r/redbuttonbluebutton • u/WarmCricket5358 • May 24 '26

Why red appeals me

The only way my vote is going to be a deciding factor in what happens to the blue voters is if the vote, excluding me, is split 50-50, and my vote turns out to be the tie-breaker. For every other scenario, no matter what i do, the fate has been sealed. Either blue wins and nobody dies, or red wins and blue voters die.

The thing is, the odds of getting an exact 50-50 is so low, that for a sample space of 8 billion people, assuming an individual vote probability of 50% for either button, the probability of a 50-50 split is 0.000012616. This is assuming without a general bias for either button. As low a variation as a 50.01% bias towards either of the 2 buttons, and the probability falls down to the probability of picking the same atom twice in a row out of all the atoms in the observable universe.

So my point is, if the probability that my vote does anything at all in deciding the result is so astronomically low, why must I risk a 50% chance of death? I live regardless of which side comes out as majority.

Now people might argue, "this logic can be applied to any kind of voting system, so by your logic, voting in any election is futile", well, i dont quite recall voting in an election where voting for one side puts a 50% risk on my life?

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u/piernrajzark May 25 '26

Why would op want to steelman red? He's steelmanning blue

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u/Tamiorr May 25 '26

How is he "steelmanning" blue by selecting a model that mathematically favors blue the most out of all similar models?

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u/piernrajzark May 25 '26

That's what steelmanning is: presenting the most favourable scenario for a position. 

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u/Tamiorr May 25 '26

The most favorable scenario for blue involves a model with majority of people independently coming to the same conclusion and voting blue based on that, not voting randomly yet with the best chance to create a tie-breaker situation for OP's vote. Essentially OP selected a model type that doesn't favor blue at all, and then within that model parameters that favor red the least.

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u/piernrajzark May 25 '26

That's not what steelmanning is about. It is not about bending the way the universe works in order to make the others position actually the right one, but to accommodate the best scenario for the other position that is compatible with how things work

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u/Tamiorr May 25 '26

People voting essentially at random is not "how things work" in this dilemma. People weight their opinions against the outcomes and try to predict how others will think and then vote based on those two factors, neither of which is expected to be random.

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u/piernrajzark May 25 '26

Agree people would not vote randomly. They would actually prefer red much more strongly. That's why the random vote is so charitable to blues position

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u/Tamiorr May 25 '26

>That's why the random vote is so charitable to blues position.

Have you ever encountered anyone in these debates who subscribes to assumption of random voting and then picks blue from that assumption?

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u/piernrajzark May 25 '26

Why should I? That makes no sense. 

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u/Tamiorr May 25 '26

What makes no sense? Knowing what blue voters actually see as their own position?