Risks and impositions

In What We Owe To Each Other, social contractualist theorist T. M. Scanlon argues that:

"(…)  there  are many  things  that we do or depend on  that involve  risk of 
serious harm to others. Suppose, then, that we are considering a principle 
that allows projects to proceed, even  though they involve risk of serious 
harm  to  some,  provided  that  a  certain level  of  care  has  been  taken  to 
reduce  these  risks. It  is  obvious  what  the  generic  reason  would  be  for 
rejecting  such  a  principle  from  the  standpoint  of  someone  who  is 
seriously  injured  despite  the  precautions  that  have  been  taken.  On  the 
other side, however, those who would benefit, directly or indirectly, may 
have  good  generic  reason  to  object  to  a  more  stringent  requirement.  In 
meeting  the level  of  care  demanded  by  the  principle, they might  argue, 
they  have  done  enough  to  protect  others  from  harm.  [b]Refusing  to  allow 
activities  that  meet  this  level  of  care  would,  they  could  claim,  impose 
unacceptable constraint on their lives.[/b]"

In other words, Scanlon is proposing that the potential ramifications our projects may have on people can be ignored so long as we at least try to mitigate them, and so long as our collective desire for the project is deemed worthy enough to proceed.

This strikes me as absurd.

Say a very large proportion of the population wants to go to the Moon. And say they have limited resources, a struggling economy, and little scientific knowledge. Any astronaut shot up there has a chance of not returning alive. But they want to go to the Moon, goddammit! Think about how much scientific knowledge will have been uncovered! The prestige, the accomplishment, the power!

But nobody wants to put their life at risk. So the majority decides to force a random person into the cockpit of the rocket and shoots them at the Moon. Unfortunately, the rocket explodes and this person dies.

But all for the sake of accomplishment, right?

The point here is that it seems that individual welfare is being superseded by "more important" matters, like the survival of the species or the prestige of scientific accomplishment. One person is sacrificed for the benefit of the many. It's a tyranny of the majority.

I find it hard to believe that someone can actually find it moral to look a person in the eyes and tell them that it is morally justified to use them for our own benefit, if we ourselves don't need this benefit. The community is put before the welfare of the individual, simply because the survival of the community is important for some funny reason.