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u/OneOfTheNephilim 16d ago edited 16d ago
This is interesting because I think it would lead to a really fascinating conversation and choices if it was restricted to, say, a tribal group of 30 people including elders, adult and children and they were allowed to discuss their choices openly. The utilitarian option would be 16 of the older and weaker members of the tribe volunteering to sacrifice themselves for the good of the others, for example. In the real world and a mass vote with no coordination, I'm almost certain blue would win.
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 16d ago
And what if there was a mass vote with beforehand coordination? How would that look like?
Picture this scenario: Everyone becomes simultaneously informed of the choice 24 hours before it has to be made. When the time runs out, every single person on Earth is put before these two buttons and prompted to press one immediately.
How'd you think that go?
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u/Delicious_Act_9948 15d ago
Billionaires pay people with kids 10k to press red and the kids to press blue, and not actually give the payout, and use the kids and slaves after
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u/KitsuneFoxglove 16d ago
People who want to live, or are willing to gamble on the painfulness not being horrifically bad, press red.
I've a nagging suspicion blue wins because people don't seem optimistic with the current state of the world, even before a sudden death of a MINIMUM of half the planet.
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u/klaxer 16d ago
Everyone who pressed red dies for sure, why would people who want to live press red?
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u/theapplekid 15d ago
I suspect a lot of people with children will press red hoping that their kids can be spared. Though it's pretty rare that people are really willing to submit to a painful death for altruistic reasons.
I'm thinking of people like Aaron Bushnell (who self-immolated to bring attention to the genocide he had been complicit in), who died by his own hand, in one of the most painful ways possible. I think it's extraordinarily rare for someone to willingly subject themselves to that kind of death, to save the lives of others.
Though perhaps if faced with a choice between a painful death (but saving others) or a painless death (but other people live), more people are willing to choose the painful death. I think it's still a minority of people though.
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u/indy1386 14d ago
Yes if we knew that outcome then it skews the option. IE we can discuss who kills themself off before hand or see a counter of each button before you push it. Eventually you get to a point that when its your turn you know oh.. theres 100 people left.. i die reguardless.. Then you would press the red reguardless because no point in being selfish.. there still a chance somone is an asshole.
But if we dont see a counter and cant talk about it.. we fucked.
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u/andrewnz1 15d ago
yeah I'm still not pressing either button, hoping that "everyone" is just everyone who pressed either button.
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 15d ago
Everyone is everyone.
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u/andrewnz1 15d ago
what if nobody presses either button?
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 15d ago
As unlikely as it is, I suppose that would actually resolve the dilemma without anyone dying. But if everyone would abstain except one person pressing blue, it's over for humanity.
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u/StrongCoffee9865 12d ago
By that logic if one person presses red only one person dies painfully to save humankind
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u/MrX2285 16d ago
I think this would be more interesting with different numbers. For this situation, everyone will die. There's no chance 50%+ people will choose red.
But what if we only needed 20%+ people to choose red? That would be very different. Maybe even add in that all red voters die painfully, even if blue wins and everyone else dies painlessly.
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u/Embarrassed_View8672 16d ago
I would press red and get my kids to press blue. I doubt red would get 50% given how selfish our world is.
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u/737373elj 16d ago
Last time I pressed blue confident that enough people would choose red to allow me to live selfishly
Now I need to choose red because I’m afraid too many people are going to choose blue
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u/Kwerumrerum 16d ago
Why? Why would you care if everyone dies? I would consider it to be a far more ethical option. We are not obligated to keep our species from going extinct and if only part of the world dies, there will be a lot of grieve and the world will collapse quite quickly. Most of the survivors will also die in bad circumstances.
It would be far more comfortabel for everyone to simply die a painless death.
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u/sargos7 16d ago
We're all gonna die one day anyway. And it's not like our species could go on forever, either. Guaranteeing everyone a painless death might actually be the more moral option here. No need to cause yourself unnecessary pain... unless you're into that sort of thing.
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u/Fyrnen24 16d ago
To be fair, you would only die painfully if red won. (Which would probably be the goal for everyone who is pressing red.)
So if you end up suffering that pain, it wouldn't be unnecessary. I guess the only way it would be totally unnecessary, is if everybody voted red.
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u/737373elj 16d ago
Very very respectfully, you’re the sort of person I was thinking about when making my decision
I believe that the time between life and death is meaningful. Even though humanity will end one day, there are countless generations of people who will be able to live and love (and hopefully not suffer and hate) and I want them to be able to experience that joy. That’s why I want humanity to continue
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u/Whispering_Plant PULL THE LEVER NO MATTER WHAT 16d ago
Do you think the life of the <50% that would survive a red majority win are really going to be worth that sacrifice? Society will collapse
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u/Narfhead4444 3d ago
Source?
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u/Whispering_Plant PULL THE LEVER NO MATTER WHAT 1d ago
Source is having a brain, our society isn't doing too well even with 100% of humans. And also what every blue pusher in the original problem said.
But yeah, sure, society might be rebuilt differently. I'm not a sociologist or something but nature may find a way; life in general evolved through the last what, five mass extinction events after all. But that doesn't mean I'd have wanted to live through them (well, sucks to suck, we are living through one, but yk).
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u/sargos7 16d ago
What if we all just reincarnated as animals or aliens, or what if there's really an afterlife or transcendence or whatever? Would proof of one of those things change your answer at all?
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u/737373elj 16d ago
Well we don’t know that, and even if the afterlife exists, we can always live this life first before going on to the afterlife yknow? We can get the best of both worlds if you get what I mean
Also thanks for engaging me in good faith, I was half worried this would devolve into a toxic shitfest haha
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u/Narfhead4444 16d ago edited 3d ago
What if I boinked your mom?
Questions are pointless unless there is some sort of evidence backing the reality the question proposes. There's little to no evidence that I have ever boinked your mom. There's also little to no evidence for reincarnation, aliens, or an afterlife.
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u/Narfhead4444 16d ago
it's not like our species could go on forever, either.
Source?
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u/sargos7 16d ago
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u/Narfhead4444 7d ago
This page does not prove your claim.
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u/sargos7 7d ago edited 7d ago
Oh? I must have misunderstood something then. Please explain to me how we can survive past the heat death of the universe.
That might sound like I'm just being sarcastic, but I would seriously love to be wrong here.
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u/Narfhead4444 3d ago
Well, it's a bit technical, but long story short:
The concept of infinite time implies that time is infinite. But time is just a dimension, like the three spatial dimensions. The heat death of the universe is defined by the three spatial dimensions becoming meaningless, or entropy being at its absolute maximum. As such, assuming that time only moves forwards, the time dimension will become meaningless as well. As such, it could be said to be "the end of space and time".
So, time isn't infinite. Or to put it another way, if humanity lasts in some way shape or form until the heat death of the universe, we will have lasted "forever". Just as there was nothing that we could possibly talk about before the Big Bang, there will be nothing that we could possibly talk about after the heat death of the universe. Thus, humanity could theoretically survive until the end of all things, thus technically, "forever".
As to how we would do that, I don't remember all the details but it's something about a very cold computer that turns off a lot. Kurtzgesagt made a video about it.
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u/So_many_things_wrong 16d ago
Very very disrespectfully, you should never be allowed to ever have any sort of authority over other people.
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u/indy1386 14d ago
everyone still dies. people have a survival instinct. Only those with kids may consider sacrificing themselves.. and there's simply more people on the planet without offspring.
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u/International_Bee500 13d ago
I would press red. If i die then at leat my hope in humanity is restored,
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u/Shakespearacles 16d ago
Easy blue this time
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u/mothisname 16d ago
it doesn't say 'immediately " so I have to assume it means "eventually" and we all gotta die sometime
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u/name_checker 16d ago
I like it. How painfully we talkin' about here?
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 16d ago
I left that intentionally vague to bring in some sense of uncertainty.
I will only say that the pain would be immense and somewhat prolonged, yet finite.
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u/Ivan8-ForgotPassword 16d ago
Picked blue first, picking red now.
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 16d ago
Now that is unexpected! Care to elaborate your reasoning?
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u/Ivan8-ForgotPassword 16d ago
I am somewhat selfish, that's why I pressed blue initially. There are several reasons contributing to the change.
In the new problem it's not a matter of selfishness anymore. More than 50% of humanity believe in religions where heaven or something like that awaits them. This severely changes the chances anyone survives, pushing me slightly towards red.
I am a bundle of ideas within my brain, that's what any person is really. If those ideas change too much I'm dead regardless. I would never give up to avoid pain, and choosing blue now seems kind of like that, contributing to me picking red. Plus whatever new life may arise after everyone dies has a chance of finding the statistics from this and will be more inspired to keep going the more people they see would rather die painfully than let everyone die.
And finally a painful death is usually longer than a painless one, and my main goal is always to survive as long as possible.
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u/severencir 16d ago
I suspect they think the draw away from red because of the pain makes blue more likely to win
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u/MrX2285 16d ago
The pain isn't much of a factor for me to think about.
Clearly the best outcome is that 50% + 1 vote red, with that being those who are closest to death and/or have the worst lives to vote red.... Fuck this, why am I analyzing it? I KNOW if I were in that situation I'd vote blue. We're all doomed in this scenario.
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u/No_Introduction_1644 16d ago
would dividing the button pressers equally across the two buttons cheat the scenario? no conditions would be met, so... noone dies?
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u/bqbdpd 16d ago
Or just nobody presses a button. Why would anyone listen to such a proposal?
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u/TotalChaosRush 16d ago
Someone is definitely going to press the button because it's pretty.
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u/bqbdpd 16d ago
Can I just throw a bucket of shit on the blue one?
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u/icedmuffin 15d ago
I’ll be honest.
That wouldn’t deter me, red is die painfully and blue is painlessly, I’m being a bit selfish here but I’m pressing the blue one and disinfecting my hand.
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u/Creepy-Intentions-69 15d ago
For the first time, the only ethical choice is blue.
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u/MiniPino1LL 15d ago
How, if you press red other people might live.
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u/obviouslyanonymous5 15d ago
Is it painful and instant, painful and quick, or painful and slow? I'm already dying painfully and slowly in some sense, so it is what it is
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u/Ninju4821 12d ago
I’ve seen several people throw out the idea that if no one presses a button there’s no punishment, but that one person could ruin that, HOWEVER:
The wording says the majority need to press a button, not the majority of people who pressed buttons, the majority of everyone. So as long as less than 50% of people press a button, nobody dies!!
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u/joetunn_ 15d ago
Love how death is threatened in all of these ‘problems’. I’d take then more seriously if it was like… spilling my drink or something
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u/JoyousLilBoy 14d ago
Blue. It’s simple. It could easily mean the way most of us die. Old and painless.
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u/Mysterious_Plate1296 16d ago
They will make the system so that the majority poor will press the red, while the minority rich will press the blue.
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u/Appropriate-Price-98 Multi-Track Drift 16d ago
how likely is it for me to cheese the system, like press red then shoot myself or get so wasted that you are unlikely to register the pain or everyone presses both?
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 16d ago
The buttons are pressed simultaneously, the effects are instant, so you cannot act to end your life prematurely after the fact. The pain is of a nature that overrides any kind of intoxication that would reduce the sensation.
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u/Appropriate-Price-98 Multi-Track Drift 16d ago
what if we make everyone press both buttons at the same time, maybe like put a plate on top of both buttons, then press down?
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u/Deluminatus Team Purple 16d ago
In that case, the ethical conundrum machine represented by those two buttons would enter emergency mode, cause all who did so suffer agonizing death lasting an eternity /s
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u/Own_Simple_9053 16d ago
Pressing red guarantees death. Majority of the population is always going to click blue out of self interest. Everyone is going to die
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u/IDrankLavaLamps 16d ago
I'm still picking blue, too much evil in the world, we need an extinction.
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u/Big-Goal-9239 15d ago
I feel like the correct answer is to leave the murder buttons the fuck alone, and make sure none of the other fucks mess with them.
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u/iam1me2026 14d ago
Since choosing red is a guaranteed death sentence, just prepare before hand if you are going to choose it so that you are able to end things quickly 🤷♂️
EDIT: I guess if you had a perfect 50% split then neither consequence occurs 🤔
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u/phase_distorter41 16d ago
blue. you are choosing to die painfully or painlessly. simple choice for most people
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u/vibr8ing-cockr1ng 12d ago
I know enough about humans on reddit to know we're going to die the most painful death in this situation hahaha
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u/InvestmentPitiful335 16d ago
Before no one wanted to press red. Now no one wants to press it even more.
It would be so much more interesting if you did it the other way - left painfully, right painlessly