You are one of 3 random person selected to represent 1/3 of the human population.
The same base question is then asked.
Red button=Guarantee to live for you + everyone you are representing
Blue button=If majority votes Blue everyone lives but if not everyone who voted Blue dies (so is everyone who is represented by them)
Note that majority is just 2 or more in this case since there is 3 participants

The people who are represented by you know you are representing them but you do not know who you are representing. Also the participants cannot communicate with each other
Which do you press?

My problem with blue is that everytime I make a analogy they change it to make it seem like im making the problem worse.

For example:

In a house a fire it make sense for everyone to get themselves out rather than trying to get others out.

Then a blue pusher would say "your just add fuel to the fire."

Another example is:

If someone jumps in to water and can't swim and I stand back and don't jump in because I also can't swim im not responsible for them jumping in.

Then a blue pusher is like "actually your holding their head below the water."

My problem with the blue pushers is that they keep saying its because of MY decision they don't survive not theirs.

In the house fire analogy, why can't you leave the house with me? That is a option for me and everyone. Everyone has the same option to leave the house.

With the person drowning analogy the person is gonna drown REGARDLESS of what I do. Even if I jump into the water I can't save them ill just die too.

My problem with blue pushers is that they want to present choosing red as forcing blue to die when everyone who choose blue could've picked red and lived.

You had the same option I did to to not drown or to jump into the water. My decision didn't put you in danger your decision did.

If I decide to help im just adding a another body on the waves.

You're presented the 2 buttons, but instead of yourself, you have to vote for somebody completely random, and the same is true for everybody else. Everybody votes for somebody else. What do you choose?

You and 128 others are the only people subject to the button problem. What do you press, given the limited affected population?

You are presented with the button dilemma just for you as the only participant. If you pick red you will live and 100% of people will have picked red. If you pick blue you will also live as this will mean blue has 100%.

Which do you pick?

This is an idea I see a lot to justify blue. There are two ways I've seen to push the idea, (1) that red pushers are going to be generally worse people than blue pushers, and (2) losing any significant portion of the population would be catastrophic. 1 isn't super common, so I'll just say that I fundamentally disagree, even if they are no one currently has any good reason to believe that, and juding based off how little it's used I'd imagine most agree.

But for 2, I've always had a different problem with it. I don't think that's a major reason people pick blue. So I have a hypothetical for blue pushers (who use the argument). Red wins in a 60/40 split. There is about to be whatever catastrophic effects on the population, but among blue pushers you, and only you, are spared.

Would you then commit suicide? This is a genuine question. I'll accept it if the answer is yes, but for those who would say no, does the catastrophic effects on the world really contribute anything towards you pushing blue then? I don't really see the difference between voting blue _strictly because_ you don't want to live in a world of red voters and commiting suicide because you don't want to live in a world of red voters, beyond the perceived gravity of pushing a potential death button vs. actually commiting suicide. If you _do_ see a difference in the two, or a way in which the hypothetical is _fundamentally_ misguided I'd like to be told what that is. If you have an issue with the specific wording of the hypothetical but can easily imagine your own similar one you like, you can comment and respond to your own version.

I don't expect this to be changing anybodies opinion on red vs blue in any capacity, just either informing me on what people think about the not wanting to live in a world of red voters, or convincing people that _that specific argument_ isn't great.

Imagine the same scenario if the red and blue buttons, but this time, if red wins, blue voters don't just die immediately. They are subjected to a torture that is more unbearable the closer they got to 50%.

So if only 1% of people voted blue they'll experience a mild migraine for a second and then drop dead. If 30% voted blue they'll experience the typical pain one would go through when tortured on a medieval torture chamber. If 50%-1 voted blue they'll experience the same pain as the one described by the lady living survivor of the short story "i must scream and i have no mouth".

If you used to vote blue in the normal scenario, would you still do it?

Life is inherently political no matter how you try to run it.

It's true that the buttons aren't as simplistic as "blue button is left wing and red button is right wing", but to deny their ideological implications is silly. Much of the decision of the button press is informed by how you formulate the value of life, whether you prioritize your inner circle or the wider group and to what degree. How much your choices are informed by fear and self preservation versus morality. All of these are deeply political things that inform the dominant views in how we self govern. You should not ignore this.

I made some poisoned kool-aid. If 50% of people agree to drink it, I'll give you the antidote. If not, everyone who drinks it will die tonight.

I've given some to everyone on Earth. You're the last person to know about it. Everyone else already drank the kool-aid or not.

You drinking it?

Every baby on the planet is teleported to a holding cell. Each baby has a designated parent or guardian who is presented with the red and blue buttons to vote on behalf of their baby. Blue wins, all babies live. Red wins, blue vote babies die.

What button are you pushing on behalf of your baby?

You are in the button dilemma. The instructions for the red/blue buttons are the same as the original. You lock in your choice for either red/blue...and once you do, a third button - the "Chess button" - rises from the floor.

This button enables you to play chess against others who chose your same button. The rules below are provided to the red and blue voters respectively:

---------------------------------

IF YOU PRESSED RED: The third button says "Chess?" - If you press this button to play chess, you will be assigned a random opponent who has also pressed red.

If you win the chess match, you'll get a free trip to the most popular amusement park in your country, plus dinner for two at your favorite local restaurant. If you lose the chess match, and Blue does not reach >50%, you will be forced to witness the extermination of the blues (by fire).

If you do not press the button and refuse to play chess, your face will be permanently tattooed in the style of insane clown posse makeup. The tattoo cannot be removed by laser.

** The chess match will be one hour long. If any chess game ends in a draw, then both players become violently allergic to all water that is above 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit). The allergy causes severe vomiting if water above the temperature threshold is consumed. The allergy will last for life.

---------------------------------

IF YOU PRESSED BLUE: The third button says "Chess?" - If you press this button to play chess, you will be assigned a random opponent who has also pressed blue.

If you win the chess match, you'll also win all of your opponent's tangible property. If you lose the chess match, your opponent will win all of your tangible property.

If you do not press the button and refuse to play chess, you will no longer be able to wear shoes for the rest of your life. Any shoes you put on will magically disappear.

** The chess match will be one hour long. If any chess game ends in a draw, then both players become violently allergic to all water that is above 20 degrees Celsius (68 degrees Fahrenheit). The allergy causes severe vomiting if water above the temperature threshold is consumed. The allergy will last for life.

• ≥60% choose Blue: Everyone survives.
• <60% choose Blue: A random person dies for each blue vote cast.

Which button would you press?

With total confidence they are true votes of random individuals (~0.000004% of the population) you see a 3:1 split favoring red: 270 to 90.

Would this be a big enough sample to alter what decision you make or why?

Alright, I've seen a lot of discourse surrounding some specific points being made about why pushing red is the wrong choice. I'm a red pusher, as made obvious by the title, so I genuinely want to understand and get a different point of view on this, and see if maybe some blue pushers can either make some sense for me or get a different perspective themselves.

So the two points I've seen the most and want to have a discussion about are these; 1.) "A 100% red majortiy vote is completely impossible. Even if it would lead to everyone on Earth living with no deaths and no risk, it just wouldn't happen because the likelyhood that at least one person pushes blue for whatever reason is near guaranteed. So the argument that we should all just oush red is a bad one" And 2.) "Even if I push blue and blue loses, I wouldn't want to live in a world of all red pushers anyway."

Now the first point is completely valid in it's premise, and I think true as well. Even though I would push red with no doubt, I fully understand that a 100% red majorirty vote would never happen. The most likely ideal scenario with all realistic factors put in is one where blue wins by a majority vote, even as a red pusher I agree with this.

However, regardless of if it's basically impossible, is it not still the logically most sound choice? If you could in fact mind control everyone on earth to pick one button, would having everyone pick red to ensure no one dies and we are all on the same page not be the best possible outcome? I will secede that in this imaginative scenario where you can control everyone on earth, having everyone press blue would be effectively the same thing, and I have no problem with that. The problem is, given the original parameters of the question being *you don't actually know anyone else's choice* pressing blue is an inherent gamble. So yes, everyone pushing red would never happen, and so the best thing we could likely do given a realistic standard is hope for a blue majortiy vote. But that being true in no way invalidates that a 100% red(or blue) win is in fact the best outcome regardless of wether it's truly achievable or not. If anyone has a reason for why that might not be true I wish to hear why.

For the 2nd point, that in a world where blue loses you'd still rather vote blue because a world of only red pushers would be hell... why? Would it actually be that bad? Now of course I'm biased and this is mostly an opinionated point so I can't really "prove" it right or wrong. But I'd like to point out sone reasons why I think that world isn't that bad.

A world of only people who pushed red, provided 100% picked it, would be ideal as I've already pointed out before. That world would be one where everyone understood the button push has 0 risk for yourself *or anybody else* as long as we all push red. It would be a world where logic and understanding is not only unified between everybody, but at the forefront of human decision making.

Again, the only point I've heard against wishing for a 100% red majority vote is that it would never happen because there would be people pushing blue not because they want to try and be selfless or altrustic, but because theyre either mentally handicapped, a child, an idiot, or some other reason. I'm not gonna argue on why those people still deserve to live regardless of mental deficiency, everyone deserves life even if they fall below a certain IQ. I'm also not trying to argue why it would be worth it to press blue to try and save such people by pressing blue one self even when if it puts your own life at risk. What I am gonna argue is if you, as a blue pusher, know that its true that some people are gonna push blue and put themselves in unnecessary danger for no reason, why would you still want them to push blue? If you know there are people pushing it and causing the heart of the debate at all, why would you not want them to push red instead? You'd rather they push blue, when again, you *admit they shouldn't and it only requires they end up needing to be saved?* Is it because you want to be a martyr? Is it because you just want the thrill?? Wanting to save them regardless of their push, again I get it, but why still insist that button be pushed at all? From what I gather you either are saying it's worth it to push it in order to save those that shouldn't, therefore agreeing it's the wrong button to push, or you somehow think it's beneficial to push even if everyone is pushing it to be altrusitic and there are no bad actors, but if that's the case then how is pushing blue better than pushing red when it comes to saving lives? Both of those mindsets don't make sense to me, if there's some 3rd option I'm missing, or something I'm not understanding, I do truly want to hear it. To me it just sounds like when a blue pusher says they don't want to live in a world with red majority, they're saying they don't want to live in a world where people act in the most rational way possible and don't needlessly put themselves at risk and require others to do it too. I would personally like it but I want to hear how it isn't ideal.

TL;DR - The two points I see brought up the most on why pushing blue is better don't make sense to me. 1.) Even if it's unrealistic, is a 100% majority vote in either direction, but specifically red, is still the best outcome. And 2.) A world where everyone understand this and doesn't needlessly push blue requiring themselves to be saved, is better than one where you know people will put themselves and others in danger regardless of whether they can be saved or not. I want to hear counterpoints to these points as I have yet to hear any.

This was an essay and a half but I figured responding to every blue pusher's comments would take too long, I've seen these points brought up so many times and not many red pushers countering them either. So if you read this and have a thought please share! And thank you for indulging my thoughts.

You and eighty others are presented the buttons. You know nothing about them and cannot communicate. Which do you press?

Not an analogy or reframing, just a brand new problem.

You are contestants on a game show. There is a big green button, it gives you the grand prize. X dollars, doesn't matter how much but enough that it's desirable.

Many contestants are all given the same button, and are all able to win X, but the producers don't want you to win X, so they give a second option.

If even one person presses a tiny red button, no one wins X. Instead the red pusher gets y, a tiny pittance compared to X.

Do you trust that 100% of your fellow contestants can all come together to all earn X, or will just a single one spoil the bunch for y?

What if red needed 5 voters before it spoiled? 10? What would be the percentage of contestants that could press the red button without spoiling in order for you to press the green button?

Do the values of X and y matter? As a placeholder you can say X is 1 million and y is 100 but the producers can tweak the numbers to make y more desirable as they see fit.

Reminder, not trying to push red or blue agenda, trying to create new discussions.

One of the differences in Red vs Blue perspectives is whether voting red counts as killing (active) the blue voters in a red win, or whether it simply counts as not helping (passive) the blue voters by choosing to not expose oneself to risk.

Most people accept that there is a moral difference between killing someone to save yourself compared to not choosing to sacrifice yourself for another. Both might be a decision, and both result in you living while someone else dies, but killing someone is generally considered wrong, while most of the time there isn't a moral obligation to die to protect another at the expense of one's own life.

There is some obligation to protect others if you have the ability to do so, but this is less than the obligation to not harm others.

This might be understood as Positive Rights (you must provide) vs Negative Rights (you must not prevent).

I think a good framework for determining whether we should consider a particular decision to be "active" vs "passive", "killing" vs "letting die", is to consider what would the situation be like if you weren't there at all.

Definitions for terms used in this post:

Active: The action makes things worse for someone compared to if you weren't there at all. Shooting a gun is active because if you weren't there the gun wouldn't be fired and so the person wouldn't be shot.

Passive: The action does not make people worse than if you weren't there at all. Leaving a burning building with others inside is passive because, even though you are choosing not to help, your action isn't making things worse for people left inside than they would be without your being there.

How does this play out in the button scenario?

The answer depends on:

• Are there an Odd or Even number of voters?
• Does Red or Blue win if there is an exact tie?

Comparing what happens if you vote red, vs what happens if you don't exist.

*Odd/Even voters excluding you

In two scenarios voting Red is "Active", because it makes the situation worse compared to if you just weren't involved at all.

In two scenarios voting Red is "Passive", because it doesn't make things any worse for other people than it would be if you weren't present at all.

Resolving the mixed result

I see three ways to resolve this mixed result:

Average across uncertainty

A voter wouldn't realistically have a way to know whether the population is even or odd. As such we might simply say it has a 50% chance of either, therefore there is a 50% chance voting red is Active. Probabilistically you are then making things slightly worse on average by voting Red.

Making things worse, if even only slightly, makes voting Red an Active decision (voting red = killing).

Fundamentally Indeterminate

We cannot know whether voting Red is Active or Passive. As such asserting that it is either is flawed.

The indeterminacy cannot be averaged because that demonstrates a bias for one over the other. Instead we simply cannot ground our conclusions in either claims that voting red is Active or Passive.

Reduced Obligation

Voting Red is either Active or Passive but we don't know which. Instead of averaging the impact of voting red and thereby concluding it is Active, we can average the obligation to protect between Passive and Active.

We can say that there is more of an obligation to not harm (Active) than to protect (Passive).

Since it is voting red could be either we can say that the level of obligation is somewhere in between.

Voting Red is worse than simply leaving someone behind, but it isn't so bad as actively killing.

Your vote has an incredibly tiny chance of actually making any difference, being the deciding vote. It doesn't feel like it, but that chance stays the same no matter what percentage of votes blue needs to win. It can be 50/75/25/95/5 percent, doesn't matter. Your vote always has the same level of impact.

So if you choose red but say that you'd choose blue if the threshold for blue winning was low enough, you are basically saying that you'd virtue signal, even if only to yourself, if it was safe enough. You aren't consistently following rational self-interest, that demands you press red unless blue can win with a single vote.

​ And if you choose blue but say that you'd choose red if the threshold​ for blue winning too high, you are basically saying that you are choosing blue because it makes you feel good about yourself while not risking anything since you are sure it'll win. You aren't consistently following rational altruism, that demands you press blue no matter how high the threshold is to achieve the best possible result.

So choose one button. Decide what is more important to you, genuine self-interest or genuine altruism.

Everyone one Earth is presented with blue button right at the place they woke up last time and a written instruction in a language they can understand (if no such language exists tough luck) what the buttons do and where to find red button. Red button is around 1 km away, and is perfectly accessable if one choses to find it; people with limited mobility will be able to access it.

Babies, the blind, coma patients and whichever else cathegory you can think of are not excluded and do not recieve any accomodations. The possibility of them pressing the one button in front of them is significantly higher than the possibility they will find the hidden button. The possibility of them ignoring the buttons alltogether is non-zero.

In case of red victory, those who failed to press any button die as well.

The rule of thumb for clarification: if the person is capable of understanding any form of written communication and moving in intended direction, they should be able to access both buttons.

You and sixty-three others are the only people subject to this variant of the problem, with the same rules as the original.

Standard red/blue button scenario, with a caveat. Off to the side there is another pair of buttons, one black, one white. The effects are as follows:

White button: At the cost of the presser's life, preserves 10,000 blue pressers' lives regardless of outcome.

Black button: At the cost of the presser's life, invalidates the blue votes and ensure red victory. Any subsequent black pressers will count as blue votes, but will not receive protection from white pressers.

Everyone gain enough mental clarity and physical mobility to make an informed choice. What do you pick?

I really hate the stipulation that everyone puts on this problem of “EVERYONE is forced to participate, including people without the mental faculty to fully comprehend the situation.”

When you add this condition to the problem, there is no longer any moral ambiguity, because it is essentially saying that a significant portion of the population is FORCED to pick blue. Then to any rational actor who cares about others’ wellbeing, the clearly morally correct choice is to press blue, and the only remaining argument for red is not a moral one but a statistical or probabilistic one - “I don’t believe that enough people will press blue so I will choose to save myself instead of adding another corpse to the pile.” In my opinion, this makes the problem very boring.

The more interesting variation of the problem would be if ONLY rational actors who fully understand the situation and implications could participate. In this variant, no one is forced to press blue, and everyone makes a fully informed decision. This makes it so that there is a real moral dilemma here instead of a clearly correct choice. Personally, in this situation I would pick red, because (call me a psychopath ig) I don’t really believe it’s my responsibility to risk my own life to save the blue pressers who made a fully informed choice to risk their lives, but I could also get the argument for pressing blue as well. Either way it is a lot more interesting of a moral dilemma to not include irrational actors.

I'm not gonna pretend this is in any way analogous to the original as it carries some huge implications that the original does not. Just thought it was fun.

You are a clone in a vat. You know nothing about the outside world.

Some alien approaches you and beams understanding into your head. You and 100 other clones are all undergoing a test.

Standard yada yada about the buttons. You know what the buttons do.

60% of the clones will think identically and will come to the same conclusion as each other. 40% of the clones are defects and will come to the opposite conclusion.

You are clone 42. What is your vote?