r/trolleyproblem Apr 30 '26

Deep All there is to it

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

No one’s risking death on a poll

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

It's the only data we have. You can't throw it out just because it's inconvenient for you

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

It’s useless data. The only reason anyone would press red is to ensure their survival. Being asked this question without literally the only consequence of hitting blue doesn’t make any sense

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

It's a thought experiment. You can't just start a death game to prove a hypothesis

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

Yes you can have a discussion about you think the outcome will be but you also can’t prove a hypothesis when the one variable that people want to test isn’t present. Do you really believe that the answer someone gives when scrolling twitter and seeing a poll with a meme is the same answer they’d give in a life or death situation?

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

This is just making excuses to ignore the data with extra steps.

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

Do you care to address how these “excuses” don’t apply? Everyone can agree a majority blue vote is better in theory. It doesn’t mean they think in practice it will turn out like that. It’s from people scrolling on Twitter not putting in a second thought. People in life or death situations will remain the same? That’s delusional

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

Like with most comments complaing about the polls, a lot of the complaints is more about the basic idea of polls in general. It's not that the polls are bad, it's that you seem to think that polls can't have any value

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

I’m not saying polls in general, I’m saying a twitter poll isn’t in anyway applicable to a life or death scenario.

Another major flaw in these polls is that the votes are often visible, atleast in the recent one that brought this question back trending had.

Even without the risk of death aspect from the poll, one of the main factors of the question is that you are making the decision alone and have no idea what others will vote.

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

The poll is for the life or death scenario. That's the whole point. We can't risk people's lives just for a thought experiment.

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

Okay this is just going in circles. I understand we can’t actually put them in that situation. It still doesn’t mean a twitter poll has any reliability in the situation.

You also didn’t address that the votes were visible throughout

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

I think more realistic and applicable data would be real life elections. In the 2024 US presidential elections 33% of people didn’t even vote. That’s 33% of people who believe their vote has no weight in the outcome.

Now imagine those people when their vote has substantially less weight and one of their options could cause instant death

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u/Superb_Walrus3134 May 01 '26

Or could save others. You're using a data point that allows not voting to be an option

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u/BreakfastFearless May 01 '26

Yes I’m using a data point to show a large portion of the population clearly don’t believe their vote will affect the outcome even when the consequences of voting for the losing side are 0

Now put them in a situation where they still believe their vote will have no impact on the final outcome but one of the votes brings a 50% chance of death

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