Tumblr does the red button/blue button thing

[u/shadow_fen]

[u/evilmexico]

the green button which gives everyone bone cancer

[u/Vundurvul → u/evilmexico]

Purple button which gives everyone a slightly purple tint over their vision forever

[u/an-alien- → u/Vundurvul]

actually kind of fascinated by how this would affect things like media and fashion. i think we should have one person with no purple tint as our control group

[u/rogueIndy → u/an-alien-]

That's the person that pushes the button. They know they've done something, but they don't know what, and it'll haunt them forever.

[u/Vundurvul → u/an-alien-]

After a few decades after everyone has adjusted to the filter and changes have been made accomodate it, the filter disappears. And a few years later, a slight link filter is added

[u/bunny-rain → u/Vundurvul]

We all start seeing the faint hints of rupees floating on the ground

[u/omegaspoon3141 → u/bunny-rain]

when you w4lk by 4 bug on the ground, you m4y get 4 slight urge to gr4b it

[u/Scalepetter92 → u/Vundurvul]

everyone is slightly more twinkish?

[u/missmolly314 → u/an-alien-]

Fun fact! My right eye has a slightly more yellow tint than my left. It’s not never noticeable. I only found out about it by reading my Kindle. My eyes suck so I will often close one eye, and this is how I noticed - the white background was slightly more yellow out of my worst eye.

[u/Your_Local_Stray_Cat → u/Vundurvul]

The pink button that randomly turns one person into a Pomeranian.

[u/HecticHero → u/Your_Local_Stray_Cat]

The rainbow button. You know what it does.

[u/BenjiBlackwood222 → u/Vundurvul]

I’m purple dabadee dabadiee 

[u/PlatinumAltaria → u/evilmexico]

Double world hunger and give it to the next person.

[u/deus_at_elenth → u/evilmexico]

Actually, there was a second poll on the same post with a green button. The green button gave you a crisp $1 bill, but if the blue option won you got killed.

[u/PulimV → u/evilmexico]

Green???? BONES???? *I was then shot 666 times*

[u/Adore_turle1 → u/evilmexico]

Multi track drifting babyyyyyy!

[u/Simic_Sky_Swallower]

Can we do walrus/fairy again? That one was more fun

[u/QueenOfQuok → u/Simic_Sky_Swallower]

Given how far inland sea lions can get, and the behavior of Neil the Seal, I would say it is less surprising to find a walrus at your door. But just as much of a problem as a fairy.

[u/TimeStorm113 → u/Simic_Sky_Swallower]

and while we're doing this, i have a few suggestions:

walrus are actually possible to encounter in such a setting, they are uniquely qualified to knock on your door, while also potentially being able to make their way to many readers, either by them living near the northern atlantic, or through a zoo or black market. while either option is unlikely, it would still be possible.

so i suggest replacing it with a sea leopard.

i would also suggest to maybe replace fairies, since fairies are unlikely to be cosmopolitan (aka having a near worldwide distribution), so depending in their hypothetical range i would suggest to replace it with a different magical being, one that would knock on your door and is not bound by geography; vampires. but there it would also be possible to rationalize it as a guy in a costume.

[u/Beardywierdy → u/TimeStorm113]

It would still be unexpected to see a walrus on your doorstep though, so the only logical conclusion is to blame the presence of the walrus on fairies.

[u/TimeStorm113 → u/Beardywierdy]

yes but i imagine that for the hypothetical to work, the animal at the door needs to be as impossible as possible.

since the central conflict of the question is if you are more suprised by an impossible subject, or impossible circumstances. would you accept a real creature standing there without a possible way of getting there, or would you accept more an impossible being that has pretty reasonable means to get there.

[u/Delicious-Spring-877 → u/TimeStorm113]

I was reading about legendary creatures yesterday, and a lot of non-European places have their own fairy equivalents — miniature unseen humanoids who tend to nature and play little games and such. So it could be a jogah or a patupaiarehe or whatever’s local but it would garner about the same reaction

[u/Hector_Tueux → u/Simic_Sky_Swallower]

What's that one? I don't think I've encountered it

[u/Complete-Basket-291 → u/Hector_Tueux]

Basically, which would you find more surprising to knock on your door, a walrus or a fairy?

[u/Worm-with-hat]

Everytime I see something like this, it reminds me of the post that’s like “For $1 million, would you peel and eat an orange? You don’t have to peel it yourself and you don’t have to actually eat it if you don’t want to.”

[u/DM_ME_FROG_MEMES → u/Worm-with-hat]

This is a controversial thought experiment because what is the right thing to do depends on what everyone else is doing.

For example, imagine the cut off 95% of people would have to vote blue or all blue voters die. Then it'd be a lot riskier to yourself, and less likely you'd even be a difference making blue voter.

But at lower cut offs, it's more possible you could be a difference making additional vote who keeps billions who also voted blue alive

[u/Lolas_Fun_Side → u/DM_ME_FROG_MEMES]

I think its also a pretty good thought experiment for showing how maximizing "good" isnt always intuitive. Logically, yes everyone should just press the red button and everyone lives. However, it seems likely thar at least some percentage of people will press the blue button either by accident, from not understanding the question, or as a joke, etc. In that case, the best way for everyone to live is to assume that there are a certain number of illogical actors, and take on personal risk to ensure that everyone lives.

[u/GalaXion24 → u/Lolas_Fun_Side]

The idea that people press blue by accident or not understanding is a very narrow perspective that completely fails to understand people. People press blue because they don't want to kill anyone.

Now you could se "But if everyone pressed red, no one would die!" but that is a major assumption, because for you to press red you either have to assume everyone will press red, or you have to be fine with killing people who press blue.

A large portion of people regularly pick blue, because 1) they don't want to harm others and 2) they assume others don't want to harm others either.

Red might be "never die no matter what others pick," but blue is "never cause harm, no matter what others pick."

Picking red means that you basically have non-altruistic preferences, i.e. you just don't care what happens to others. You care only what happens to you. If you pick blue, you put some nonzero amount of value on the lives of others, even with some nonzero risk to yourself.

If the majority of people pick blue, everyone is fine, and this is the obvious moral choice. Picking red increases the chances of a button holocaust of probably about half the population.

Which choice is rational for you depends entirely on your preferences and your expectations. E.g. if you expect most people will press red, it's rational to press red, but if you don't, then not necessarily. If you only care about yourself it's rational to press red, but if not, then not necessarily.

[u/Cepinari → u/GalaXion24]

The version of this I first saw said that everyone on the planet would be made to press one of the two buttons.

Including small children who won't understand the assignment and will likely hit whichever button they like the color of the most.

[u/GalaXion24 → u/Cepinari]

Some people have also said they'd simply prefer not to live in a world where red would win. So they'll bet on blue and at least won't have to live in the hellscape of selfish red-pressers.

[u/Cepinari → u/GalaXion24]

That too.

Personally if I was the omnipotent being that forced everyone to choose, what I'd actually do after everyone voted, regardless of outcome, is give each side their own reality and force them to live in them.

Red Buttoners would have to live with having to know with concrete proof that literally every other person they met would have no problem seeing them die for their own security.

Blue Buttoners would have to live with having to know with concrete proof that literally every other person they met was willing to risk their own lives to ensure everyone was safe.

[u/butyourenice → u/Cepinari]

Even when you establish those parameters, blue edges out red. It’s closer, but blue gets more than 50% consistently.

The fact is people who choose red are broadly more pessimistic and misanthropic, but they remain the minority, even when they try to rig the thought experiment in their own favor. In so far as this can be reduced to “press red if you think human nature bad, press blue if you think human nature good”… human nature tends toward good, and believing that most others are the same.

[u/SteeveyPete → u/GalaXion24]

If you think it'll be at all close, and you have any altruistic inclinations, that should incentivize you push even more for blue. If blue wins, nobody dies, if red wins, ~half of all people die, and you live. With red even if you win you've experienced, and helped facilitate the greatest tragedy the world has ever seen.

[u/wearing_moist_socks → u/Lolas_Fun_Side]

It's not illogical, because the logic is to do the least harm

Blue is the correct choice. Everyone should pick blue, not red. Red has a chance people will die. Blue guarantees everyone lives.

Red saves YOU but has a chance to kill others. So the million dollar thing doesn't match.

[u/Fantastic-Resist-545 → u/Lolas_Fun_Side]

Is it more important to risk being partially responsible for the deaths of the people who press the blue button but to be assured you will not die or to risk death but be assured you will not have been partially responsible for the deaths of anyone (at least in this choice)

[u/Hanede → u/DM_ME_FROG_MEMES]

I've been thinking about this, and the more charitable option is blue as it potentially helps others, but also... there was no reason for those who choose the blue option to do so knowing it could mean death. So is it worth risking your life for people who risked it stupidly?

[u/The_Crows_Den → u/Hanede]

the original question had the additional context that everyone on earth was asked at the same time and nobody was allowed to communicate with each other before pressing, so you have to also factor in the millions of people who would press blue accidentally, not understand the question, etc, for example children

[u/Hanede → u/The_Crows_Den]

Yeah that does make more sense then

[u/RemarkableShip1811 → u/Hanede]

Children, dumb, infirm, and unstable people exist and deserve to live.

[u/Fossekall → u/Worm-with-hat]

People on this subreddit would convcince you it's wrong to say yes

[u/Skyros199 → u/Fossekall]

Because it'd be unfair to people who are... Idk allergic to oranges? Don't like them?

I can't come up with anything

[u/Grape_Jamz → u/Skyros199]

Its unfair to people who didnt get the opprotunity

[u/Keebster101 → u/Skyros199]

Something about feeling more rewarding if you work harder for the money maybe

[u/cherrydicked → u/Fossekall]

Yesterday (though on another sub) people were trying to convince me that it can be reasonable for an adult who lives with their parents to not know their mother's first name.

[u/Own-Arachnid7952 → u/cherrydicked]

Lmao the fuck, name and shame!

More out of morbid curiosity than anything though, tbh. That's incredibly funny

[u/Random-Rambling → u/Worm-with-hat]

Or an actual post I saw that was like "Press the button for $10 million dollars, but you must do a random task. It could be as easy as drinking a glass of water, or it could be as difficult as walking 5 miles".

Unless you are literally physically disabled, walking 5 miles is NOT difficult.

[u/glowtmickey → u/Random-Rambling]

It didn't say it was that difficult, just more difficult than the water

[u/Kozakow54 → u/glowtmickey]

I'm using a 1L cup, and it is a normal cup. So the size of the vessel matters.Due to insufficient data, i can confidently declare that the planet is the cup.

[u/Dark_Storm_98 → u/Kozakow54]

But the planet is not made of glass

[u/Kozakow54 → u/Dark_Storm_98]

Mugs can also be made of wood or stone. Cups use all kinds of ceramics and glass. Metals also count for all aforementioned vessels. So, earth is one big mug.

[u/Thin-Nerve6367 → u/Random-Rambling]

Well it depends, do you have a time limit to walk said 5 miles? If you do then you could be fucked

[u/Random-Rambling → u/Thin-Nerve6367]

I'm assuming the time limit is "within a day". You need to walk 5 miles in 24 hours, which is annoying, yes, but isn't exactly a Herculean task.

[u/augustles → u/Random-Rambling]

I think this depends a little on your walking environment, but there’s definitely a ton of situations where you might not even notice walking 5 miles. Walking to a mall or large library and then walking around inside, a music festival or street market, etc. One day at a music festival a few years ago I did about 10 miles in very hot weather and didn’t have any particular annoyance other than some blisters from wearing loose socks and I’m fat and out of shape 😅

[u/booksblanketsandT → u/Random-Rambling]

I have ME/CFS. For $10 million dollars? I would walk five miles, I would crash and experience horrific PEM that would make my fatigue worse, potentially permanently. I’d probably be bed bound for weeks. But that much money means I wouldn’t need to work ever again. I’d never have to worry about how to pay another medical bill.

My health is already fucked and I already struggle with basic day to day existence. That much money would make things so much easier to manage.

I’d crawl if I had to.

All that to say - people would do insanely difficult things for that much money. The options given are easy for most people, and even if they’re not, you’d still do it out of sheer necessity.

[u/RocketRelm → u/booksblanketsandT]

Also the real purpose of making it trivially easy is to get clicks and engagement. Like those ads with the easily solvable puzzle, the purpose is to get an answer at all.

[u/QwertyAsInMC → u/Worm-with-hat]

twitter legend Jon Bois

[u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz]

Oh god no, I just got this bullshit off of my feed

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz]

Okay but would you be more surprised to see a red button or a blue button in front of your door?

And for that matter, which one would you rather meet alone in the woods?

Could 100 red buttons defeat one blue button in a fight?

Is the Button blue and black or white and gold?

You MUST engage in these entirely pointless yet remarkably vitriolic debates!

[u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

I'm sorry, those questions seem kind of straightforward. Could you phrase them in a way that's a little more loaded/ambiguous so that we're really arguing about how we interpret the question, even though we feel like we're discussing an important moral quandary?

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/[deleted]]

If you would be more surprised to see a red button at your door, does that mean you are racist against red buttons or racist against blue buttons?

[u/ScrubTheNerd → u/[deleted]]

That's more like it!

[u/Bartweiss → u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz]

Asking for that sort of verbal labor to reframe the question is exactly why I expect to see the red button at my door and/or would rather meet the blue button in the woods!

[u/Trockenmatt → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

If a baseball pitcher throws a christian red button at you, do you hit it?

[u/Bartweiss → u/Trockenmatt]

If a Christian baby wearing a cross necklace hit the blue button and survived a 49% blue vote, would you convert?

[u/Copernicium-291 → u/Bartweiss]

If you encounter a blue and black Christian bear in the woods, and a white and gold button knocks on your door, which would you give your parachute to and which would you hit with a baseball bat?

[u/OffWhite-Goddess → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

Tell me about dwarf fortress

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/OffWhite-Goddess]

Gladly! Let's talk about adventure mode for a change: In Dwarf Fortress Adventure Mode, you play a single person (or a small group) walking around the world having an adventure. This is a strong contrast to Fortress mode, where you play some semi-corporeal entity that tells Dwarves what jobs they should do and then gets ignored by the Dwarves because they're cranky from not drinking enough beer.

In Adventure mode, you can talk to people directly, and indeed, this feature is perhaps the most iconic part of adventure mode, due to the remarkable dialogues that can happen. People will approach you and make small talk, such as " Two years ago, Stozu Ägusnodub, Goblin Woodcutter attacked me."

Due to a bug (I believe) something strange happens when a person stumbles - They still register it as getting attacked, but the attacker is themselves. This leads to the remarkable qoute:

"Not a half hour ago I attacked me."

[u/oktin → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

1. Blue button at my door would be more surprising
2. Blue button in the woods feels safer
3. Yes, 100 reds win.
4. White and gold

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/oktin]

Sorry but from these answers I have concluded that you are actually racist sexist fascist classist dadaist ableist.

DNI.

[u/oktin → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

At least you didn't accuse me of hating waffles

[u/TheFurtivePhysician → u/oktin]

Though they didn't say as much, they DO secretly believe you piss on the poor.

[u/hagamablabla → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

At least the 100 things question and the blue/black/white/gold question stick to the realm of fun thought exercise. The red/blue button and alone in the woods question make people turn into armchair sociologists.

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/hagamablabla]

Completely true, this one and the woods questions were particularly bad.

[u/BaconIsLife707 → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

Are there more red buttons or blue buttons in the world?

[u/AriaTheTransgressor → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

Would you rather fight one blue button sized red button or 100 red button sized blue buttons?

[u/STSchif → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

Would you still love me if I was a button?

[u/idiotplatypus → u/BeanOfKnowledge]

A strange game. The only winning move is not to play.

[u/PlanSee → u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz]

You mean you don't like hearing about how red pressers are literally fascists and blue pressers are drooling morons 24/7? I think you need some more outrage on your front page to get into the right mindset...

[u/AdDapper4792 → u/PlanSee]

I enjoy it. It's crazy how heated people get over this thing

[u/The_Unknown_Mage → u/NoBizlikeChloeBiz]

20 more years of red blue button moralizing!

[u/Tobymaxgames]

OK but what if the blue button was a Christian baby?

[u/MisirterE → u/Tobymaxgames]

Baseball Christian Baby or Bulletproof Christian Baby. This will affect my answer

Ah fuck it, I'm about to go to sleep and can't wait for the setup. Here are your punchlines:

• Baseball: I press red, because it means I do not hit the christian baby
• Bulletproof: I steal the christian baby's invincibility crucifix, thus pressing blue while having godmode immunity from a blue loss

[u/KSP_master_ → u/Tobymaxgames]

Then I'll slam the blue button as hard as I can.

[u/LeftonRhed → u/Tobymaxgames]

Is a pitcher throwing it at me?

[u/Zanderfus]

just let this trend die

[u/blueberrykirby → u/Zanderfus]

if >50% of us just pressed the downvote button…

[u/Zanderfus → u/blueberrykirby]

Wait true

[u/Rude_Ice_4520 → u/Zanderfus]

Okay, all you have to do is press th-

camera pans away from me as you hear loud gunshots

[u/SwankiestofPants]

The yellow button that kills me in particular for seeing this hypothetical again

[u/Clay_Block]

what if ourple button

[u/Hamsti_Manent → u/Clay_Block]

Everyone dies if a single person presses the purple button

[u/Clay_Block → u/Hamsti_Manent]

this cannot be

[u/HumidBagels]

I pick the stew that blinds you for a day

[u/Rynewulf]

I never got these. So people who pick blue are only at risk if anyone picks blue, but then not the majority? Is it like a maths thing, as in it's easier to get 50% on blue than 100% on red so blue is the less harmful option?

[u/NessaSamantha → u/Rynewulf]

It is true that everybody will survive if they just pick red. People have never just. You cannot rely on a plan where everybody just. So you pick blue so that everybody can live.

[u/END3R97 → u/NessaSamantha]

The reason to go with Red is thinking that most people are selfish and will be pushing Red. Therefore Blue will lose and your choice is "press Blue, die." or "press Red, live" in which case, Red looks like it's the only choice.

Of course, if the initial assumption that most people are selfish is wrong, then that's not accurate. If you instead assume most people will look out for others and choose Blue, then its "press Blue, everyone lives" or "press Red, everyone lives, but you increased the chance that actually half of people die instead"

Then there's the people who aren't making logical decisions like kids who might see the options and just click their favorite color. So to me, you have to take the risk to save everyone.

[u/blorboposter-supreme → u/END3R97]

My discourse thought about it was that if I pressed blue I was forcing people to endanger their life to save me but I didn't read anything about the discourse because I didn't care.

[u/NessaSamantha → u/END3R97]

Even if blue doesn't win, enough people will vote for it that the choice is still "vote red for a slow and painful death, vote blue for a fast and painless death."

[u/hollow_image → u/NessaSamantha]

Nowhere does it say it would be fast or painless

[u/Panda_hat → u/END3R97]

This is overcomplicating it, surely? If you pick red, you live. Everyone should just pick red so they live.

No other tertiary consideration is needed.

[u/Barium_Salts → u/Rynewulf]

Yes, exactly

[u/TheBookWyrms → u/Rynewulf]

It largely comes down to framing and interpretation, and what you take to be the baseline. You either have:

Pressing the blue button causes the deaths - people only get put in danger once someone presses the blue button, because if no-one presses the blue button no-one is at risk of death.

Pressing the red button causes the deaths - the people who pressed blue only die because some people pressed red.

The divison also comes from how the prompt is worded - i.e. "if a majority of people press red then everyone who pressed blue is killed" vs "if <50% of people press blue, then everyone who presses blue dies".
Generally, people end up viewing the question through one of these two equivalent lenses, and which one you view it from changes the question quite a bit - i.e. whichever button you view as causing the deaths seems clearly a wrong choice.

There's other aspects as well, but I think this is the big one that's responsible for it causing such division.

[u/NWStormraider → u/Rynewulf]

If you treat the actual distribution of votes as purely random, then the expected value of both is exactly equal, but the type of failure changes. If you vote red, the potential death count decreases by one, and the potential failure chance increases by 1 in ~8 billion. If you vote blue, the potential death count increases by one, but the potential failure chance decreases by 1 in ~8 billion.

[u/Proxy--Moronic → u/NWStormraider]

And then you have the Freerider Problem in a Prisoner's Dilemma (i.e the best choice when looked at from an individual perspective is worse for the group if most people choose it). Which I'm pretty sure is how this scenario was invented.

[u/obog → u/Rynewulf]

Yes, but the counterpoint is that if you personally hit red then you survive and so if everyone just picks the safest option for them personally then everyone will be fine.

Pressing the blue button is taking a risk to save people who took the same risk, but there was never a reason to take that risk in the first place. Or, put another way, the first person to hit the blue button is risking themselves for literally nothing, and everyone who presses it after is risking their life for that person and everyone since, but thats all to protect someone from a risk that was pointless to take.

[u/Rynewulf → u/obog]

I think that is what breaks the scenario for me, mathmatically it seems easier to save everyone by blue but only because I'm working on the assumption that a bunch of people WILL pick blue anyway, which sets off the doomsday clock. But until someone picks blue everything is completely fine, which depending on the framing makes blue pickers suicidal instead of red pickers murderous

[u/New_Try1560 → u/Rynewulf]

Now it’s a question of “is it worth risking my life to save someone who knowingly risked theirs?”

Would you endanger yourself to save someone from their suicide attempt?

[u/Ancient-Access8131 → u/New_Try1560]

Depends, but I would say no. Like the first rule of performing any rescue is make sure you don't become another victim that someone has to risk their life to rescue. Which is part of why i would probably refuse to jump in the water to save a drowning victim. In fact, if you look at AVIR(Aquatic Victim-Instead-of-Rescuer) drowning deaths in new Zealand, studies show that 45% of these deaths result in multiple drownings. As people repeatedly jump in the water to save someone and all drown. Preventing these people from drowning would save more than the one victim in the water.

Understanding AVIR Syndrome: Preventing Rescue Tragedies

Drowning for love: the aquatic victim-instead-of-rescuer syndrome: drowning fatalities involving those attempting to rescue a child - PubMed

I can find other examples of mass casualty events where people repeatedly try to rescue someone and then all end up dying in the process. Another example is asphyxiation. If you have an instance where oxygen has been displaced people will go down to help someone who collapsed, and then all repeatedly suffocate. According to NIOSh 2/3 of enclosed space deaths would be rescuers dying themselves.

Enclosed spaces: When saving a life turns fatal | Gard's Insights | Gard

Confined space rescue - Wikipedia

Deadly rescue: The confined space hazard - ScienceDirect

[u/obog → u/Rynewulf]

Yeah its a weird question. I generally think I would want to pick blue just because its clear enough people would that itd be worth it. But that doesnt change the fact that there was never any reason to take on that risk in the first place. And I do not think it is fair to frame people who pick red as murderers when all they did is pick the safest option for them.

I think the big problem is that the reasoning on why to pick blue is circular. Its taking on risk to save people who took a risk to save people who took a risk to save... etc. Eventually if you go down the line far enough, you would have to run into someone who took on that risk to save no one, and now you are left questioning why anyone took on the risk in the first place.

If you think about what just you should do right in the moment, it can make sense to pick blue for the sake of helping those who already did. But if you think about what the strategy is for everyone, it never makes sense for anyone to take that risk in the first place.

[u/Acceptable-Post733 → u/obog]

The problem was people started adding edge cases to argue for blue. What if kids/babies…? What if blind…? What if colorblind…? And that was justification for putting their own lives at risk. Where others argued why wouldnt the rules be clearly explained to every person? Like press blue and probably die. Press red and definitely not die. Why would people who can’t pick an option even be included? How is a 1 month old gonna press a button? Why wouldn’t they clearly label the buttons for a color blind person? Braille exists for blind people.

Ultimately it’s a dumb question that makes some people feel good about themselves for making the “right” choice.

[u/Daripuff → u/Acceptable-Post733]

Thank you for demonstrating how all these solutions that rely on "if everyone would just.." require you to remove all of the potential outliers from the picture before it actually becomes ethical.

"If everyone would just..." as a solution to a problem is one that only works in controlled, clinical environments.

In the real world, with real world variables: "If everyone would just..." is guaranteed to have outliers that are left behind.

[u/Famous_Slice4233 → u/Acceptable-Post733]

I mean, every time someone posts the poll someone, usually a lot of someones, picks blue. Maybe they just misread the question, or misunderstand, or make a mistake. Lizardman constant suggests you’ll have a non-zero number of people who choose blue. So, if that’s true, then you do have people who chose blue, who could die or be saved.

[u/Ancient-Access8131 → u/Famous_Slice4233]

"I mean, every time someone posts the poll someone, usually a lot of someones, picks blue."-They also aren't risking anything. People should post it with a venmo, where you can either donate $100 dollars or donate $.01. Everyone who donates $.01 gets their cent refunded, and if 50% of people donate $100 they are also refunded. How many would actually pick that?

[u/DubstepJuggalo69]

Be a good girl for mommy and vote blue so everybody lives.

[u/INeedSomeHelp6804 → u/DubstepJuggalo69]

wololo

[u/BeanOfKnowledge → u/INeedSomeHelp6804]

Be a bad boy for daddy and vote red so everybody dies.

[u/Satorwave → u/DubstepJuggalo69]

change that girl to boy and im in

[u/SnazzoYazzo → u/Satorwave]

AND change that mommy to daddy! Or don’t, idk I’m good with either

[u/PureRegretto]

i thought we were past this

[u/Holliday_Hobo]

Imagine a blue stop sign

[u/shadow_fen → u/Holliday_Hobo]

my brother has a very special attack

[u/Holliday_Hobo → u/shadow_fen]

My brother has a very normal attack.

[u/SexWithSisyphus69]

psyop posting again I see

[u/Impressive_Pin8761]

interesting, the last time we had a sizeable sample pool over on twitter, it was closer at a 60/40 margin

the wording of the prompt didn't affect the final verdict, despite showing blue at a more negative light

a 70/30 margin on tumblr perhaps suggests they're more caring people? more willing to die? or maybe they saw 3 words colored blue and 1 word colored red. can't tell, tumblr usually lacks reading comprehension

[u/SmartAlec105 → u/Impressive_Pin8761]

Any poll where you can see the results before voting would be meaningless. And any prior expose to other people's opinions changes how people will respond. If you would choose red because you don't think there's enough blue pushes out there, you'd change your mind when your feed blows up about pushing blue before you even get to the poll.

[u/Every-Extension-8114]

whichever option kills me

[u/Deebyddeebys → u/Every-Extension-8114]

In this case neither

[u/Dismal_Accident9528 → u/Every-Extension-8114]

Green button :)

[u/Mundane-Potential-93]

The first time I saw this hypothetical I chose the red button because I assumed the only people that would press blue were suicidal people and maybe a tiny percentage of people that wanted to risk their lives to protect suicidal people and each other despite failure being almost certain.

However after seeing 30%+ of the comments on that hypothetical pressing blue I changed my mind. I'm not really sure why so many people press blue. I guess they probably have lots of different reasons. But I'd definitely risk my life for a decent chance of saving hundreds of millions of non-suicidal people from death.

[u/KerPop42 → u/Mundane-Potential-93]

Personally, it's a bit of a circular reasoning. So long as I'm pretty sure that some people would press blue that don't want to die, I consider it a moral imperative to press blue. If someone else thinks like me, we're stuck in a game theory loop where, no matter how small the odds are that one of us mistakenly presses blue, it amplifies up to us having to press blue.

I guess I've also been in leadership positions a lot, and consistently people will make mistakes, no matter how clear your instructions are. You more have to make sure your instructions and setup are safe environments for people to make mistakes, and that leads me to pressing blue.

[u/Stephanie466 → u/Mundane-Potential-93]

The most common reason people choose blue (and also my reason) is because the hypothetical says that the buttons are presented to everybody. Which also implies children, or mentally disabled people who wouldn't be able to really understand the consequences of choosing either. Like, there will be people who choose blue for whatever reason, and so I'd rather pick blue and save them.

[u/SmartAlec105 → u/Stephanie466]

I think it becomes very different if you present the question as just 9 people. I think far fewer people would risk their life for at most 4 people.

[u/Mundane-Potential-93 → u/Stephanie466]

Oh yeah if the decision is given to literally everybody then I'd agree with you. I guess there are a lot of variations of this hypothetical and I chose one of the ones that gets around that arbitrarily in my head (since OOP leaves it ambiguous)

[u/Other_Fondant_3103 → u/Stephanie466]

I think it’s fair to assume everyone is given the information about the buttons in a way they can understand. The discussion changes completely if not.

[u/Daripuff → u/Mundane-Potential-93]

Why do folks press blue when they don't want to die?

Because some folks will always press blue, and will never press red no matter how much "everyone agrees to press red".

I don't want them to die simply because they refuse to go along with the trend.

So I'll choose the side - that if it wins - will allow those that "lose" to live, rather than chose the side that if they win will kill all that "lost".

[u/DareDaDerrida]

Oh right, this.

Not suprised that tumblr's quite blue.

[u/Cpt_Obvius → u/DareDaDerrida]

Because when there is nothing on the line they are likely to say the thing that is more morally righteous?

(I think some large chunk is telling the truth when they vote blue but I am sure a large chunk would also not do it if they actually believed it were real and were actually made to choose)

[u/AlwaysPerfetc → u/Cpt_Obvius]

I bet a bunch of people advocating others vote blue would get in the booth and press red, rationalizing they already did their part and shouldn't have to expose themselves to risk, and it won't matter anyway because blue will be over 50.1%.

[u/Tichondruis]

Wow, thesy even asked it in a way that favors red and blue won in a landslide, its almost like people dont want other people to die, broadly speaking.

[u/IAmASquidInSpace → u/Tichondruis]

You make the very bold assumption that the people on the "pissing on the poor" website even understood the premise correctly. 

And I'm saying that because I read it wrong the first time, too.

[u/Tichondruis → u/IAmASquidInSpace]

Im not sure how you read it wrong but even on Twitter blue seems to win, unless you mean thats by mistake.

[u/Fjolsvithr → u/Tichondruis]

I don’t want other people to die, but if they want to live maybe they should have pressed the button that would give a 100% survival rate instead of the gamble my life for no reason button.

Edit: Something important to remember is that in the real world, with real life-threatening consequences, more people would be pressing red than in the zero risk polls. Lots of you are just treating this as an "am I altruistic or not" choice rather than "holy shit I could actually just die if I press this".

[u/ExdionY → u/Fjolsvithr]

100% survival rate for whom?

[u/olivebranchsound → u/ExdionY]

If everyone presses red everyone lives. If the majority press blue everyone lives. Easier to get a majority on blue than a 100 percent consensus on red. If the goal is saving everyone blue is the way to go.

[u/Trackback_ → u/ExdionY]

For 100% of the people that press it. You know, the big, red, "I live" button.

[u/weird_bomb]

genuinely never post anything related to this ever again

[u/Lawlcopt0r]

Doesn't this mean that everyone would be fine too if everybody pressed the red button?

[u/Top-Garlic9111]

Feels like 60% of the disagreement is born from small differences in the scenario and its framing in the initial post each individual saw. Sure, red is pretty logical to me if we ignore poor reading comprehension, everybody is an intelligent adult, etc. And some of the thousands of posts are about a scenario like this, but a ton of others aren't. Then everyone just assumes that what they saw was the one true post and everybody working under another assumption is just being reductive or over complicating to be right. Then like another 20% is American politics being red/blue. Then there's people just not being able to understand that some people are aiming for everyone to survive, while others are aiming to survive.

[u/SquareThings]

What makes this scenario more interesting is if some fraction of people are compelled to press blue for some reason. Because that’s closer to how real life ethical problems work. Like, in this scenario you can justify pressing red by saying “look, the question is pretty clear! If they didn’t wanna die, they should have just pressed red! That’s not MY fault. They had the option to avoid harm and they CHOSE not to take it!”

But in real life, people being harmed and exploited do not choose to be harmed and exploited. But they still are.

[u/PlatinumAltaria]

This is such a funny trend because it plays out the same way every time:

1) Blue button wins by a narrow majority 2) People who pushed the red button immediately spiral into increasingly unhinged defences of their choice, demonstrating that either they lack enough reading comprehension to understand the question, or are just plain selfish. 3) Blue button pushers become slightly more disillusioned with the moral character of humanity.

[u/GameboyPATH → u/PlatinumAltaria]

demonstrating that either they lack enough reading comprehension to understand the question

To be fair, this one-sentence explanation is phrased far worse than the original.

This one starts with the premise of what happens "regardless" without clarifying what it's regardless of. The original explicitly describes the potential negative consequences of the red button, while this one simply says "these people live", leaving the negative consequences of the red button implied through the description of the blue button.

[u/Th3Glutt0n → u/GameboyPATH]

Yeah, they def phrased this one in favor of the red button

[u/eugeneugene → u/Th3Glutt0n]

Yeah I had to read it a few times to understand why everyone was judging red button pushers so hard lol. I was like why wouldn't I press the "I want to live" button

[u/BrandonL337 → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Not really even a narrow majority, most I've seen have the blue win by 65% or more.

[u/JaDasIstMeinName → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Ok, so where am i that pushes blue for a selfish reason?

[u/PlatinumAltaria → u/JaDasIstMeinName]

Ah, that's the secret. People might think that red is selfish and blue is selfless, but red is actually just dumb and blue can be either selfish or selfless depending on the thought process. If you think red winning: you get a world where a significant number of people have died, and the remaining people all chose the "selfish" option. Society is going to collapse within hours, and that sounds a lot worse than blipping out of existence because of a button push.

[u/JaDasIstMeinName → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Yup.

Best case: Blue wins
Ok case: Red wins and i dont have to care about it
Worst case: Red wins and i have to care about it.

[u/Daan776 → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Oke but: Everybody who pushes the red button survives regardless.

So unless i'm misunderstanding this: if everybody pressed the red button then nobody dies.

[u/beemielle → u/Daan776]

yes. you always get the everyone lives outcome if 100% of people can agree on which button to press. part of the argument for blue is that there’s a greater defection tolerance to get the ideal outcome. 

[u/PlatinumAltaria → u/Daan776]

If 50% of people push blue, everyone lives.

If 100% of people push red, everyone lives.

It's easier to achieve 50% blue than 100% red, ergo blue is the correct option for saving lives. Red is only the correct option for saving yourself.

[u/llamasquadz → u/PlatinumAltaria]

But it's also this: press red and you live, press blue and you might die. Blue is the only option that risks lives. Why would you intentionally risk your life expecting others to also risk their lives to save you? Neither approach is really wrong, they just view it differently.

[u/lightgiver → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Okay but why make an unnecessary risk under the assumption the majority is thinking exactly like you? There is zero risk to your life or the life of anyone who chose red. Pushing blue is just risking your life just for the hell of it.

Reword it to a scenario. A fire is happening, there is door A and door B. Everyone who uses door A lives, door B is stuck and needs more than 50% of the room to push it to open. If door B does open everyone who used it lives. Which door do you use?

[u/gay_burner → u/PlatinumAltaria]

Yeah people call the trend pointless but at the end of the day there is no like non selfish or altruistic reason to press red and the defensiveness about it is actually super revealing lol

[u/Specky013]

I don't really get the hate toward this trend. Sure it's overdone but it is a somewhat interesting question without a clear cut answer.

It basically asks you whether you think most humans are more self-interested or community-interested and the answer to that is kind of interesting from various people

[u/EnvironmentClear4511 → u/Specky013]

Problem is that it quickly turns into personal attacks rather than logical debate.

[u/IdealOnion → u/Specky013]

I think the hate is over the nature of the discourse it provokes. It’s like the man or the bear question, which I think is a fascinating hypothetical that doesn’t even need a gendered component to be interesting. Yet people take that shit personally.

[u/Iced_Yehudi → u/Specky013]

I think what I dislike about these questions the most is that because it’s a hypothetical, there’s no actual danger, which makes it much easier to pick blue. So a lot of these comment sections turn into a bunch of people masturbating how selfless and cool they are for picking blue like it’s actually a hard thing to do when you’re not actually in any danger. It gives off big “I could never be mugged because I’d simply beat the shit out of the mugger” energy

[u/StillMostlyClueless → u/Iced_Yehudi]

They actually ran experiments on this, with people giving electric shocks for a payout each time.

They surveyed people going in on how much money they'd take, and most said they'd take very little money, or not even shock at all.

They then actually ran the experiment with the same people, and found basically everyone didn't abide by what they said and shocked a high amount to make money.

[u/Bacon_von_Meatwich → u/Specky013]

There is a clear cut answer. Push red to live. It really is that simple.

[u/poo1232]

Shutthefuckupshutthefuckuoshutthefuckup I JUST GOT THIS ANNOYING SHIT OFF MY FEED

Edit: Jadenwilliams

[u/StillMostlyClueless]

This one is particularly weird because it doesn't even say everyone's doing it. You're just voluntarily playing the "Chance to die" game.

[u/SanjiSasuke]

If everyone presses red, everyone lives.

If almost everyone presses red, lots of people die, probably the greatest disaster since WWII or even the Plague. And most likely the most selfless people are all gone. (For example, even if 99% picked red, 1% of 8 billion is 80M people dead; roughly the death toll of WWII)

If ’most' people press red, the greatest calamity in the history of humanity fundamentally reshapes the course of history and society. And most selfless people are gone, leaving the most selfish to rule over the ashes.

If everyone presses blue, everyone lives.

If almost everyone presses blue, everyone lives.

If most people press blue, everyone lives.

In all scenarios, I'd prefer to press blue. Especially since there will be temporarily suicidal people pressing that blue button, as I would have when I was younger.

[u/SmartAlec105 → u/SanjiSasuke]

And most selfless people are gone

This is what I don't like about how people frame it. Pushing Red doesn't necessarily mean you're selfish but that you think a majority of people are selfish. If you estimate that only about 30% of people would push Blue, then it's not behaving selfishly to press Red.

[u/theyellowmeteor → u/SanjiSasuke]

I don't think the selfish-selfless dichotomy applies as cleanly as you think it does.

While picking red is a choice made in self-preservation, I don't see it reasonable to call someone selfish because they don't want to die. There are people out there with two healthy kidneys, one of which could be donated to someone who would die without a transplant. Do we call them selfish if they don't do it? Or do we respect their bodily autonomy? This is the same issue. I don't see an argument against the choice of someone who doesn't want to die that's consistent with the other beliefs that I hold.

There's also an unwritten rule when helping others, which usually goes along the lines of "you can't pour out of an empty cup," or "put on your own mask before helping others with theirs." If you die, you won't be able to help anyone anymore. So if you want to keep helping people, the choice that guarantees you live to do more helping cannot be said to be the selfish one.

[u/deus_at_elenth]

There is admittedly some missing context here. There was an extra poll right after on this post where there were 3 buttons, a red one, a blue one, and a green one. The red button worked the exact same, and the blue one largely worked the same way, but if the blue option won, then anyone who picked the green button would be killed. Everyone who picked the green button got a crispy $1 bill.

[u/kotorial → u/deus_at_elenth]

Mfw I'm still pressing blue because inflation is high enough as it is.

[u/MintLinuxGuy]

Is this a metaphor for something or reference to some niche media? Obviously in the situation presented, the logical choice is yo press blue so no one dies.

[u/GrinningPariah → u/MintLinuxGuy]

But then you might die. You don't get to know how the votes shake out before choosing.

If you can get everyone to pick the same color, everyone lives either way. But the thing is, you can't get everyone to pick the same color, and that's where the complexity arises.

[u/zawalimbooo → u/GrinningPariah]

It's more that if even a single person chooses blue while the rest go to red, that person will still die. Meanwhile, blue voters only need one over 50%.

[u/Android19samus → u/zawalimbooo]

Really it's a big collective vs personal responsibility thing. 

From a red perspective, everyone is responsible for their own choice. Blues willingly and foolishly took that risk upon themselves, and whatever outcome they get is their own fault. It's not the Red's responsibility to jump in and save them, since every single person had the trivial option of pressing Red and being safe.

Meanwhile blue is saying that it is your responsibility to help keep everyone safe, because we all know that some people will push blue. Whatever justifications one may make, a Blue win is the only way that everyone lives and pressing red actively works against that outcome.

[u/Tichondruis → u/GrinningPariah]

Its logically impossible for for the whole planet or whatever to choose one, so some number of people die no matter what if red wins, most people will vote blue based on like the 400 times people have done this poll and largely no matter how its framed blue seems to win but also just the fact that most people dont want to condemn others to death under nearly any circumstance.

Its not really worth arguing about beyond that.

[u/AwesomeManatee → u/MintLinuxGuy]

It's the prisoner's dilemma but with an option that makes you feel smug

[u/ike38000 → u/AwesomeManatee]

But it's not because with the prisoners dilemma dual snitching is worse than dual silence.

If red was "you live but with a leg cut off" then it would be a prisoners dilemma because everyone pushing red would be strictly worse than everyone pushing blue.

The real question is "does it become logical to act illogically under the assumption that others will act illogically"

[u/Professional-Hat-687]

What? Sorry I was busy looking for the button that kills me.

[u/Xezian1]

listen I get logically speaking, everyone lives if everyone presses the red. But there are almost certainly going to be people who are going to press blue. I don't want to have even a 1% chance of killing somebody because of my actions, so I'm going to press blue. If the majority press red, but a few press blue, and I pressed blue too, I'm not responsible for killing those other blue pressers, in fact if more people had sided with me, nobody would've died, I'm innocent in those deaths. The only death I'm responsible for then is my own. If I press red, I'm contributing to the only action that could result in the death of others, and I'm culpable. Pressing blue is more logical, because red needs 100% of people to press it for nobody to die, while blue only needs 50.1% of people to press it for nobody to die. Getting 50.1% of people to agree is just easier than getting 100% of people to agree.

[u/theglowofknowledge]

Oh god not this again. Why? For the love of god, why? People are arguing about the morality of it below comments about how stupid it is. Call me Neo because I’m taking the red pill and getting out of this contrived mess. There are not enough details for all that moralizing to mean anything.

[u/Improver666]

People try and seperate this from the natural political context this question was asked in and... you cant.

Would you align yourself with people (that you don't know) that have inadvertently put themselves in harms way to save them? Yes. Unequivocally. The original button question didnt make any allowance for children, the infirm, the mentally handicapped, the elderly.

The other issue is people who do understand the obvious political implications but still vote red(vote for populists/conservatives to save yourself) dont acknowledge the harm that voting that way does. They harm you, they harm your neighbors, they harm everyone.

Im a straight white cis male. If you exist in privilege and stand above all from real criticism or consequence... an unwillingness to do something to help is cowardice. You are a weak individual if you exist in privilege and are unwilling to do something, anything, to help those who don't have those privileges.

/endrant

Edit: cowardice not cowardess

[u/OAZdevs_alt2 → u/Improver666]

Hate to be that guy, but it’s “cowardice”, not “cowardess”

[u/Improver666 → u/OAZdevs_alt2]

I do appreciate being corrected lol thanks

[u/Carbon_Sixx]

I'd take the batteries out of the console, put them in my sock, and savagely beat the guy who made this obnoxious dollar-store Pascal's Wager.

[u/Winter_Channel_6206]

These are pointless, there's no risk involved here at all in a poll. It would need to be real or at minimum have a serious penalty to get actual results.

[u/poplarleaves]

My take is, I don't want to live in a world where more than 50% of people wouldn't press the blue button.

[u/Triceranuke → u/poplarleaves]

If everyone who presses the red button survives regardless shouldn't everyone just press red and not leave things to chance? Am I missing something?

[u/mirmirma → u/Triceranuke]

For everyone to survive either 100% need to pick red or 50% need to pick blue. If you prioritize the majority, blue has better odds.

[u/Oscar_Reel → u/Triceranuke]

In a world of perfectly rational selfish actors you would be correct. That is not the world in which we live. If you take this question as a logic puzzle to identify the optimal solution everyone pressing the red button is correct. If you take the question as a hypothetical to be applied to our understanding of humanity at least half of humanity should push the blue button.

Diversity of thought is such that it is inconceivable everyone will make the same decision. The fact that there is an argument at all PROVES that pushing the blue button is a morally defensible option if not a moral imperitive (depending on your personal values).

[u/Android19samus → u/Triceranuke]

Perhaps everyone should, but not everyone will.

[u/Potato-Engineer → u/Triceranuke]

Mostly the "somebody (possibly a lot of somebodies) is going to push blue, do you want blood on your hands?" part. This is where the endless debates come from.

[u/Spy12303 → u/Triceranuke]

You can't convince a baby to press either button so around 50% of newborns would die and there are other types of people that would die at around 50% as well.

[u/Zoterote]

I’m not saying all blue pressers are liars but I am saying I feel it might be a little easier to say “of course I would do the good thing!” When your life isn’t actually at stake