Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

shankwiler.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 333 posts

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#11

Post by wavemode »

This is like a prisoner's dilemma, but with no payoff for the risky option.

In a prisoner's dilemma, you can choose a risky option (stay quiet), but the potential reward is that if the other prisoner also stays quiet then you both go completely free. But if one prisoner instead speaks up and accuses the other prisoner, the accuser gets a short sentence and the one who stayed quiet gets a max sentence.

But in this scenario, there's no payoff whatsoever for the risky option (pressing the blue button). 100% of people choosing blue and 100% of people choosing red lead to the exact same outcome. So why would it ever be rational to choose blue?

This "dilemma" would make more sense if getting over the 50% blue threshold caused some additional positive outcome, like world peace or a cure for cancer.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#12

Post by margalabargala »

Another way to frame the question is "how much effort should society as a whole put into saving the lives of individuals who endanger no one but themselves through unnecessary dangerous choices?"

I feel like it's fine that wingsuiting off a mountain is legal. I don't feel a need to beg some stranger not to do it. Both myself and that stranger are perfectly aware there's a decent chance their choice will result in their death.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#13

Post by stego-tech »

I honestly kind of hate these thought problems, because they attempt to distill a complex system into a single, momentary choice, and then maximize the outcome somehow.

As if it’s the decision that somehow matters, as opposed to the systemic dysfunction and incentives that mandated the decision in the first place.

I’m an increasingly reluctant blue pusher, because I am aware that societal incentives reward individual greed when traded against societal harms; that is, those who sacrifice others are rewarded proportionate to the amount of others they sacrificed. I want to cooperate, because historically that has been the source of our collective survival and growth as a species; however, at this specific moment in time, I would be greatly rewarded if I harmed as many people as possible, as thoroughly as possible, to enrich myself.

If all you’re looking at is the binary decision, red makes sense. Except taken in the context of the wider whole, red pushers should be rightly vilified and excommunicated for prioritizing their own survival over the survival of the whole.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#14

Post by gnfargbl »

Is there actually a real-world version of this game, that the author is alluding to buy not explicitly mentioning?

Otherwise all I'm taking away from this article is that people don't think deeply about survey questions before answering them.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#15

Post by rbren »

Some people seem to be convinced by logical reframings, like "if you jump into a woodchipper you die, but if 50% of people jump into the woodchipper they all survive"

A logical reframing is not equivalent though! We know everyone else gets the same frame, and most of the problem is predicting what other people will do when presented with this particular two-button frame.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#16

Post by empthought »

These types of analyses always treat voting red and ending up in the majority as preferable to voting blue and ending up in the minority. I don’t think that assumption is universally valid.

In the first case you contend with living in a world after a catastrophic population loss — likely including at least some of your loved ones — knowing that had some of you and your fellow survivors voted differently, nothing bad would have happened.

In the second case, you don’t care at all. Because you’re dead.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#17

Post by hx8 »

Hello, Blue Presser here.

We learn something about humanity based on the results of the poll. It's naive to think that 100% of people will press the red button. Some people will die if red wins. I think pressing red is selfish and violent, in that it can result in the death of human life by their own unwillingness to cooperate.

If we are not willing to work together in order to protect each other then I have a very pessimistic long-term view of our future. If every blue-presser dies, then our average cooperation level will only decrease, and the population will be over-saturated with defectors. I'd rather just go out now then deal the those consequences.

Re: If more than 50% press blue, everyone survives. Red pressers always survive

#19

Post by rayiner »

eesmith wrote: post #7

These sorts of problems assume that actions have no consequences beyond the immediate decision. These tests, run in places which have higher long-term expectation of social connections, give different results than in the US. In the world where I don't want to live in that world, so blue for me. And it's the fault of everyone who pressed red should I die.

That knowledge isn't a "consequence" of the game. It's a symptom of a fact that's knowable a priori. Running the game doesn't make it true; running the game merely reveals something that was already true.
Post reply on HN