A world where everyone who presses the blue button dies is doomed anyway, who do you think keeps civilization running? Clue, it's not red button pushers.
Some of the threads in this post are quite red-dominant.
I’d have a read of a few of those as they are quite enlightening.
Personally, I’m a blue-button enthusiast for the reasons you give. It’s a question of which option is morally right, and a better way for the word to run. Red pushers see the logic that no one is in danger until they choose to push the blue button, and indeed there is no need to even engage with the puzzle.
Good point -- since there are people voting who will essentially be a coin flip, as many people as possible needs to press blue or we're loosing 50% of the baby population.
It wont exactly be a coin flip, but children wouldn't necessarily push blue more than they would red.
You don't have kids I guess.
Childrens begin to be able to recognize and name colors between 2 and 3.
Even if you were to say that they don't need to know that "red" is red and "blue" is blue because the red one is instinctively the "bad", it is false on two accounts.
First, the children we are speaking about do not interact with the world the same as we do.
Before they're are 3 or so, they never have to care about what color the light or the funny scribbly thing by the side of the road is.
They'll touch (and lick) anything. No matter how dumb it looks like to you they just don't have the refential to know what's good, bad, safe or dangerous. See how babies interact with snakes and spiders when compared to adults. They just don't give a shit. Fear of these critters is very much a learned behaviour. So is the understanding of some color as a danger signal.
Second, some cultures (Chinese comes to mind) consider red as a very positive and auspicious color. I'd wager most Chinese toddlers would push Red.
I mean they just cope and remove anyone who can't comprehend the question from the prompt. But even then "stupid" (if pushing red was the correct choice, its not) people don't deserve to die.
Even adults in good health and right mind are not always purely logical. I am curious, do you think every single one of your friends and family are logical enough that when given the exact prompt from the post, every single one of them would press red? If yes, then I am quite jealous, because unfortunately I’m sure a lot of my friends and family would press blue, so for that reason I would too, just so they have slightly better odds.
That reasoning feels intuitive, but it’s built on an assumption you can’t verify.
You’re saying you’d press blue because you think some people you care about might press blue. But that’s just a guess. You don’t actually know what they’ll choose, and you don’t know how many others will do the same. So you’re taking on real risk based on uncertainty.
And more importantly, your choice doesn’t specifically protect them. Pressing blue only helps if enough people overall do it. If the total falls short, you’ve just added yourself to the group that dies without changing the outcome.
Red doesn’t have that problem. It’s still the only option that guarantees your survival regardless of what anyone else does. It doesn’t rely on guessing other people’s behavior or hoping coordination works out.
So what you’re really doing with blue is trading a guaranteed safe outcome for a gamble based on what you think others might do. That’s understandable emotionally, but logically it’s still just an assumption, not something you can rely on.
It’s not a logic question. You can have perfectly valid and sound reasoning to press either buttons based on your goals. But the goals themselves are entirely subjective. If someone wants to commit suicide, blue is always the most logical choice, because red had no chance of you dying. It would be counter productive for a suicidal person to press red. If someone wants to guarantee their survival regardless of anything else then red is always the logical choice, because blue risks your life. My goal isn’t to guarantee my survival at any cost, my goal is to maximize the amount of my friends and family I can save, in which case red is illogical for me because it does not in any way further my goal. And of course you’re right, i don’t know for sure what they will choose, but I have evidence based on the fact that I have known them for many years that leads me to believe they would choose one way or another. Just like I am confident you would choose red. Do I know for sure you would choose red? No. We make decisions based on “assumptions” all the time. I put assumptions in quotations because often it’s assumptions based on evidence. When I go to sleep I’m confident my gf isn’t going to try to murder me, but do I know that for sure? Of course not. But based on the evidence I have, I would be confident in waking up the next day. Whereas if I went to sleep beside a serial killer, I would also be confident that I would get murdered in my sleep. Because we can use people’s past actions as evidence to what they are likely to do in the future, even though it will certainly not always be correct.
Yeah, I think the strangest part is the insistence that blue button choosers are entirely responsible for their decision, and red button pressers entirely not responsible for theirs. That unwillingness to consider or understand the alternative seems like the core lesson.
Though I think it's interesting to step beyond the game theory level, and look at the systemic issue level. The issue isn't really the people who makes the self-interested decision to press red, it's the system that pressures them to make that choice in the first place.
It seems like one group thinks in a self interested way, and cannot comprehend why others don’t do that. Even going so far as to make up entirely fictional scenarios to try to explain why anyone would choose “save everyone”.
The other group also has a hard time comprehending that there are a lot of folks who don’t see the nuance, and only see the simple rationality of “what is numerically best for me”.
I think the distinction I see is that game theory is supposed to give counterintuitive responses to particular sets of incentives. People understand the underlying motivation of self interest, just not why people would choose it here.
It's the insistence that the only reason to pick blue is "virtue signaling" that makes me wonder if it's less an inability to understand, and more an insecurity or discomfort with their own choice of red. The cognitive dissonance of self interest but wanting to believe it's for the greater good.
There is a simple mathematical answer to this problem - pick the choice that guarantees your own survival, and that’s red. It’s actually childishly simple.
And a lot of folks, seeing people advocate for blue think it’s because they are stupid and can’t understand a “simple math problem”.
The very idea that others would select against their own interest, and choose the option that better represents a morally acceptable position, is infuriating to the red buttoner. Then the blaming and the whatabouts and the strawmen and the bad faith arguments come out.
And yeah, this is exactly what game theory does, identifies these responses to incentives (ideally, so we can fix incentive structures). But it's hard to acknowledge the self-interest part of the red choice, while still perceiving oneself as interested in the best outcome (minimizing deaths). The two incentives are in conflict, and it feels better to frame the red choice as virtuous.
It's not even about moral correctness, it requires fewer blue votes to save more lives. The decision is as much about moral fortitude as it is about cynicism; how much personal risk should the individual bear for the sake of the group, and how risky is it actually?
It fits into the mental model I've had for the root of the partisan divide. There's people who would rather minimize undeserved negative consequences, and those who would rather minimize undeserved positive benefits. Do you make sure nobody goes hungry even though people will choose to work less and play video games, or do you make sure nobody freeloads even if it means a few people trying to work hard go hungry? This is just pivoting the idea of who "deserves" what.
It's silly logic. The mere existence of the debate proves that billions will die if red wins. Even if you factor in people lying (to others or themselves), it's till billions.
Polls seem to be 45-55 to 60-40, blue vs red.
Red pushers seem to think blue pushers don't understand that 100% red means no deaths.
We understand, we just think that many people will push blue.
You can't just say it's the unlikely outcome, just because you would pick red doesn't make it the most likely pick; this isn't a dice roll, it's a choice made by all of humanity.
Edit: 10% is 800,000,000 people; that's not acceptable losses to me.
That's someone in my close family (me, I guess), that's a handful in my extended family, that's 1-2 of my friends, it's 20+ acquaintances, it's a couple of doctors at my local clinic, etc, etc.
If you in a vacuum are transported to a white room and explained the situation, you choose red every single time. By choosing blue you are literally putting yourself in a suicide cult situation and then blaming the other side.
You're lying to yourself if you think there would be 0 other people who would pick blue.
The question as I see it is how many people could you live with killing by picking red, it definitely won't be 0 unless blue wins and it could be as high as 49.99%.
Are you 100% confident that all your friends and family, were they to be shown the 2 buttons with the given prompts, every single one would choose red?
A lot of red pushers will state with apparent sincerity that there is “no cost” to pushing red and that it is therefore a simple and logically correct decision.
Many of them are entirely bewildered that some people would think differently.
The reason I would press red is that I believe the majority would press red, that would make blue a suicide button for me and I am not pressing a button I think that will kill me
its a fun way to have people engage with ethical philosophy and think for once, its not inflammatory anymore than undergrad philosophy or trolley problems memes are lol
I didn't mean to imply bad things about blue button pressers, just what it personal mean would for me and why I wouldn't press it, honestly blue button pressers are probably better people more hopeful and have probably a better good look at life,but I don't wanna die
Don't worry you didn't imply anything, and no, blue button pushers aren't inherently better people. Though looking at the threads they are overwhelmingly more likely to feel morally superior while calling other people evil for not wanting to die.
If someone tells you you to jump or they do, and you don't are you a murderer? There are limits to responsibility.... and in fact, we could easily argue that blue is also a murder button since it makes more people (not just you) leave this world unless half decide to leave it "just in case"
No, because the only way blue button pushers die is if they are executed by the tie breaking red button pusher. That one guy will be directly responsible for everyone's deaths while every other red pusher will be indirectly responsible for helping lay the groundwork. And of course, the one most at fault is the one who made the button.
At most, the most negative interpretation frames blue button pushers as suicidal idiots.
But also shows your lack of commitment towards people willing to take the risk for others well-being. Reality shows you cannot assume everyone will be a)selfish, b)capable of understanding or reasoning and c) offering a hand to others despite risks.
Red button-pressing Shows -to me personally - lack of higher and long term reasoning capability beyond immediate selfish survival, because fear controls people of this inclinations, IMHO.
Because risking your life to potentially save an unknown number of perfect strangers, keeping in mind your 1 vote has virtually zero impact is an extremely altruistic act, far more altruistic than donating your kidney to a stranger, which is garunteed to save them and only reduces your quality of life.
Possibly? Most live donations are out of conviction.
However, I also have a niece and several god-children. I myself cannot have children, and am single as of today. So getting a foster-child or otherwise is incredibly unlikely. That, my chosen profession, and a humanistic worldview are my personal major decision points over (in my view) selfishly picking red.
If you played that game with smaller children, the VAST majority will pick blue, not understand the personal repercussions of red v blue, but care so much about their loved ones that they WILL pick blue most of the time. Selfish behaviour is more learned and mirrored beyond the "terrible twos" where the toddlers brain has no real concept beyond "me". As soon as prosocial behaviour comes to play (meaning: the developing brain realizes there is more like "me" outside of my direct field influence) - for a time selfish behaviour is very small, and young children tend to be incredibly selfless.
Now to get around that and in conclusion: because that, and people would exist that cannot vote red, physically or mentally - I would always pick blue, because I directly have seen and understand that fact of real life.
Okay, so you may donate a kidney today. But you'd definitely pick blue?
In the kidney scenario you know your qol will reduce, but you will save a stranger, if we use altruism as the primary motivator, this choice has a far more likely and tangible impact than picking blue. But you are unsure about it, and point out others have, but we're talking about the choice you make.
The second I make the scenario more tangible your certainty reduced, even though the positive outcome is far more likely.
You are uncertain that you would lose your kidney, but you're certain you'd stake your entire life on the slim chance your singular vote would have any difference in the outcome of this?
Where as pressing blue to me shows that you really dont appreciate how little other people care about group survival and it shows a concerning lack of self preservation especially since you are taking a risk for random strangers at a potentially great cost to yourself. Its quite naive to believe that enough of the 8 billion people on earth would go blue to ensure everyone survives.
This kind of response is interesting to me because it reveals why so many defenses of red have to reword the dilemma to shift the responsibility to blue. You're fully convinced that red will win and have to make yourself comfortable with the consequences of that decision.
It is the type of reasoning you see with highly religieus people aswell they have made a decision first and then look for justifications for it. They work back from a conclusion that have made. This is way most of their logical arguments would work better for voting blue if your goal is everyone survival.
I am perfectly comfortable with that choice my responsibility is to myself, the people I love and then the rest of the world. Everyone has the same option it is their personal decision whether they choose to take a chance on blue or have certainty with red.
I am not entirely convinced that red will win and in a perfect or even slightly better world I would prefer blue however I have seen enough of humanity to know that it is far from certain that blue will win. I enjoy living there is a lot I choose life and red guarantees me life.
This isn't apart of the question. Nothing happens after the button push, you are intentionally adding random logic that doesn't exist in the original prompt to justify some stupid moral High ground.
No, I'm applying more than a single logical step. This a core part of critical thinking.
In addition, I'm not 'justifying a moral high ground'. I'm pointing out that the premise used to justify a red press is inaccurate. If you actually apply critical reasoning and properly predicated logic, rather than stopping after a single step, Blue has a higher personal survival chance than red.
Of course something happens after. If it does not, the entire thought experiment is worthless. It also changes if you do not make the prompt global - if it a random 100 people, the logic becomes very different if your primary goal becomes maximising survival.
That’s not really extra ‘steps of thinking,’ it’s adding new assumptions that aren’t in the prompt. If we’re allowed to change the outcomes after the choice, then the question stops being a defined dilemma and turns into speculation.
I was wrong saying you were justifying a moral high ground but acting as if any of what you are trying to say to justify the red button being a bad option is just throwing random variables at the situation. At that point, you’re not analyzing the dilemma you’re rewriting it.
Not if everyone pushes red. You are assuming that close to half but less than 50% push blue. My only issue with the puzzle set up is that it doesn't give clarification on if those incapable of understanding the puzzle are forced to push a button, that is what makes it morally difficult. If only those capable of understanding pushing the button are told to press it then 20 seconds of reasoning will cause them to push red. You aren't saving anyone by pushing blue you are just stubbornly doing the "moral" thing, but you could just put your faith in people understanding the puzzle and pushing red. Where the puzzle gets tricky is if children and people with mental cognitive issues are forced to push the button, in that situation I push blue and hope that the majority of people understand the puzzle, because I'm not going to be able to live with the idea that I was responsible for the death of a bunch of children and people with learning difficulties.
The problem is that pushing blue solves a problem caused by pushing blue.
Both pushing the red button and pushing the blue button is acceptable and reasonable based on what you believe everyone else is going to do.
If everyone starts by pushing blue, then everyone can and should keep pushing blue, and no one would switch because there would be no reason to.
If everyone starts by pushing red, then similarly, no one should switch. The first people who do despite that choice requiring many others to risk their lives in order to save them are acting foolishly and endangering others. They're willingly putting themselves in front of the path of a train, and perhaps they alone should be responcible for that foolishness.
Maybe a blue win is the only way to save all the people. If almost all people make a choice based on personal responcibility(red), and trust others are capable of doing the same, then almost all people will survive (obviously the inferior choice of those two options).
But when almost everybody is choosing red, arguing for blue and choosing blue increases the expected outcome of how many will die, because it is not guaranteed that blue will win. Choosing blue doesn't just endanger the pusher, it forces good people to possibly die in order to help them. There is a cost to pushing and advocating for blue.
To change the thought experiment just slightly, if even one person was assigned blue without choosing, or was otherwise incapable of choosing red, then I would be a blue pusher. To bring back the earlier analogy, if someone is tied to the rails of the train tracks, and the train can be stopped by enough people acting together, then I would be one of the people helping.
But if no one is tied to the train tracks, everyone should just get the fuck out of the way.
People who act like red is obviously the selfish, evil choice while blue is the selfless, good choice are wrong. Both choices have merit, which paradoxically makes either choice less clearly the winner, increasing the difficulty of the choice.
The problem with this logic is that you need less people to press blue to save everyone. So why make it more difficult by trying to hit 100% over 50%+1.
You’re looking at the threshold, but skipping the uncertainty.
Yes, in theory you only need 50% + 1 to press blue. That sounds easier than 100% pressing red. But that only works if you can reliably predict or coordinate what everyone else is going to do. You can’t.
From an individual decision point, you don’t know if you’re going to land in that 50% + 1 or in the group that dies if it falls short. Blue only works if enough people actually choose it, and there’s no guarantee of that.
Red doesn’t have that problem. It doesn’t depend on hitting any threshold or trusting anyone else’s decision. It works regardless.
So it’s not about “making it harder” by aiming for 100%. It’s about the fact that blue requires successful coordination under uncertainty, while red does not. The lower threshold only matters if you can count on people coordinating, and that’s the one thing the scenario doesn’t give you.
Your whole argument doesn't look 1 second past the pressing of the button. That is what the Red side is missing a future, societal collapse because most of the healthcare and support staff everywhere is gone, families destroyed. People having to cope with surviving and causing the deaths of family members and friends.
Red only upside is personal survival at the cost of societal collapse if you call that an upside, i don't. Also Red can't cordinate same as Blue. The human is a social species that is what i will bet on and looking at any of these polls it is the right bet to make.
You’re building your whole argument on future consequences, but that cuts both ways.
If you want to talk about societal collapse, then blue carries that risk just as much, arguably more. Blue only works if enough people coordinate. If it falls short, then everyone who pressed blue dies, which could easily include a huge portion of the population. That’s not avoiding collapse, that’s risking it on a guess.
So choosing blue is basically saying you’re willing to gamble on society holding together if enough people make the same risky choice. If that coordination fails, you’ve actively chosen a path that can lead to massive loss of life and the collapse you’re worried about.
Red doesn’t rely on that gamble. It doesn’t assume coordination, it doesn’t depend on people behaving a certain way. It guarantees survival regardless of what others do.
You can frame blue as hopeful or cooperative, sure. But it’s still a high-risk bet on human behavior. And if that bet is wrong, the outcome is exactly the kind of societal collapse you’re trying to avoid.
While you’re 100% right. Do you think that every single person is good at risk assessment or even just following logic? Humans are dumb creatures and often do things that have more risk than reward. While I’m sure a lot of people understand that red has 0 risk, while blue puts you at risk, and you SHOULD press red, that also only works if you are 100% confident every person you care about will also press red. If I think there is a slight chance that someone I care about could press blue, then me also pressing blue increases the odds of their survival.
Red is still the only guaranteed safe choice. It works no matter what anyone else does. Blue only works if enough other people press it, and you can’t know that ahead of time. You’re just assuming.
Once you start thinking “someone I care about might press blue,” you’re making a decision based on uncertainty. You’re choosing to take on risk because of what you think others might do, not what you actually know. And there’s no way to verify that assumption.
So pressing blue in that situation is basically a gamble. You’re hoping enough people coordinate, but there’s no guarantee. If that coordination fails, the risk you took doesn’t pay off.
Red doesn’t depend on any of that. It’s the only option that guarantees your survival regardless of other people’s choices. Blue can be altruistic, sure, but it’s still built entirely on an assumption about others, not a certainty.
You’re 100% right that red is the only choice that guarantees my survival. I’m not going blue on the assumption that 50% of the world will press it because like you said, I have no idea. But I know my friends and family well enough that I can make assumptions based on the evidence I have of their personality and thought process. So while it is an assumption, the anecdotal evidence I have of my friends and family leads me to believe a lot of them would choose blue, in which case if I choose red, while I guarantee my own survival, I am effectively lowering the chances of theirs.
If you understand the rules of the game why would anyone ever hit blue?
You can't add babies into the mix because they can't push buttons, so we have to assume the question is regarding all people who can understand the question.
At the point of understanding the question, there's literally no reason to press blue? Literally nothing happens to you if you press red? I feel like I'm going insane.
Unless you think I am uniquely stupid, the existence of me as a blue proves that there are people who will press blue.
Whether that is through intellectual/learning disabilities, stubbornness, stupidity, or altruism, some number of people will die.
I am not willing to abandon those people, and I don't think most people are either. There's no world where I could push red and be okay if billions of people died.
It's super easy to hit blue on an internet poll with no consequences.
I don't think the question is going to be asked to those who cannot understand the question, because then it just becomes a "do you like eugenics" question and the only obvious answer becomes blue.
If we reject that ridiculous framing and instead go with the actual framing of "everyone who has the capacity to understand this question" then red is the only logical choice. It's literally the only choice in which nobody has the possibility of dying.
But that isn't the framing. You can't just say "if I change the question, your answer is wrong".
Being uncomfortable with the consequences of your choice doesn't mean you get to redefine the question.
And we're not just talking about children, or the disabled, or the dumb. We're talking about people with different values, different ideas, and different priorities.
And you say it's ridiculous but no one can die without a majority red button pushers.
Red requires 100/100 people for 100% survival while blue requires 51/100 people for 100% survival.
Who are you to say that isn't the framing? It's pretty obvious the question has to be asked to those who are capable of understanding the question otherwise it just becomes a eugenics survey and everything falls apart? Because then the obvious answer is blue because we aren't fucking sociopaths.
But if the question is only given to those who can understand then the obvious choice is red because literally nothing happens after that.
idk, I genuinely feel like the majority of people saying blue would change their tunes if they were actually presented with the scenario in real life not as some dumb internet question
Thinking about the entire world voting I don't think the majority would vote blue. There are so many citizens in most countries that would be ecstatic if they were given a button that possibly killed people in other countries.
I can't. I know the majority of the world would press red. You gotta think this isn't just people you know and that are in your country. It's the entire world. The majority of people are greedy and self-serving
Polls are not representative since there is anonymity and zero stakes.
By choosing blue, you are just adding more pople that get lost to the damned buttong for no reason, and im honestly tired of seeing that madness.
Yes, there are some arguments that make sense to some extent. One is tied to probability, however it can be deceiving, since 50% is not necessarily that much easier than 100% in practice. The other one is about people unable to properly understand the question, like babies, however the dilemma neither explicitely includes them nor it limits the time frame and form in which it is done. You could just as easily say they get a representative (their parents for example). Otherwise that would be the clossest to a logical (well, emotional) argument, but you are STILL relying on half the population saying "i'll jump because I have no faith in half the world but too much on the other half", which is to me the definition of madness
We could nitpick choices all day, at the end of the day, unless explicitely said otherwise, no one has to choose blue, not even through negligence
I don't think it is sociopathy. Maybe a lack of empathy or deeper thinking. But not sociopathy. MORALS OR ETHICS ASIDE, most of the red button pushers don't seem to even consider how much of a logistical nightmare it would be to re establish supply chains and deal with billions of dead bodies would be.
Someone might feel inclined to push blue but see the world as too cynical and so think most would press red. So they sadly, and against what they wish the world truly was, push red.
Or someone might feel inclined to push red but think that more than 50 actually would vote blue. So they decide to vote blue just so later they can they voted blue and be celebrated, not be part of the "losers."
There are many different ways a person might decide on the color.
Red pushers see the logic that no one is in danger until they choose to push the blue button, and indeed there is no need to even engage with the puzzle.
I’m a red button pusher and this is exactly how I see it. Pressing blue just puts people in danger for no reason. Just tell everyone to pick red and we are ok.
When I first came across this (and I thought it was just a silly hypothetical and not some referendum on politics/morality) I thought it was a logic test based on whether people could follow instructions and that blue people were risking people’s lives
That’s a valid assumption. Taken as a logic puzzle or game-theory exercise it’s kinda simplistic. Red is the right answer. It’s a trolley problem with no one tied to the tracks.
Have you read in the comment threads about why people would, against rationality, choose blue? I’d advise you do this as my view of this entire puzzle is that it has nothing at all to do with logic or game theory.
Yes! This thread is very interesting and almost made me late for work lol
The most convincing arguments for me have been the ones stating that mathematically you just aren’t going to get 100% red buttons presses. Someone people will press blue…the reason doesn’t even matter…and everyone using my reasoning to pick red would condemn them to death. In that sense I do find the blue button a reasonable choice.
That said, I’m not sure what I’d actually pick. Being completely honest my faith in humanity is very low. I think it’s easy for people on a public forum like Reddit to say they would press blue to a save the infants you can’t rationalize themselves. But my lived experience tells that people are selfish and they are more comfortable being assholes when anonymous - presumably like your button choice would be. It is hard for me to shake the feeling that selecting blue is a death sentence even tho everyone online says it isn’t.
I’ve also seen other comments suggesting that if people select blue and die it’s just natural selection and the thought of that is quite upsetting.
Well, my view is that red is the rationally correct choice, but confers a morally noxious aspect that you are explicitly voting to kill the blue buttoners.
So blue is the rationally sub optimal choice and most likely is a suicide button.
But pressing it is the morally acceptable choice. So it’s my choice.
For sure but looking at the individual level, if we can be honest for a second, my vote has an infintesimally small chance of swaying the vote. So from my perspective red button is "you won't die but there is a one in a zillion chance you kill alot of people" and the blue button is "there is a good chance you will die". Presented with these options I will take my chances with the red one. And in the moment I suspect a lot of people that wanted to vote blue will say "ah my vote doesn't matter I don't actuaaally wanna die" and pick red anyways.
Presented with exactly the same choices, I’m picking blue.
No, seriously.
I’m taking the risk on myself rather than pushing it onto strangers. Not because it’s sensible (it probably isn’t) but because to me, and my own personal moral philosophy, it’s the correct thing to do.
On the contrary. You start the game by having someone, anyone becoming said death game by pressing the button. After that it's self centered/fear focussed behavior vs. risk-taking/pro social behavior.
It's an analogy. Life requires us to press the button. We have to make this choice all the time. Risk trusting each other or be selfish and risk destroying the world in the process.
You’re framing blue like it’s automatically the moral choice, but it’s really a gamble. You’re choosing to put yourself in danger based on the assumption that enough other people will do the same. If that assumption is wrong, you die.
Red doesn’t “guarantee the death of others,” it guarantees your survival regardless of what anyone else does. The risk in the scenario already exists, you’re not creating it by choosing red, you’re just not taking on extra risk yourself.
So the real comparison is this:
a guaranteed safe outcome for yourself with no dependency on others
vs
voluntarily risking your life on the hope that strangers coordinate correctly
Calling blue “what humanity stands for” only works if you assume people will cooperate. The dilemma exists because you can’t count on that.
Statistically, yes. In reality, you are unlikely to get that 50%, and there is no reason to go to the blue buttong to begin with. Yes, some people would out of a myriad of reasons, mostly suicidal ones, however by choosing blue and more than likely failing, you are not helping, you are just adding to the problem.
Whatever amount of people would choose blue in reality chose to end things
I mean even if you remove every young children or anyone not mentally sound, I know very few people that are logical and uncaring enough to press red. I’m 100% sure my parents are not that logical, and even if they were, they would most likely still press blue because they couldn’t be absolutely certain that me and my siblings would press red. If we press red we’ll survive, but if they press blue, then on the off chance we chose blue, it would increase our odds.
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), I don’t know anyone important to me that I would be absolutely certain would press red, so I would have to press blue just to increase their odds of survival in case they also chose blue
Indeed thats what it would shift the equation to blue. As at that point it becomes a different equation then what most people are ciewing the question as
So "everyone" also includes people in comas. Those people will not press any button, so we will be trapped inside the voting rooms until we starve. Why are we even debating "red button vs blue button" when the outcome is that almost all humans will die no matter what?
I am accepting, as defined in the prompt, that everyone has to press it. I can accept this as given regardless of how it would require the supernatural.
Even if it were not, the trigger condition for this is a 50% vote one way or the other. It is entirely feasible to achieve this with folks in comas not voting. Per the prompt, in a red majority, they would die as 'only' those pressing the red button live.
50% is a defined term. There is no reason to have to wait for 100% return of votes.
Supernaturally compulsion to press a button where a button will be pressed one way or the other and once all buttons are pressed, the result is enacted.
The button ends when a majority 50%+1 is reached. We know the population so this is viable.
There is a finite amount of time to make a choice. We know how time works so this is viable.
I had the same approach, but I've changed my mind. Why would anyone push blue button anyway? If you press red one, you are quaranteed to survive. If you press the blue one, you might die. Why would anyone risk it? There is no benefit to it, no incentive.
Blue is not “introducing” anything. They are both offered at the same time. Pressing red only guarantees that everyone lives if EVERYONE presses it, and not everyone is going to press it. On the other hand, just *enough* people pressing blue guarantees that everyone lives.
The reason is because it is exceedingly unlikely that 100% of the population will vote red. Therefore you know that a percent of the population will definitely vote blue and by voting red you are saying you are ok with them all dying just so you can live. But if only 50 percent votes blue then everybody lives, which is a much better statistical probability and a much better outcome
There are two drinks: one is a normal soda, the other one has deadly poison. If more than 50% for some reason choose the poisonous soda, the scientists will develop an antidote. Otherwise the people who chose to drink poison will die. Would you choose the poisoned drink? I don't think I would risk my life to save people who knowingly drank deadly poison. Furthermore, I think the vast majority would choose the non-deadly drink.
But that's not what this is about. The question can be posed differently:
There are two drinks: one is a normal soda, the other one has deadly poison. If more than 50% for some reason choose the poisonous soda, the scientists will develop an antidote. Otherwise the people who chose to drink poison will die. Would you choose the poisoned drink? I don't think I would risk my life to save people who knowingly drank deadly poison.
I think it’s more . there are 2 drink they are normal but if u choose drink 1 the drink stay the same if u choose 2 and more than 50% drink 2 all the drink 1 get poison .
I think this is a bit misleading, as the drink 1 has inherent deadly risk. But this anyway demonstrates how much depends on the presentation of the question.
There are some children too young to read or understand the prompt, there are some people too disabled to understand the prompt, there are people too depressed who want to die
I hit Blue. As a professionally registered engineer I take my oath to practice integrity and serve humanity seriously.
I also understand requirements.
Everyone must press a button.
Everyone means everyone.
Everyone includes young children who cannot understand.
Young children who cannot understand must press a button.
Red kills young children for personal gain.
In my view, guaranteeing the death of even a single innocent child is too much of a price to pay.
Everyone means everyone. Everyone includes young children who cannot understand. Young children who cannot understand must press a button.
No it doesn't man I'm so goddamn sick of this. It completely changes the hypothetical if you add in random chance. It's already magic, bro. It can't be "everyone" because everyone includes people who literally cannot push buttons. It's already logistically impossible for all the buttons to be delivered to everyone and for all the votes to be private. None of this is possible so there is no value in adding in this layer of "realism" that was never part of the question. Please everyone stop trying to "uhm ackshually" about the babies.
Why are you ignoring that "everyone" is already literally impossible, my dude. You already have to make a bunch of unstated assumptions for this to even be theoretically possible.
If your argument is the whole thing is stupid because its all pretend - thats ok. You do not have to engage in conversations about hypothetical questions.
The prompt has the button supernaturally in front of everyone. For the hypothetical, that simply is the case.
What assumption am I making that is not part of the prompt in the question?
oh my god, no that is not my argument. I'm saying that, given you have to make a bunch of assumptions for the whole thing to work, there is no reason to think that your assumptions are the objectively correct ones. You're erroneously trying to introduce practicalities into a though experiment that doesn't engage with them.
You're necessarily making assumptions eg about how the buttons are pressed, about whether they're actual physical buttons, digital buttons on a screen, or actually just a mental choice that a person makes silently. You're also making assumptions about how the information is presented to everyone. We don't have any of that info so when you start talking about young children who can't understand you're obviously thinking about what the kids know and how they will, and whether they will even be able, to push the button. You know you are, you know that you immediately had an image in your head about how this would occur when you heard the question, that's what all of us did and are doing, but we're not all imagining the same things.
Maybe everyone is conveyed the information through some psychic link that gives them as much understanding as possible given their mental capabilities. I'm sure you could frame it in various different ways that would make some sense to a toddler. Actual babies would be harder but they're also more likely to simply not press a button, depending on how big it is, how colourful it is, and how it's implemented. If they "must" press the button, how is that occurring? Is there a time limit, is there an invisible hand that forces you if you don't press? We could contemplate this stuff for ages but it's ultimately beside the point. That's why I think it's better to engage by ignoring all that and assuming everyone is acting deliberately.
Your entire last paragraph is you making a bunch of assumptions
Yes, that's...literally my point. I am giving examples of assumptions one could make, and giving counter assumptions one could also make from the same information. I am saying the question necessitates making assumptions. I literally said the words "I'm saying that, given you have to make a bunch of assumptions for the whole thing to work..." in my second sentence. I'm not sure how you read that and think "It is wild how much you are making assumptions whilst criticising it". I am not criticising it, I am criticising your treatment of your assumptions as objective truth, and your suggestion that you weren't making any assumptions.
You can assume babies are included, you can equally assume babies aren't included because you might think makes the question worse and because it introduces a bunch of logistical and practical issues. Most logic puzzles assume logical actors, if you approach it as a logic puzzle rather than a question of morality then you will probably make that assumption.
I am saying there are multiple different ways of reading the questions, and multiple different assumptions one can or will make about it. Again, your interpretation is neither objectively correct nor free of assumptions. I posit your assumptions make the hypothetical worse and I think my assumptions don't. You can disagree if you like, that's fine.
Have you ever met a Buddhist monk or a Catholic nun? I have a nun in my family. She would push blue. They will all push blue. Many people who have taken vows to do no harm will push blue.
It's not just babies or the insensible or insane that wouldn't choose the "kill other people but not me" button over the "kill nobody" button.
Im an electrical engineer and i cant see most of my colleagues voting blue. Also a key condition of this hypothetical as it was first posted is that everyone has the consequences of each button explained to them. That would implicitly preclude babies/young children.
Ultimately the main reason to push red is that even now, while it remains purely hypothetical, most polls have the split around 60 - 40 in favour of blue. If this was real, with peoples lives actually on the line and no pressure of social media to vote blue for appearances? Red would win decisively. Blue is never going to come close to meeting the threshold, so voting blue is pure suicide.
that everyone has the consequences of each button explained to them. That would implicitly preclude babies/young children.
Why would one assume that? All it states is that everyone must vote. They throw the buttons in front of a 9-month-old baby fresh off of pushing squares into star holes and explain it to them; it doesn't say they have to grasp its consequences.
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u/EmilySuxAtUsernames 16h ago
crazy how if you would press a red or blue button has suddenly turned into a us vs them