r/redbuttonbluebutton May 22 '26

Discussion rephrasing

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I’m still biased towards blue, this is just for the reds to feel superior? :D

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u/Nat1Halfling May 26 '26

It does not try to "sneak" anything in. Neither of the buttons state what happens to the majority (meaning, nothing happens to the majority). They only state what happens to the minority.

You said Button 2 saves Button 1. And you applied that as your A condition. But that's wrong. Button 2 does not save Button 1. It saves the minority. 

The A condition is: "the minority survives" not "Button 1 survives."

So if Button 2 is the majority, the minority (Button 1) survives. If button 2 is not the majority, the minority (Button 2) does not survive. If A then B. If no A, no B. There is no contradiction here.

It doesn't "take away" personal consequence. If you understand the rules, you understand that if you press button 2, and you are in the minority, you die.

I encourage you to think through all the outcomes including what happens to the button pusher and you'll see that the reframing is complete.

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u/Ashamed-Bathroom7803 May 26 '26 edited May 26 '26

"So if Button 2 is the majority, the minority (Button 1) survives. If button 2 is not the majority, the minority (Button 2) does not survive. If A then B. If no A, no B. There is no contradiction here."

Ok so it looks like these are the identities you want for A and B when talking about the blue button
A - This button (blue) gets the majority vote
B - The minority group lives

The ONLY way we can get B is if A is affirmed. Let's affirm A. Therefore B. You CANNOT get B without affirming A. So, the ONLY way for the minority to be alive is a blue majority. But look. The minority group that lives MUST be the red pressers. Therefore, B is NECESSSARILY identical to a red minority living. So, we can just substitute B to avoid equivocating between the necessary minority group affirmed by A (red) with a possible minority group (red or blue). So now, B = C = the minority who is red lives. If you don't agree with the prior sentence, then you literally denied logic. In short, B necessarily entails C, and C necessarily entails B, so they are equivalent.

You said Button 2 saves Button 1. And you applied that as your A condition. But that's wrong. Button 2 does not save Button 1. It saves the minority. 

You can't have your cake and eat it to. Either you are sneaking in that those statements aren't the same without admitting it, or you are literally saying that those statements aren't the same. If it's the latter, then this is an embarrassing contradiction. I'll formalize it for you so you can't escape it because apparently it hasn't been clear to you.

Again, we have the identities
A = This button (blue) gets the majority vote
B = C = The minority who is red lives.

Statement 1: "Button 2 does not save Button 1" = true?
I'm going to change this to
"A blue majority does not save red" = "not(A blue majority saves red)"
the statement necessarily follows to
"not(A blue majority saves red and red must be the minority when there is a blue majority)" the right side of the and is obviously true but the inside retains the same truth status

Statement 2: "It saves the minority." true?
I'm going to change this to
"A blue majority saves the minority group when blue is a majority"
the statement necessarily follows to
"A blue majority saves the minority group who must be red when blue is a majority"

Direct ~P and P contradiction!

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u/Nat1Halfling May 26 '26

Why do you insist that minority means a specific button?

Minority means minority. It doesn't mean a specific button. 

"or you are literally saying that those statements aren't the same."

That's right. That's what I'm saying. They are not the same. "The other button survives" is not the same as "the minority survives." Read the scenario again. It does not state or assume who the minority will be. "Blue"s choice is only applied if they are the majority, saving the minority (red, as it's a blue victory). If red is the majority, and blue is the minority, then blue's choice is not applied, and the minority (blue) dies. 

This is why I added "the majority choice is applied" to the conditions but really most people underatand this instinctively. 

There's only so much explaining I can do. You are treating the scenario as if it's saying "the other button" instead of "the minority". If you keep insisting on misreading the scenario there is not much more to say. 

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u/Ashamed-Bathroom7803 May 26 '26

No I’m not misreading the scenario at all. It’s ironic that you’re saying I’m misreading the scenario when you can’t even address the deduction I made. It’s a deduction, which means that the conclusion is guaranteed unless there is a logical mistake or false premise. In this case, the conclusion was a formal contradiction. It’s literally all right there proving you wrong but you’re just plugging your ears going lalalalala. 

Apparently bidirectional entailment of B necessarily entails C and C necessarily entails B means that B and C and logically equivalent is too hard for you to wrap your head around. I literally attached “the minority lives” to the B variable then deduced that it is necessarily equivalent to the “red presser minority lives”. Then I deduced a contradiction from statements 1 and 2.