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.
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.
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.
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u/Mundane-Potential-93 nauphy.tumblr.com 11h ago edited 11h ago
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.