Wednesday, April 13, 2005

A traffic light moral dilemma

I was driving to my parents' house from an international airport this morning, and I missed my exit. I missed a couple of other exits that probably also would have been relatively good. (It was very early in the morning, and I didn't get much sleep last night.) Finally, I came to my senses as I saw what was probably the last exit of the pretty good before the absolutely awful ones. I took it, and it wound up in two lanes at a left-turn-only traffic light on the highway that I wanted to turn left onto. I waited at this traffic light about two minutes before I realized that no one was going pull up next to me and trigger the light any quicker, and that for one car it would probably take about 5 mins. for the light to turn, since it was pre-rush hour and the highway had moderately heavy traffic (as opposed to the very light traffic of an hour earlier). It occurred to me that I could "fool" the traffic light's magnetic sensor into "thinking" that there was a second car by backing up a little and pulling between the two lanes. More curious than in a hurry, I tried it; the perpendicular (sp?) traffic lights immediately turned yellow, then red, and of course my light turned green, and I was on my way.

My dilemma is this: now that I'm pretty sure that I can rush long traffic lights by pretending to be two cars, am I ever justified in doing it? What if I'm in a hurry for something important? What if I'm taking a man to his own wedding? Or taking a friend to her mother who is dying in the hospital? Or am I justified in a situation as simple as when I'm late for work? I would like both my readers to weigh in on this, if and when they have the time. Thanks.

Backlog Bob