Motus Mentis

9 Comments

1. Götterdamn-it-all says

   Push the red button. You survive in either case.

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 9:29 am | Permalink
2. Jason says

   I’m no hero Malcolm, but I hope I’m not a barbarian either. I would press the blue button. (But then, it’s much easier to be an altruist as a middle-aged bachelor.)

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 12:04 pm | Permalink
3. Malcolm says

   G.,

   Yes, of course.

   A logically equivalent rephrasing, from elsewhere on X:

   There is a black button. Everyone in the world gets a chance to press the button or walk away. If at least half of people decide to press the button, nothing happens. If fewer than half of people press the button, everyone who pressed it dies.

   Do you press the black button?

   Also:

   You’re the last person to participate in this game; everyone else has voted already. You’re handed a box with a button on it by a man with a gun pointed at you. You can either walk away safely, or press the button. If you press the button, and fewer than half of everybody else has pressed it too, you will be shot immediately. (In other words, you can either opt into this insane game or not.) What would you do?

   Frankly, I find this so exasperating that at this point I’m inclined to press the red button if only to have a chance of eliminating those who would press the blue one.

   (Sorry, Jason! But I actually don’t think you — or any other sane or normal person — would really press the blue one, if the stakes were genuine.)

   Why would anyone participate in such a crazy scheme, when they can just say no?

   It’s like a trolley problem, but with nobody on the track, and saying that if enough of us go and get in front of the train, we might be able to block it safely with our bodies. But all we have to do is not go down onto the track in the first place!

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 12:12 pm | Permalink
4. Malcolm says

   See also this:

   https://x.com/MarkChangizi/status/2048366336309375061

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 12:19 pm | Permalink
5. Malcolm says

   I suppose the framing is everything. If there were a third button that just said “opt out”, I’m sure most people would just press that. But that is logically the same as the red button.

   Indeed, there isn’t even a need for the red button at all: either you press blue to opt in, or you don’t.

   To be fair, the solution — NOBODY should even consider pressing blue, which (obviously!) means nobody dies and the game is harmlessly shut down — puts at risk, I suppose, people of limited agency (such as small children, and some other sorts), who might push blue despite there being such a transparently available way to short-circuit the whole evil scheme. And I suppose there might be some who would go for blue just to try to rescue them.

   Was that your moral intuition, Jason? (I meant no offense, by the way, with my earlier comment, which was admittedly, perhaps a little harsh.)

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 11:34 pm | Permalink
6. Malcolm says

   Yet another framing:

   “Anyone who presses red, lives. If everyone presses red, everyone lives. People who refuse to press red will die unless more than half refuse to press red. Which button would you press?”

   Posted April 26, 2026 at 11:40 pm | Permalink
7. Malcolm says

   One last thing:

   If you are inclined to press Blue, does the calculus change if the threshold for Blue-presser-survival isn’t just that a majority must press Blue, but 99%? Why?

   Posted April 27, 2026 at 12:15 am | Permalink
8. Jason says

   I’ll admit Malcolm that my logic might be half-baked and fuzzy, but yes it is something like you suggest: since it’s likely there would be at least a minority of “blue” pushers (indeed, hypothetically millions across the globe), I couldn’t in good conscience even acquiesce in their unjust murder by hitting “red.” It’s the principle of the matter, something akin to the perhaps especially Catholic idea that certain acts are illicit regardless of proportionality or enlightened self-interest. I say this ironically as one who struggles to believe in God, much less Christ, yet it does strike me as intuitive that certain transcendent notions must come before biological survival. But again, as you not unreasonably indicate, this may be wishful thinking on my part.

   Posted April 29, 2026 at 4:34 am | Permalink
9. Jason says

   Simone Weil: “One must always side with justice, that fugitive from the winning camp.”

   Posted April 29, 2026 at 4:41 am | Permalink