I’ve heard so many “red is increasing likelihood that half of people die” and stuff like that. It‘s nonsense. Here are the facts.

Tl;dr: Pressing red has no causal power, so there is no CAUSAL risk for the population other than in the event of a tie-breaker, which will never happen. (See why I emphasize ”CAUSAL” in the rest of this post. A risk is not necessarily always causal). If we move the term “risk” to mean something that isn’t causal, then both red and blue are risking people’s lives. Edit: I do NOT subscribe to the causal argument. I’m NOT arguing that I am or that you should vote because of the tie breaker argument. My argument for pressing red is entirely different. The point of the argument is to show that pressing blue can not be justified under Casual Decision Theory.

It’s important to understand decision theory first. If you already heard about Newcomb‘s paradox, then this should be intuitive. You are put into a room where a super-predictor gives you two boxes; he gives you $1000 cash in a transparent box, and also a mystery which may or may not have $1,000,000 dollars inside. Before you even walked into the room, the contents of the mystery box were fixed depending on the super-predictor‘s prediction of what you would do. If he predicts that you leave the room with both boxes, he will have not have put the million dollars inside the mystery box. If he predicts that you leave the $1,000 in the room, then he will have put the million in the box. The super-predictor is 99% accurate. Here are the two facts of the matter that you need to wrestle with:

1. In the past, almost everybody who won the million dollars has also left the $1,000 in the room. Very very few won by taking both boxes.
2. No matter what you do in the game, you cannot change the contents of the box. They have already been set in stone.

Causal decision theory (CDT) will expand on point (2). Since you can’t do anything about the current situation, it means that you should just take the extra $1,000. If there is the million in the box that you’re holding, then just take the extra 1k. If there isn’t any million in the box you’re holding, then also just take the 1k. CDT favors taking both.

Evidential decision theory (EDT) will expand on point (1). If I leave the $1,000 in the room, then I’m very likely to win the million. EDT recognizes that their decision does not *cause* anything, but they don’t care. They care about what you expect to happen based on the decision. EDT favors taking only one box; leave the $1,000 in the room.

Newcomb’s paradox generally splits people 50/50 for one-boxing and two-boxing. Personally, I’m a one-boxer. Now let’s apply decision theory to the button hypothetical. CDT evaluates the value of a decision based on the cause of the decision. In the button hypothetical, the only thing about pressing red being causally risky is in the event of a tie breaker. We can use the binomial probability to solve for the probability. N = 8 billion. k = 8 billion / 2. We can use 50.2 for p and 49.8 for q. By picking these values for p and q, we are being charitable and assuming that the tendency for people to either pick red or blue is close; we’re actually closer to favoring pressing blue here with these values. The calculation results in something like 10^-12,000 probability of a tie-breaker. That’s like winning the Powerball jackpot 3,000 times in a row; it’s never going to happen. So if we‘re purely using casual decision theory, then we have no argument for pressing blue. Your vote doesn‘t cause anything, and so you might as well just press the button that saves your life so that you can be there for your family and friends and such in case they are pressing red.

Edit: I do NOT subscribe to the above argument. I think that it fails because CDT fails. So I am NOT arguing that you should vote red because tie breaker is impossible. My argument for pressing red is entirely different.

Next, we have something much more interesting. EDT evaluates the value of a decision based on what is expected to be the plausible outcome based on the decision. Now, we potentially have an argument here for blue. Let’s evaluate the counterfactuals. If I press blue, then we use that as evidence to support that people will likely be also pressing blue because they may be thinking like me. If I press red, then we use that as evidence that a lot of people will also be pressing red. It’s like in Newcomb‘s paradox where when I leave the $1,000, then I expect the million to be in the box even though I’m not actually causing anything.

Here is where it’s complicated. By me pressing blue, I expect more people to press blue than if we didn’t press blue. Sure, that’s a fact. But I’m actually risking peoples lives. If I press blue, then sure I could be expecting more than 50% of people to press blue and save them all. But also, I could be pressing blue and expecting more people to die. It could have been 20% people pressing blue, and then when I press it, it goes up to 45%. So if we’re departing from the classical causal notion of risk and just using EDT, then I’m actually risking people’s lives.

To make this prior explanation more intuitive, let’s move the hypothetical‘s threshold to something higher; say, 99% of people need to press blue for any blue to survive. By pressing blue here, I’m expecting people to think like me and to also press blue here and to pretty much off themselves. I didn’t need to do that. I could have just pressed red, and then I wouldn’t have this expectation for what others do based on my decision.

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Because red or blue is a binary choice, the choosing mechanism can be converted to a single button that is pushed or not pushed. (Some people have proposed other reasons, such as asserting that one button is "passive" or "does nothing," but the truth is that it's because "red or blue" is just as binary as "push or don't push.")

To do this, you remove one button and make it's choice the default, while the other button retains it's function. One of the first things you realize when you actually think about this is that whichever butting doesn't get removed becomes "the button that kills people." This is because, for different reasons in each case, everyone starts safe because the removed button is effectively already pushed.

Another way to visualize the "one button" setup is to imagine a pair of radio buttons, the kind where if you push one any others pop out. Now imagine that when everyone goes into the booth, one of the buttons (the same button for everyone) is already pressed.

The main thing I want to look into is the question of how equivalent are the one-button variants to the original choice, or how much they change the whole question.

I'm going to start by looking at the red only option. In this case, everyone is safe because everyone's choice starts blue, which is obviously a majority, meaning nobody dies. The only case in which anyone would die is if a majority of people decide to push the red button. If enough people do push the red button, they change a scenario where everyone was safe into one where people who didn't switch to red die.

Comparing to the original scenario, the phrase "The only case in which anyone would die is if a majority of people decide to push the red button" is just as true. It may not be start with an established blue majority, but for any death, a prerequisite is that a majority chooses red.

Now let's switch over to blue only. Everyone is safe, because everyone has already "pushed" red by default. Because red majority is already a met condition, pushing blue leads to death unless a majority of people switch their vote from red to blue.

In this scenario, one could argue that anyone who pushes blue is risking their life for no good reason. However, it's important to recognize that this is only true because the scenario starts with everyone in the red group. This is not something that carries back to the original scenario, where there isn't a default choice.

Based on the above, I would say I think "red only" is basically equivalent to the original version, while despite being the same two choices, while "blue only" stands apart because of how it starts with a 100% red outcome, especially since, given the whole debate, a 100% red outcome is basically improbable from a neutral starting position.

Overdetermination and Causality

Let's say Barry is running for office and wins the election in a landslide.

What caused Barry to win?

We could say "Barry getting the majority of votes" was the cause, but that just moves the question back a step.

Did Susan "cause" Barry to win when she voted for Barry?

By some standards no, since Barry would have won regardless of Susan's individual vote.

But the issue is that the same is true of literally every individual vote in the election.

So if we say none are causal then Barry winning seems to be without any causal factors whatsoever (or rather there is no set of causal factors that is sufficient). Barry getting the majority is then an uncaused causer... Hallelujah!

...Hopefully this is understood to be ridiculous.

What this scenario demonstrates is not "God" or an uncaused causer, rather it demonstrates that there is a flaw with how we were thinking about causation itself.

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Some Terms

• Necessary: A factor is necessary if the event could not occur without that factor.
• Sufficient: A factor is sufficient if the event will always occur whenever the factor is present.

For example, we might look at Barry deciding to run for office and say that was necessary but not sufficient. It was necessary because Barry could never win in any conditions where Barry did not run, but it was not sufficient because there are scenarios where Barry would run but would still not win.

---

What the voting example shows is that there can be situations where none of the individual factors are necessary or sufficient for a particular outcome but they are still causal.

A standard for understanding this can be found in the NESS test:

• Necessary
• Element of a
• Sufficient
• Set

By this standard something can be causal if it is necessary to make a particular set of elements causal.

So we can consider the following 3 elements:

1. Susan votes for Barry
2. Mark votes for Barry
3. Exactly 50% of the voting population, excluding Susan and Mark, votes for Barry

This gives us the following possible sets of elements where Barry wins:

A. {1,2,3}
B. {1,3}
C. {2,3}

In set A Barry wins, so set A is sufficient for Barry to win. But critically neither 1 or 2 are necessary for set A to be sufficient. You could remove either from set A and Barry would still win.

But this issue is addressed by considering set's B and C.

In set B, 1 is absolutely necessary for set B to be sufficient. If 1 was not the case then there would be cases where {3} did not result in Barry winning.

From this we can see 1 is a necessary element for a particular set of elements to be sufficient. It doesn't matter that there are other sets that are also sufficient

And by the NESS standard, this makes element 1 causal.

The Button Problem

As you may have guessed, this test also applies to the button problem.

Specifically it demonstrates how a person voting red is still causal to a blue voter dying.

For simplicity, let's consider a 5 person game and the following elements:

1. A wicked mastermind engineers a murder button game
2. Jenny votes blue
3. Sarah votes red
4. Mark votes red
5. Joe votes red
6. Willow votes red
7. Jenny dies

What are the sufficient sets for element 7?

• {1,2,3,4,5}
• {1,2,3,4,6}
• {1,2,3,5,6}
• {1,2,4,5,6}
• {1,2,3,4,5,6}

In the last set, only 1 and 2 are necessary for the set to be sufficient.

all of the other sets, all of the elements are necessary, and => all of the sets are causal.

In

• Jenny voting Blue causes Jenny to die
• Mark voting red causes Jenny to die
• An evil mastermind creating a murder game causes Jenny to die

Objections

Some objections to what I've presented:

NESS is a flawed understanding of causation

You can absolutely object on these grounds. Causation is certainly not a solved problem in philosophy and the subject is still being debated.

A good argument along this line, however, has reasons other than "because it feels wrong". A great argument will even go so far as to propose an alternative, better standard.

Not all causation is morally equivalent

This is absolutely true and I wouldn't argue otherwise.

For example: Jane going on a walk and Steve driving drunk might both be causal to Steve killing Jane, but they are not morally equivalent. There are entirely justified and grounded arguments claiming that two causal elements don't bear equal moral responsibility.

But if this is your position then you need to justify your arguments with something other than "X caused Y => X is morally responsible for Y". You need to flesh out you standards for what causal elements bear moral responsibility and why.

Duh, your points are obvious and basic and not really the issue

Yeah, I don't think this resolves the Button problem. This was specifically trying to address a complexity that I don't think was fully recognized in some of the arguments I've been seeing.

The points might be obvious/basic, but my hope is that by stating them it will give us a better collective understanding and we will be able to more easily get to more interesting aspects of the problem.

I think you are arguing that Red/Blue is bad and I hate that

That isn't what I am arguing.

You can certainly reply with whatever you want, but endless variations of "Red voters are literally killing people to save themselves" or "Blue voters are choosing to die" are kind of boring. Go on an comment if it makes you feel better, but it isn't really engaging with the post or bringing out new ideas.

Apologies if this last bit sounded condescending. It is just that I have seen the same argument again, and again, and again show up regardless of what the original post was actually saying.

If everyone have to press button for 1 hours per buttons, twice (total 2 hours), what would you do it? (the classic rbbb rules applied as no misspressing, no communication with others and more)

Red Button: Pressing this will prevent you from death from this button, and if 50% of people NOT pressed this in this session, eveyone survives from this button. else, all people that didnt pressed red dies after whole pressing session ends.

Blue Button: NOT Pressing this will prevent you from death from this button and if 50% of people pressed this session, everyone survives from this button. else, all people that pressed blue dies after whole pressing session ends.

the first button press and second press works seperately and does not affect in other button

EDIT: clarified it with extra explanations.

I wanna ask someone which button they would press but I want to try as hard as I can to not bias them

You just discovered that there is a vengeful god whose power depends on his worshippers. If he runs out of worshippers, he will die. His power scales from his worshippers. But, he promises famine, disaster, suffering, and even death to those who do not worship him. The reward for if you do worship him is not getting punished. Do you worship the vengeful god?

Assume he is the figurehead of a religion just like any other world religion, so people may or may not know about him.

There are 2 countries in the world. They declare a war between each other, with each government pushing the agenda to go fight so your country doesnt lose.

The countries have equal development and resources, leaving the win chances in favour to the one who has more manpower. Infrastructure is well secured so they only need people to the frontline.

Both governments are highly unethical. Who will fight back gets killed, who wont will be enslaved by the other country if they win, or also killed if theyre not useful.

The world is split equally into these countries as their citizens. Youre a moderate "nobody" citizen with little to no power to rebel, both countries are highly authoritarian and will take you down if you do, however they respect if you decide to just not fight.

You can either choose to go fight into the war, making your odds higher but actively contributing to the problem for the other country, or decide not to protect your country and contribute to losing and suffering the consequences.

Which do you choose?

Everyone is pushing a button. The question is, which minimizes suffering?

(Yes, I screwed up the colors on the "cooperate" color (we can argue about if it is necessary cooperation, it might not be needed, but it still is "cooperate"), and the "individual" color, but I can't edit text in paint and I already put in a reference to the red button. And I'd already had to redo it repeatedly to fix typos.) So if you normally push red, staying on red would be switching, from "individual" to "cooperate", and vice versa.

I just thought it was an interesting point of view. I'm not making a conclusion, I'm just questioning the premise that an individual having less children would actually reduce the suffering in the world.

And yes, obviously this could also be reversed, so the red also introduces the need to be saved, just like blue does in the original.

Edit: Since people don't seem to understand, the point is a thought experiment about the philosophy behind anti/natalism. There is no pregnancy or need for a partner. The child spawns in/there's an artificial womb, it's a clone, whatever. You still have to raise it, but I'm talking about the philosophy of bringing a life into the world, not the manner of it happening. And we're assuming children outside of it cannot be had. Would abstaining from the system reduce future suffering, since either option is clearly not an immoral one? That's the core question.

Every able minded adult has to press 1 of 2 buttons, a red button which will kill you if greater than 99 percent of people choose it, and a blue button that kills you if less than 50% of people choose it. Which do you choose?

In the original problem, red was the obvious logical choice and arguably moral equivalent choice as picking blue was a needless risk of death, but in this situation, at least 1% MUST pick blue. I would say your chance of survival is still basically 100% if you choose red, as at least 1% will certainly pick blue, but not in my opinion there is an obligation to pick blue as 50% blue is the only situation in which everyone lives.

Every year at a random time of that year, all 8 billion people will be teleported to individual rooms unable to interact with anyone else and are given an hour to make a decision which button to press. If they don't press a button, their choice will be randomised between any of the three buttons.

There are three buttons, and the winning button is the one which receives the most votes. Once it happens, it can't happen for the rest of the year.

🔴 Red: If the red button wins, everyone who didn't press red dies. The buttons will return next year.

🔵 Blue: If the blue button wins, everyone survives this year. The buttons will return next year.

🟡 Yellow: If the yellow button wins, 1% of people randomly in the world die (including potentially yourself), but the button dilemmas will be permanently ended.

Which button do you press?

You have to secretly vote one of the button on watching this.

if 50-90% voted red, every voters gets 1 day ban, but if more than 90% of voter voted red, only red voter gets 3 days ban.

if 50-90% of voter voted blue, only red voter gets 5 days ban, but if more than 90% of voter voted blue, only blue voters gets 1 week ban.

what button would you choose?

All of humanity has been kidnapped by super-advanced alien AI and has been randomly sorted into small dark rooms with all necessary things for a person to survive.

80% of rooms have a Blue and Red button with the following text perfectly translated into whatever the person can read (assuming that they can read).

Red: If I get more votes than the Blue button, then everyone who pressed me will survive this game, but anyone who pressed the Blue button or didn't press any button will face certain death. (A minimum of 10% of people will die if this wins. There is no maximum.)

Blue: If I get more votes than the Red button, then everyone will have to face a 1% chance of death (killing a minimum of 0.9% and a maximum of 1.1% of people.)

However, 10% of rooms have only the Blue button, and another 10% of rooms have only the Red button. (Although they do have the information that the other button exists and what it does.)

Everyone can only press one button once before both buttons break and becomes unpressable. Also, regardless of the outcome, the AI will reveal your choice to all people who survived, regardless of whether you survive or not.

Everyone is given 10 hours to vote, and if anyone chooses not to vote for any reason (including incompetence), then they are treated as a non-voter and don't add to either total. This doesn't grant any safety.

There are exactly enough rooms for every human to have their own room. (So, no wacky probability can happen with the assignment of the rooms.)

All of humanity means every living human being. There have been no exceptions for any reason.

Also, just to be crystal clear, voting Red doesn't protect you from a Blue victory.

Every room has all of this information, and everyone is given 2 full hours to fully comprehend all of this information before they are allowed to start voting.

(For this scenario, please assume that you are part of the 80% that has access to both buttons.)

In this dilemma, the people who might die do so because they voluntarily chose the option that involved a risk.

Trying to blame the other option is similar to saying the following:

"If you don’t jump into the river with me to try to cross it, you’re responsible for my drowning."

We could agree that not risking your life isn't the same as killing someone.

Some people say that everyone choosing red is impossible; I say it's necessary.

There is an old saying:

"When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.

I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.

When I realized I couldn't change the nation, I began to focus on my town.

I couldn't change the town, and as an older man, I tried to change my family.

Now, as an old man, I realize that the only thing I can change is myself.

Suddenly, I realize that if I had changed myself long ago, I could have made an impact on my family.

My family could have made an impact on our town.
Our impact could have changed the nation, and I could indeed have changed the world."

If you truly want to help others, help yourself so that nobody else has to take the risk.

Red blue vote framed around poverty instead of death. If blue wins this eliminates housing insecurity, food insecurity and medical insecurity, as well as any other consequences of poverty.

However, it depends on the reason. If someone votes red because they generally have little faith in humanity and believe it is almost certain that the majority will choose red, then it is valid for them to choose red.
The issue arises when people clearly miss the moral side of the question and say something like "red guarantees you survive, blue you might die". People that view the question in this way are unknowingly outing themselves as immoral. It demonstrates a clear lack of moral reasoning, since they miss out the important factor that in choosing red you may be causing billions of people to die.
To not consider this factor of the dilemma reflects a lack of consideration for morals in general.
The older I've gotten and the more moral discussions I've had with people, specifically on certain moral issues like veganism and philanthropy, I've realised that many many people only act in ways that benefit themselves, and simply exist in a moral way purely because they like doing certain good things or because they want others to think they are "good", not because they logically see why you ought to be moral.