in Ethics this is known as the Act / Omission distinction. (Even if they result in the same consequences, you’re ethically responsible for your acts, and r

Yep, in Ethics this is known as the Act / Omission distinction. (Even if they result in the same consequences, you’re ethically responsible for your acts, and rarely to the same extent your omissions.) It’s common to the main deontological ethical frameworks including the Judeo-Christian models that underpin “western values. The “solution” is to take a Consequentialist approach, though most people fail the trolley problem and find consequentialism repugnant, so I don’t think we will solve this problem any time soon. (Most people are familiar with Mills’ hedonic utilitarianism, but it’s quite simplistic; I’m a big fan of Eudaimonia as your value function, and richer systems like two-level utilitarianism as a way of getting round the “calculate everything all the time” problem with some utilitarian systems.)