Should You Press the Blue Button?

Maybe. Or maybe the "Red Button, Blue Button" question is picking a fight.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

So there is apparently a philosophical challenge going around on the internet. The challenge being thus there's a red button and there's a blue button, and if in the the challenge goes, challenge goes if more than 50% of people press the blue button, everybody lives. If fewer than 50% of people press the blue button, only those who press the red button live. Well, it's supposed to be this thing about can we all choose to live along in harmony versus what about you know, do you just choose for you and yours? Are you gonna be selfish about living? And this gotta be the dumbest of the modern philosophical I don't know, dilemmas. It's a dilemma that it's a dilemma. And I'm gonna outline it for you here right here, okay. The corollary to all this, I think corollary is the right word. Okay, so the entire phrasing around it is on the blue button, and so you think to yourself, okay, then the blue button is where I draw my sense of morality. No, it falls apart the minute you think, wait a minute, what if I press the red button? You press the red button, either way, you live. What then is stopping everybody from pressing the red button? And the formal answer is nothing physical. You know, the uh everybody presses the red button, everybody lives. 50% of people, you know, over 50% of people press the blue button, everybody lives. Fewer than 50% of people press the blue button, the red people live. So there is no incentive to take a risk here. You don't need to press the blue button. The only reason I can think of to press the blue button is to prove your morality. Because then there's a chance that you could die. And what does your dye improve? That the red people are jerks. No, it doesn't. It doesn't. All it proves is that you were willing to turn what was a very simple practical press the red button and get about your life. You were willing to turn this into a moral matter and put your life on the line for no reason. The fact that this is a dilemma is a dilemma to me. So, what's the right answer? The right answer is everybody just press the red button and get about your life. You do not need to put your life on the line just to prove that you are a more moral person than the person who pressed the red button. There is no need for that. Hit the red button and be about your way. Because then no matter what you believe, you live for another day. And then if fewer people, you know, if if anybody chooses the blue button, it's basically saying, ha ha ha, I want you to choose the blue button too, or else you're a jerk. Well, at that point, anybody who pressed the blue button solely to prove that they are more moral than you are, do we really need that kind of emotional blackmail in our lives? No, no, no, we don't. This is a funny little experiment, and I'm pretty sure that yellow that red and blue are meant to be the same thing. Meant I mean, can you can you I would love to be able to ignore the political insinuations here that one way or another the red people are gonna try and kill you unless you outnumber them? Like, no. Red people fully believe that you can press the red button too. It's everybody's choice, isn't it? So yeah, maybe the red button, blue button dialem is the next hot thing improving morality, or maybe, just maybe, it's the next way for some people to turn a simple practical matter into a matter of morality that it didn't need to be. Cheers.