Submarine Dilemma

[Nomaken]

I would shut the door and say, "Okay guy's were all gonna die together, if you feel like drowning to death is particularly gruesome, i suggest you request we kill you now because we're running out of air and space by the second."

[Nomaken]

Basically yes.  If I am going to kill 50 of my loyal friends and ship mates, i think it would only be fair to them if they knew I was sharing their sacrifice.

Wouldn't you want to take the 90% chance you could save them all?

No.  Depending on how loyal they are to the rest of the sub, I think they'd know it was the best choice too.

[Leto729]

Submarine Dilemma:  You are the captain of a submarine and a compartment is leaking where there are 50 sailors inside.  You can close the compartment door immediately, trapping and killing all 50 sailors, OR you can take a 10% chance that you will kill all 1000 people on the submarine by leaving the door open for long enough for the 50 sailors to get out.  What do you do?

As long it is 10% chance of killing 1000 people I would let the 50 sailors of that compartment out. Though being under water in a leaking submarine I think the risk could become greater by the moment at that 10% chance would be greater than 10% in the end. Then You really would have a dilemma and Your hands then. So as long it could be done safely I would risk it for the 50 sailors.

[purposefulinsanity]

Basically yes.  If I am going to kill 50 of my loyal friends and ship mates, i think it would only be fair to them if they knew I was sharing their sacrifice.

Wouldn't you want to take the 90% chance you could save them all?

No.  Depending on how loyal they are to the rest of the sub, I think they'd know it was the best choice too.

It just seems to be that a 10% chance is a really low risk to take. (please note I'm just passing the time with this not going on the attack).

[Nomaken]

i thought there was a 90% chance it would kill the rest of the ship.  But still I think it would be irresponsible to play dice with 1050 peoples lives.

[purposefulinsanity]

i thought there was a 90% chance it would kill the rest of the ship.

No 

you can take a 10% chance that you will kill all 1000 people on the submarine by leaving the door open for long enough for the 50 sailors to get out.  What do you do?

Would you still do the same?

[Callaway]

The logical thing is to of course immediately shut the door on the 50, because that would kill the fewest people on the average.  The expected outcome of leaving it open long enough to let them all out is you kill 10% of 1000 people or 100 people versus the 50 you would kill by immediately closing the door because the 10% risk is that all 1000 of you die if you leave the door open long enough to save the 50.

That would definitely be my husband's answer, but I would find it difficult to be so coldly logical if I were the captain of a submarine actually faced with the situation of directly killing some of my crew.  I would probably try some creative solution like Duncvis', even though I know logically that the expected outcome of that would probably be you immediately kill 25 people plus 5% of 975 or approximately 74 people instead of 50 or 100, assuming the risk is linear with time.

The answer that kills the fewest people on the average is you immediately close the door and trap and kill the 50 sailors.

[Nomaken]

Yes.  I am not gonna be standing before god next to 1050 people with saint peter giving me an "you twit" look, and me have to say, "Well.. I had good odds, you gotta give me that."

[Nomaken]

I guess the most fair thing would to be put it to a vote with the entire crew.  It would be fair, and by the time we were done our problem would be fixed.

[purposefulinsanity]

I wonder how many people would be logical though if faced with the situation for real

[Scrapheap]

Submarine dilema??? Is that something like hide the sausage??  

[Nomaken]

I have some proof i think very clearly in tense fast going disasters.

[QuirkyCarla]

I don't think I'd be able to do all the math that quick if it were actually happening, especially under that much anxiety and pressure.

[Nomaken]

Your brain has the capacity to make a guess about it.  Humans are guessing machines and they are very adept at being accurate despite no apparent logical reasoning.  Human intuition is very powerful, you'd not need to make a calculation.  If you feel like something is a bad bet there is a really decent chance it is.

People who are geniuses at certain things often cannot describe how they come to their conclusions, they just have a feeling about it.

[QuirkyCarla]

That's true. I am very intuitive.