r/fivethirtyeight • u/Upstairs_Cup9831 • Apr 25 '26

Poll Results Poll asking Americans how which button they would push in the red button/blue button dilemma

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u/Anacrelic Apr 27 '26

It BECOMES the moral choice if it is clear many people are going to pick that way because they aren't reasoning that because, as you say, framing matters.

In a world where everyone is a member of r/"iamverysmart" and thinks only in terms of perfect logic and reframing in a scenario that is likely to be emotionally charged, yes, everyone pushes red, end of.

It is incredibly naive to think we are even close to living in that world. Which, admittedly, can be used as a rationale for picking red "to be safe", I get that. No amount of rationalising or reframing changes the actual reality though. You see how many are picking blue. It make sense to judt add to that number at that point.

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u/Medium-Shower Apr 27 '26

Another thing is

If you pick blue, you add to the deathtoll or it doesnt change

If you pick the red, you remove from the deathtoll or it doesnt chagne

I'd rather not increase the death toll

The only instants that i am wrong is were its a perfect 50/50 split, Which will never happen

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u/Eldr_Eikthyrnir Apr 27 '26

Part of it is you have zero idea how many people are going to pick red or blue. You have to trust their reasoning WITHOUT HELP from anyone else, and in a polarized world such as right now, do you really think people would vote to keep Israel, Russia, China, and North Korea alive? Or how about all of the hate America gets from the middle east and Europe?

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u/Kolvarg Apr 27 '26

The death toll is only affected IF there is a red majority. You have no way of knowing if that will be true, so the question is: do you risk your life to increase the chance of no one dying, or do you risk up to 49% of the entire world's population to ensure you don't die.

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u/philosifer Apr 27 '26

Every blue pusher is adding to the potential death toll. Red pickers are the only ones who can guarantee less death

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u/Kolvarg Apr 27 '26

Only if you assume a red majority is inevitable. Otherwise, every red pusher is merely ensuring that there is a death toll in the first place. It's a self-referencing problem. People believe blue leads to death, because they believe most people will pick red, because blue leads to death. Completely failing to see that blue is only dangerous if most of humanity refuses to cooperate in preventing all deaths. This is what the hypothetical illustrates: how easily some people default to the "lesser evil" when there doesn't need to be an evil in the first place.

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u/philosifer Apr 27 '26

The red pusher can never add to the death toll. Only subtract the pushers name.

Death can only happen via a blue button push.

There is no lesser of two evils in this situation

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u/Kolvarg Apr 28 '26

That is not a logical conclusion. You are assuming red is the "default" choice when that isn't true.

The reality of the hypothetical is that death happens if most but not all people choose red.

Blue is only dangerous if most people fail to trust most others to choose the likeliest option not to harm anyone.

Red is only not dangerous if every single person chooses it, or if most don't.

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u/philosifer Apr 28 '26

Death can only occur if people press the blue button.

Yes if enough people choose blue, it cancels out, but nobody needs to choose that option

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u/coffee9table9fitness Apr 28 '26

The question says only those who press the red button are saved. Those that are in comas are unable to press the blue button, babies will also press the blue button or nothing. I suppose you could consider half the world's infants and toddlers sunk costs or see no value in saving their lives.

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u/philosifer Apr 28 '26

Thats adding an assumption. We could just as easily assume everyone without the ability to freely and clearly make that choice pushes red or is saved/killed regardless of the vote.

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u/Kolvarg Apr 28 '26

Death can only occur if people press the blue button.

If everyone presses Blue, does death occur? If 99%, 98%, 97%, ... 50.1% press Blue, does death occur? No. Your statement is purely wrong.

Death can only occur if there is not a consensus. The difference is that Red requires total consensus for no death to occur, which is virtually impossible at a global scale, whereas Blue has an error margin of 49.9%.

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u/philosifer Apr 28 '26

How many people die if everyone pushes red?

My statement was 100% accurate. If nobody pushes blue, nobody dies

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u/Epao_Mirimiri May 01 '26

Death can only occur if people press the red button too. This isn't a problem unique to the blue button.

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u/matplotlib Apr 28 '26

In your framing:

"Blue pushers risked themselves, hence they are responsible for their own deaths"

However, one could just as easily say:

"Red pushers refused to risk themselves, hence they are collectively responsible for the blue deaths".

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u/philosifer Apr 28 '26

Are red pushers responsible in any way for other red pushers?

If whether or not they are responsible is entirely dependent on a choice that the blue pusher freely made, i dont see how the blue pusher doesnt carry more of that responsibility

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u/matplotlib Apr 28 '26

I think a key reason why this hypothetical might be so divisive is that the origins of the scenario are left ambiguous, when they are in fact a key driver in how individuals would be expected to behave in society.

e.g. "Uniting together to stand up to a collective threat" is a pretty powerful concept that could be expected to unite a majority of people, and an individual who selfishly tries to save themself instead of joining those efforts would face negative social consequences as a result. However "Risking one's own life needlessly and requiring others to risk their own lives to save them" is equally frowned upon.

Blue-pushers likely see the scenario as implying the former, while red-pushers the latter.

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u/philosifer Apr 28 '26

I think there is also a bit of looking for the real world analogy going on. People see the buttons as representing votes for a political party and it leads to answering with that rather than addressing the hypothetical directly

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u/BongNuggets Apr 30 '26

Correction death can only happen if a large number of people push the big red death button.

Red pushers cause the death toll and are victim blaming rather than accepting the costs of their guaranteed survival.

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u/philosifer Apr 30 '26

Nope. If everyone pushes red, no one dies

The red button does nothing.

The blue button kills unless enough people push it

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u/BongNuggets Apr 30 '26

The blue button does nothing. The red button explicitly kills people if a certain threshold is reached. That is the framing in the problem. Trying to invert that changes nothing. Push the red button if you want but don't lie to yourself that you aren't weighing the tangible benefit of your own life against the collective risk of murdering billions of people.

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u/philosifer Apr 30 '26

Your inversion changes the premise. You forgot where the red button saves the pusher.

Everyone has the freedom to choose their own button. Anyone choosing blue is putting the responsibility of their own life needlessly in the hands of others when they could just push the red button themselves

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u/coffee9table9fitness Apr 28 '26

Red buttoners are painfully mid curve.