Would you push the button?

You're probably right. I believe that there is a lot of good in the world and that most people can, and would, do the right thing. Yet, I have this terrible feeling that I'm wrong about that. It sucks.

A small price? Another persons life is a small price? Yes, there are people who are evil, bad, etc. but the chance of you killing someone who deserves that life (I believe) is much higher than not.

Do you really hold your life with such little value that you wouldn't hold it against someone if they pressed the button? I'm flabbergasted. I truly, truly am.



I think that's a very sad way to look at life if you think the majority of society are idiots. So you're saying instead of being malevolent, you're just hopeful?

I'm glad you understand a bit why I don't believe you, or most of the people who said they'd press the button. What do you think you would you be thinking before, during, and after you pressed the button? Would you hesitate at all?

Everything a person do is in the end only for a personal gain. Doing "the right thing" is just a comparison between what you feel is worth more; the money or the praise of the people around you and the fact that now "everybody knows I'm a good person".

Also, let's try it like this; You desperatly need money for a operation on your sick family member/gf,best friend, doesn't matter, let's just say the person you care most about in the world, and you need it quick, now, and there is absolutely no possiblility of you getting them other than pushing the button. If you do, a innocent person will die, if you don't your most beloved person (who is also a innocent person) will die. Would you push it?

I'll tell you right now, that if you do, you're not doing the right thing.

Who deserves life? I think that is something you can decide, just like you can not decide who doesn't deserve it. Right and wrong is just a matter of personal opinion, there is no godly decided law of what is good and bad.

I don't hold my life in little value, but I don't value it neither more or less than another persons value either. Since I've already decided that I would push the button, I have no right to complain. It's an eye for an eye, my flabbergasted friend. Then again, this is not to say that if I saw the guy with the button, knowing I would be the one who would die, I wouldn't try to stop him, cause I would, even if I had to kick his ass and kill him. I don't have a deathwish ya know.

I need money to ensure my own survival. Such is our world. Tell you what; Find me a magic kill-and-profit button and I will push it in front of you. I'll even pay you $30,000 for finding it.

Thanks, but I'll pass. Instead, I'll ask you a few more questions to try and better understand your way of thinking. Hope that's okay.

If you only look out for yourself and your own survival, then doesn't that make it hard to sympathize and care about other people? Would you press the button out of selfishness/being a dick or because you think that any human being would do the same thing so it's (for the most part) an completely acceptable answer?

By the way, I'm not trying to be insulting. I'm asking honest questions. :]

The question is: someone you do not know.

It is very easy to put something out of your mind if you'll never know the answer to it.
For instance, lets say you do push the button. In your immediate reality, all that has changed is you have gained a fair amount of money. You subconsciously de-humanize the person you've killed.
It's the same in war. Troops are trained not to think of the opposing army as human beings. They are the Evil Enemy. Japs, Indians, Rag-heads, Yankees... they become a name, not a person. Because if it's a person, it's significantly herder to kill them.

I believe a majority of answers would be quite different if they had to watch the person die, or if they where told about the random person they where to sacrifice.


But hey, maybe I'm just babbling on about nothing...

That actually makes a lot of sense. My dad was a fighter pilot and he said it was easier to kill them because he didn't have to look at them or really think about the people he was killing.

it makes sense. but for me, even if i had to watch the person die i'd still press the button.

but i practically grew up in a hospital so i'm used to seeing death pretty much all around me so i may be a special case

First off, allow me to say I don't look down on others, perhaps I used too strong of words earlier. I don't want you to think badly of me. It's just that most people just seem to do stupid and immoral things for little or no reason. The more I watch the news (Be it TV or the 'net) the more I see how truly ridiculous some people are. Assuming that anything that happens to them is more important than anything else. Freaking out over menial things, and attempting to drag things out in order to get money or whatever it may be.

Now, back to your questions, I'd probably hesitate sure, I'm not saying I'd run up there smack the button and ask if I'd get another million if I hit it again. I'd just hope that someone who honestly deserved it got killed off. If there was fine print somewhere that said the next baby born will die or something along those lines, of course I wouldn't push it, as that baby did nothing wrong. Perhaps if I could choose who died, then I'd hit the button with reckless abandon.

Or maybe, as pointed out before, I'd rationalize it as "not my problem." Maybe in the same manner that I can't feel bad for people who die from speeding or for exemplifying Darwinism. Ah well. I guess it's up to you to decide on how you think of this.

-_- I might be wrong, but to me it sounds like it would be harder to press the button if you grow up watching people die in a hostpital.

Id press the button without a shadow of a doubt!

Human life is very cheap anyway but if you dont know personally the people who are going to be affected by your choice then its even cheaper again.

Im sure ill come to regret my decision and feel really sorry for myself whilst basking on my yaught in the Mediterranean sun! (Woe is me *Slurp of Pina Colada*)

you kinda get numb to it after awhile and you just think,"eh, there gonna die eventually"

I wouldn't press it because I would make the exact assumption that that would be what happens. Plus, for all you know, you may end up killing someone that you don't know yet but if you had not killed them they would have had a profound effect on your life.

The Twilight Zone prepares you for all too-good-to-be-true paranormal decision making.

I would not be able to do it. Im too much of a nice guy to do it

It kind of raises the question "How much is a human life worth?" don't it?

Curiosity killed the cat. Then out of the cat came knowledge.

If I have no knowledge of what happens after I press the button, I'll do it. But if there is reference material on which I can base the result of what I do, I will change my course of action based on the said reference.

Basically, that is the best course of action on the said problem.

okay, let's see what we've got. we have no clue, no explaining, just one big red button. so, you just click it, or not?