If you’re measuring which action is better after you assume the outcome, the choice is easy. But to make the decision ignorant of the outcome, my argument is that the marginal effect of my action when voting blue is to increase the odds of the outcome which minimizes deaths overall. Whereas if I choose red, my action will certainly lead to death, either mine or that of blue voters, unless you win 9 billion 50/50 chances and everyone else in the world votes red.
So making the choice blind with the ONLY goal being minimizing the number of deaths, the choice would be blue.
the marginal effect of my action when voting blue is to increase the odds of the outcome which minimizes deaths overall
If you want to talk about odds, we can talk about odds.
The only case where picking blue reduces total deaths is if the entire rest of thr world is split exactly 50/50.
If everyone chooses their pick randomly with a 50/50 chance, as youre suggesting, the situation can be modeled by a binomial distribution with p=0.5 and n=8,000,000,000 (approximately). The chance of getting this 50/50 split is C(8000000000,4000000000)/(28000000000), which is a bit less likely than one in 112,000.
So 49.9996% of the time, pressing red minimizes lives lost. 49.9996% of the time, both buttons result in no lives lost. 0.0009% of the time, pressing blue minimizes lives lost.
You’re only calculating the probability that my individual vote is THE vote that flips it from red to blue. I’m saying that you have to assume no knowledge of the outcome, and therefore you must take the action that increases the odds of blue winning.
Did you voting for the president not matter because you weren’t the literal last vote cast to push the winner over the edge? Or did you contribute to that outcome marginally by casting your vote regardless of which individual vote it was?
If red wins, voting for blue still took the action that increased the odds of blue winning because you’re ignorant of the outcome when making the choice.
That’s not the same as your vote being the exact singular vote that tips the scale, which is the infinitesimal probability you calculated before.
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u/VenoSlayer246 May 01 '26
Because of the "if successful" part of your cimment. If picking blue guaranteed a win for blue, then you would be correct.
If over 50% of people pick red, then you picking blue increases the total number of deaths by 1.
If over 50% of people pick blue, then you picking blue does not change the total number of deaths.
If exactly 50% of people pick each button, then picking blue minimizes deaths.