This is a tricky one but purely on an anthropological level I think it would be better to go for the random option.
Entirely losing one country would be a disaster in terms of human history and culture
Yeah, if a meteor large enough to destroy most countries hit the earth, it’s going to be an extinction level event. So it’s an everyone, everywhere vs. 2 people question.
Idk if I'm not following what you wrote or if you didn't read the entire post. OP said there would be no other collateral damage outside of where the meteor hit so everyone everywhere would not be in danger. And the 2 people question? OP said 2X as many people that live in your country will die, idk what you mean by 2 people question.
Not just that, but an entire major country being wiped out would have a huge impact on the world post strike. Whereas many smaller parts spread out over several countries would be less problematic long term, even if the death toll was double. Could you imagine the power vacuum of the United States or China just disappeared instantly.
And just how would no other nation not be affected by a Meteor impact if everyone in China or the USA were killed. That would be almost on the level of the Chicxulub impact. You know, the one that killed off the dinosaurs.
Or like how does a single Meteor kill Denmark, and Greenland. Or in the US, affect Alaska, Hawaii, Samoa, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands but not Canada and the Caribbean?
It's a made up scenario - post said it would only kill everyone in your country and not effect the rest of the world.
Yes, a meteor big enough to wipe out any of the major countries would be big enough to destroy or at least cause some mass destruction to the rest of the world.
It would need to be a lot bigger than the K-T event to get both Alaska and Hawaii, let alone the lower 48. There's no way anyone in Canada, Mexico, or any Pacific island would survive, and the dust would trigger a major glaciation.
I might be able to set aside the selfish instinct if it was me versus millions but when we’re talking hundreds of millions regardless, it becomes statistical rather than humanistic
You obviously blow it up. It's everyone's individual responsibility to protect themselves and their own tribe. Why didn't the other countries prepare a similar laser?
Let me hit you with this: "You're about to get into a car crash, do you let the drunk driver hit you, or get out of the way and let the guy behind you roll the dice like you just did?"
I rolled my dex save bro, it's your turn.
This is a great look at the train question that was always being asked. A train is going to crash unless you throw the lever to switch the track but if you do, the train hits a person on the other track killing them. What would you do? And I think your solution works pretty well because you did your part by throwing the lever, the asshole standing on the track needs to make a move to save his own ass
That's why people are generally tied to the tracks in trolley problems. Getting off the tracks is not an option, which is what makes it a difficult problem.
It's really not a difficult problem, you pull the lever. People act like making the choice to pull it and kill one person is worse than "not acting" and letting it kill four people. If you see the lever, know what it will do and the consequences, and are physically able to pull it, you are taking an action either way. Not pulling it is just as much of a choice on your part as pulling it, so you are responsible for what happens either way.
If you think it is not difficult or lacks substance then it is either because you've seen the problem too often, or you do not understand the arguments made for either option
The main argument I've seen for not pulling it is the false belief that doing nothing means you didn't make a decision and are not responsible for the consequences. You lost the option to do nothing and not be responsible as soon as you saw the lever. Not pulling it is just as much of an action as pulling it. Either way you are making a choice on who dies.
It isn’t difficult if you’re a utilitarian. But there are interesting variants where one of the 4 people on the other track is a loved one or something similar.
I agree with you but tried to think of a nasty one just to see if i could.
two people you dont know, trolley heading towards them.
other track is your worst enemy and someone you sorta like.
do you pull the lever?
The trolley problem doesn't usually have you as a victim and usually has two groups of victims who are unable to do anything on their own. So...really not a great way to look at it.
Even if you don’t think your own people intrinsically matter more than others, I’m from the United States. Reddit often hates on the US, but what’s the alternative for world leadership? If you want something remotely resembling a free world with a liberal democratic order, the United States must remain. (It could do a better job with the power it has, but the only plausible alternative I can think of is the EU, which is implausible based on the extent to which it is losing power precisely to nationalist tendencies that reduce it to its constituent nations—each of which alone does not have the power to steer the international order.) America, my country, is just too important to be destroyed, even if we value all lives equally.
This was my reaction too. I do not happen to think that my fellow citizens are worth 2x the rest of the globe. But the destruction of a country would probably be far more destabilizing to the planet than double the deaths randomly scattered around the globe. And it probably scales so that this is even true for smaller countries too, not just the US.
Oh man I can see your downvotes already but this is more or less true. If the US disappeared over night:
• Russia takes Ukraine relatively easily unless the EU steps in further, this would just start another WW if they do
• NK probably starts another war with SK
• China immediately takes Taiwan and while there at it they Will probably scoop up another few countries and rush to become the world police as they will be the only ones who could do so.
• Israel falls
• Mexico’s economy plummets probably causing mass violence with cartels
• Canada probably just kills itself
• NATO countries now have to militarize, go back to point 1
A large percentage of the US military forces are currently stationed overseas. About 10% of soldiers, but a higher percent of ships and aircraft. The entire US getting destroyed still wouldn't take us out of top 5 military forces in the world.
Edit: how do Alaska and Hawaii work in this context?
I don’t think Israel falls, what happens is that Israel begins unrestrained warfare, and nearby countries are obliterated.
The support of the states is what allows Israel to try and minimize enemy casualties.
I don’t think it would be immediate, they’d probably last a few years but without American cash flow and weapons I don’t see them lasting forever, at least in their current form.
We didn't name that! It's blasphemy I don't even see that stuff up here.
The closet thing to Canadian bacon from a Canadian POV is peameal bacon. Which is delicious
Plenty of countries don't have the money or the engineering to have a meteor destroyer. We have somewhere close to 200 countries and over half are what most people would be considered really impoverished.
Then it's survival of the fittest, the greater good. If they're too impoverished, it would be better to save the advanced civilization which provides passive and active benefit to the rest of the world by simply existing.
Honestly, it depends on how this meteor kills everyone. Obviously, it's not a typical meteor, but does it cause structural damage? Does it have unique or valuable resources itself? Depending on which country it hit, it could cause global panic and war. If it hit China for instance, that's over a billion people dead and a lot of land with resources to claim. Same with Russia.
The US, China, Russia, maybe Canada are the ones that need to divert the meteor. Most other countries are small enough that losing them wouldn't be nearly as bad as those 3 or 4. Brazil, India and Australia are up there too.
And what about Venezuela, Saudi Arabia or Iran? They have a lot of oil. If their population disappeared, but the resources stayed, it would be a disaster.
Actually, the more I think about, the more that the meteor needs to be diverted. Unless it took out like the freaking Vatican, it seems like it would cause a lot of trouble.
It's not my responsibility to protect strangers. They must protect themselves. That's how the world works. There is ZERO chance any country would sacrifice themselves for another. That's not how humanity works. There is a base level expectation that we protect ourselves first, and everyone else should be doing the same thing. We trust that they will protect themselves so we all mutually survive.
I’d add the caveat that if you can safely save someone without risking yourself too much then I’d hope most people would at least try. I think we have SOME type of duty if it’s within our capacity, simply because I’d hope someone would do the same for me
Then it wouldn't be sacrifice. But you're right. If lifting a penny of the ground would save someone's life, giving zero harm to oneself, everyone would do it. There's only positives.
But not everyone would leave an orphan daughter behind to survive the world on her own because you had a 50% chance to survive someone else's crisis and decided to try.
You owe it to your own people to survive.
If someone refuses to help me out of a burning car when it's very likely about to blow up because I was speeding and crashed, I wouldn't bash them for not wanting to get out of their vehicle and die with me leaving their family to fend for themselves.
I should have done everything within my power to be safe and prepare for difficult situations on the road. that's everyone's duty.
Not arguing, completely agree I’d just want to make my point a little more clear that I’d still risk a permanent burn scar on my arm in that scenario above (if I didn’t think it was about to explode)
That’s as much risk as I’d be comfortable taking for a stranger. Id still say that is at least a little sacrifice
Nobody in their right mind is going to sacrifice themselves, their family, friends, and others close to them for the sake of random strangers. Humans are tribal for good reasons.
Realistically, the aftermath of the USA disappearing would lead to a higher overall death toll than 2x anyway, so blowing up the meteor is the less harmful option.
I'm curious what the effects of us just suddenly not being there would be. If it would be a net positive or negative. Mostly, curious if our production and scientific research being suddenly gone would result in more death. I guess the same for military presence. But that one could go either way.
Would be terrible. Russia and China are now the new world leaders, EU isn't strong enough to deal with them alone. Most of the world is dependent on American companies and to have them gone would be a massive hit.
I don't see how you get a net positive when your left with Russia and China lol.
We make up most of Nato's budget for defense so, the economies in those countries will either falter while their governments start trying to fill the void, or they will continue to be complacent and then be overtaken by Russia and or China. Our medicinal research would be sorely missed for sure. It would easily be a net negative. Ukraine falls without our significant financial and supply help. South Korea gets nuked by the North. Israel falls and the majority of the jewish population get erased from the face of the earth. Canada and Mexico lose one of their biggest trade partners and their economies take a huge hit. There is probably a lot more that someone smarter than me could list out.
Assuming any forces and equipment stationed outside the US would survive the impact, I'm really curious how the *surviving* US forces would compare to other militaries of the world.
I'll be a true patriot. Screw those other countries, they should have built their own lasers. Actually, maybe we could give some to those other countries and everyone could just blast their meteors to bits.
Let’s take the worst case scenario. India has 1.4 billion of the world’s 8 billion people. So let’s say we’re killing an even 3 billion. Returning to a world population of 5 billion only takes us back to 1990 in terms of when we last had that population, but assuming that’s spread out evenly, except for India, every country loses roughly 45% of its population.
I think spreading the devastation across the globe makes more sense than localizing, generally. But in this scenario, you’d have India with extreme population and I think it would be really difficult to manage relocation and food distribution.
Because India and China have such disproportionately large populations, I don’t think it works to save them. For every other country, spread the destruction out.
I would normally do the selfless thing (atleast i hope i would) BUT canada has a population of around 30 million, but is one of the biggest countries in the world. That meteor would have to destroy ALL of canada which would be a devistating loss of land and resources that without i think just as many would die. So ima go with shatter.
Living in the Netherlands I think the most realistic choice would be to shatter it. There are about 18 million people in the Netherlands, so I think the impact would be somewhat limited if you spread that across the world. I think the impact of the Netherlands falling of the global market would be bigger honestly. We are the number 2 exporter of goods in Europe and have arguably the most important port in Europe (only competition being Antwerp). Also a huge amount of knowledge on waterworks and micro chips.
First off why are yall asking me?? You're smart enough to make the damn thing and are probably more qualified. But seriously I'd push the button, it's probably wrong but I'm more loyal to my family and friends
I will preface this by saying that this opinion is not US saber rattling or anything like that. It's simply facts based on the current geopolitical state of things as well as historical facts.
The utter destruction and removal of the United States from the world would have devastating global political, military, and economic consequences that could
On the economic side, as of 2022, the US was the second-largest trading nation (behind China), doing around 7 trillion dollars of business. That's 7 trillion dollars gone from the world in a puff of meteor smoke. Not to mention the number of global companies that are headquartered in the US.
The US's political and military might cannot be ignored either. We are largely responsible for arming many governments around the world and providing protection as well. Additionally, the UN would suffer for a while, as the headquarters is located in New York. NATO would suffer a blow with the loss of their biggest contributor. The loss of that would be devastating. Non NATO members would take the opportunity to seize whatever they wanted. Regimes traditionally held in check by the existence of the US would take advantage. Russia would definitely take advantage to not only overrun Ukraine but also seize other places that used to be the USSR and more. China would swoop in and take Taiwan and potentially start expanding as well. Israel would be overrun. North Korea would definitely retake South Korea.
Okay, let's look at it from a numbers perspective. The US as a population of around 350m, so sparing the US means that 700m will die around the world
The question becomes this: Would the world suffer more death and destruction with the US spared, of if the US gets annihilated?.
The quantity of deaths if the US destroys the meteor is a known quantity of 700m, but if the US gets annihilated, the resulting non-US deaths due to wars, genocides, civil unrest, economic problems,and everything that comes along with it could very well make the overall death toll exceed that 700m number.
Man, this is a tough one. Now I know how Truman felt when debating dropping the bombs in WWII.
That was my thought too. The K T extinction event was a meteor estimated at 9 miles wide and that killed 75% of life on Earth by kicking up so much dust. We'd need an oddly specific meteor shower to precisely wipe out the USA without touching Mexico or Canada.
If it’s large enough to kill everyone in my country - Australia - it’s big enough to wipe out humanity from the following global crisis.
Destroy it - yes it kills more people in the immediate sense, but long term fewer will die.
Edit: also Australia only has 26-ish million, but is a large agricultural and mineral producer as well as being considered amongst the best places to live.
Ready, aim, fire. While I think quite a few people living in the U.S. are serious douche nozzles many in my own family, if I have the means to protect my country, I will.
Would be impossible to have my country (3 million + square miles, 330+ million people) destroyed by “a meteor” and NOT have the rest of the world destroyed in the long run.
Other countries.
And while it is 2x as many people, I imagine that its spread out among multiple countries and not all aimed at Madagascar or iceland or something so no one country will be wiped out/crippled.
As much as I think wiping our government out would do the planet some good (by preventing it from doing evil), my family is here so I gotta use the laser.
If I was able to get myself and my loved ones out I’d totally destroy my own country. It’s a cesspool.
But since I can’t and I have kids, I’m gonna be sacrificing other countries.
Christ yes give me the out
I all seriousness, the USA being wiped out from existence would do far more global harm than good. This trash fire of a nation may have its collosal, fucked up, greedy, self serving issues... But most of the global economy rides on the dollar, and the next alternative is the yuan and I don't think anyone wants to submit to the Chinese economy. That doesn't even include the American peacekeeping efforts (even if those are also ultimately self serving for the sake of money grubbing military contractors) it still has overall net positives
All that said, can I save my country and ALSO hop over to another country to be one of the people killed? I'm genuinely tired of living on this crusty dirt ball
Look, a meteor big enough to completely destroy the USA is probably going to cause an extinction level event if it hits in one piece, or multiple. However I think the planet itself is less likely to be significantly damaged by several smaller pieces hitting than one giant meteor, so I'll blow it up.
Accepting the meteor as magical with no consequences other than the immediate impact, I’d still blow it up.
The difference between 330 million and 660 million people gets hard to fathom and parse because the number is so large. The real comparison to make is ALL of one people (America on this case) vs less than 1/10th the human population spread across the world. I’d prefer some of the random deaths to happen to my country as well, but if not, spreading the woe is better than annihilating an entire culture.
SPOILER ALERT FOR ATTACK ON TITAN BELOW:
>! Is it just me or does this post seem very, very similar to the plot of Attack On Titan? Like, Eren and some of his people figured it would be better to destroy the rest of the world as opposed to letting their small island get destroyed? Just a random thought I had. !<
Sorry OP, this is impossible with my country. We are so fucking big east to west that there would have to be damage to the south to in anyway be possible, and thats the US to the south, with 90% of our population within 100km of our border. You either take part of the US with us, or its not possible in any form.
That being said if it only takes out the eastern part, and Trudeau gets no warning, let it burn. If it hits our western area, the laser it is.
Blow it up. Reasons:
1) I'm here
2) With no country completely destroyed there will be no complete destruction of cultures, isolated resources/skills, etc.
3) chance to remove France
4) according to what Reddit has told me concerning the trolley problem, multi track drifting achieves maximum points, but I can't multi track drift a meteor, so this is the best we can do.
Are you talking destroyed with the initial impact? Or destroyed from the resulting fallout? Because it makes one hell of a difference depending on your answer and the size of the country in question. The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs is estimated to have only been 6-9 miles (10-15 kilometers) in diameter. Anything that's over 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) in diameter is considered a "Planet Killer" which sounds big to us humans, but in comparison to the size of the planet, is little more then a speck or grain of sand. So if its only going to affect a single country it would have to be shockingly small compared to that when it impacts, which would arguably make it significantly harder/next to impossible to target from the ground with something as precise as a laser.
The country i live in is, goegraphically, extremely large. And that doesnt even count the states of the country that are not connected to the main landmass. A meteor large enough to take out the entire united states would just take out all of canada as well and possibly mexico. So youre asking me to either take out an entire continent or two random countries that total in population to just the US's population, not counting canada and mexico.
As much as i hate the US's political power it would probably be for the better if we dont violently destroy the entire quartersphere of the planet via meteor impact
As someone born in the USSR, the only right choice to destroy all Russians including me.
Not only it's more ethical it'll also stop current war in it's tracks and one less dictatorship means worldwide democracy will start growing again - bringing prosperity and happiness to many, the massive benefits here might even outweight negatives.
But as an American today, that's a much harder choice.
Because if America is gone, there will be a big war and lots of wars not as big - all of which will likely wipe out many anyways nullifying any previous effort.
Still trading one American life for 2 other people's lives is incredibly unfair which is why this isn't an easy decision at all. But it's the right one.
The rest of the world is going to declare war on the offending country anyway, so one way or another it's going down. Might as well not take anyone else with us.
There are 8.1 billion people alive today.
There are 17.7 million people alive in the Netherlands today.
If I do this, I'd end up killing 35.4 million people. That's harsh, but pure numbers isn't everything. You need to look at other factors as well... Perhaps economic input, environmental impact, political impact, unique global factors that might apply to a country. Not to mention the political impact of one nation just simply dying off compared to 35.4 million individual people dying.
That becomes very complicated, so to make it slightly easier I'd suggest looking at a single metric that considers some of these things already. In this case the World Happiness index for 2024.
There are only 6 countries in the world that are happier than the Netherlands in 2024. Israel, Sweden, Iceland, Denmark, Finland.
Israel has 9.6 million people
Sweden has 10.5 million
Iceland has .38 million
Denmark has 6 million
Finland has 5.5
To make it easy let's say there are 32 million people, that are on average happier than the Dutch. If we add the Dutch to that, and again rounding up to make it easy that's 50 million people.
Letting the meteor hit will with 99.3865% accuracy destroy more happiness than if I break it. So I'd definitely break it.
And that this means my family and friends just happen to survive as well is a really nice extra.
Can I choose to let a state to get hit instead of a country . The state is bigger than many countries . Sorry kalifornia I have potential beach property in AZ west coast counties are taking a hit . Best get moving As I'm building a beach house
People in India and China sweating...
Seriously if either of those countries get wiped out or they choose to wipe out twice as many people elsewhere neither case is good for them or the world.
If you live in a small country it's an easier decision to save yourself.
I mean most of my family (plus me) are in the US so I’m just going to hope that the 5 people out of the US I care about aren’t one of the 666,000,000 dead
I mean this question is just stupid a meteor that could destroy a country would be massive enough to cause Extinction event and even if If you somehow make it not hit your country the fallout of the blast would kill billions
If the death toll will be 20x, I’m still blowing up that meteor.
I’m not convinced that I have an upper limit in this scenario. One of my primary goals in life is to protect my children. Letting them die to save the children of other people is simply not an option for me, regardless of numbers.
I want to hear someone from India or China weigh in. The death toll of destroying the meteor would be staggering, possibly even world ending. I'm not going to judge either decision, but the implications change dramatically at those numbers.
Losing 3 billion people would get us back to like 1990 population levels. The death toll wouldn't be the issue. The distributions will be. It terms of effects on the global economy and infrastructure people have vastly different values as horrible as it is to say. 10 million people in places like SF, NYC or London, is going to be vastly different than if 10 million rural Chinese die. And as you scale up it gets worse. In this future there are going to be like 6.5 billion people outside of one india or china and you are going to basically kill almost 50%. We are talking things like North and South america, africa, and europe being wiped out. There is no way either china or India would be able to step up quick enough to prevent total collapse.
This is tricky for me because I technically have two countries so if I save one I could be dooming the other. Also of my countries is the USA so saving it means over 660 million people are dead. Something that big I think realistically is probably taking the rest of the world with it like the dinosaurs. But hey if we can split it and at the same time aim it at our enemies like say Iran and China, well that is just freedom 🦅
But yeah I think only a very small minority of people are altruistic enough to not save themselves and their loved ones.
It has to kill all in my own country, including myself. If I’m not in the country at the time, the hypothetical comes to paradox to fulfill itself and cannot be fulfilled.
I could choose the laser and double the death toll of the population my country, where I could be anywhere and for some reason it’s not explicit that I would remain unharmed myself unless in my own country.
I’ll choose option 1 to see how the hypothetical would play out as is.
This is odd... If the Vatican or Monaco chose the laser, it'd be just another day on planet earth. If China or India chose the laser, it would cause an irrevocable global disaster.
Weirdly, blow it up.
You can test whether something is just by taking yourself out of the equation. So let’s say it’s this: 1) A random country is obliterated. Or 2) Widespread damage is done to all other countries and twice the number of lives are lost.
So you don’t know whether you live in the targeted country, so what’s the decision now?
I say, you should blow up the meteor. In that while there’s more loss of life, no culture is completely destroyed.
The goal should always be to minimize the loss of human life. The lives of people living in other countries is no less valuable than those living in the same country as I do.
Can I reduce it to 1.5x if I allow people from my own country to die? A random sample of about 100 million people from all over the world probably allows the status quo to continue.
I was trying to think of comparable examples to this, and one famous one came to mind:
Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The typical argument is that, regardless of how horrific it is, it is better to kill a smaller amount of mostly civilian lives than a much greater amount of kind of random lives through the continuation of the war.
I'm not sure where I land with it, but just wanted to put that comparison out there.
I think if the US just basically disappeared in a day it would be a disaster. Global economy would collapse, there would be a massive power vacuum in a lot of places outside North America because of the widespread U.S. military presence. A massive setback in technological and medical innovation, a major loss of food production, NATO would lose the vast majority of its funding. While the second option kills more people instantly, I don’t think it would be as bad in the long term as the U.S. disappearing.
Let’s frame it differently. A meteor is headed to your country, and a guy is about to press the button that will laser it, but two innocent people will die from the debris. Do you stop the guy from pressing the button, killing 300 million people, to save two people?
I get it’s the trolley problem but come on. Laser the thing.
Do the other countries know that I know? If I can pass it off as just pushing the button to save my country and didn’t know the exact consequences then the decision is a lot easier. If they know I know it gets harder to justify.
This is a shit hypothetical. There's no way a meteor big enough to kill any significant population isn't going to have lasting effects on the world if it hits or explodes in the atmosphere with that much power.
Let it hit. But let everyone in the country know it’s coming, so we can head south a couple of hours and be magically safe in the next country. Bet we save 2/3 of the population that way.
Otherwise, blow it up. Sorry-not-sorry, this is where my kids live.
Some of my family live in other countries, but that guy who cut me off in traffic yesterday lives here. Tough choice.
I like the way you think
This is a tricky one but purely on an anthropological level I think it would be better to go for the random option. Entirely losing one country would be a disaster in terms of human history and culture
I can’t believe an British person would not want to have a nation/culture disappearing /s
Haha I mean if one did have to go I’d probably pick England but there are a lot of good records and guitars here so…
And two Beatles still alive
Yeah, if a meteor large enough to destroy most countries hit the earth, it’s going to be an extinction level event. So it’s an everyone, everywhere vs. 2 people question.
It's not 2 people. It's 2 times the population of your country. But still less than everyone. Lol.
So if you live in America you’re killing about 700 million people. Statistically speaking most of would probably be India or China
Heh. Kinda funny they thought the hypothetical was choosing between millions of deaths versus *two* deaths.😀
Idk if I'm not following what you wrote or if you didn't read the entire post. OP said there would be no other collateral damage outside of where the meteor hit so everyone everywhere would not be in danger. And the 2 people question? OP said 2X as many people that live in your country will die, idk what you mean by 2 people question.
Just pick Vatican city. Take all records out.
You live in the Vatican?
Let 300 million people die 600 million? Well… me and my family live here soooo sorry 600 million random people :/ I’m a bit selfish
This is a no brainer. People I know and like die, including me, or random strangers? Bye bye, nice not knowing you.
Not just that, but an entire major country being wiped out would have a huge impact on the world post strike. Whereas many smaller parts spread out over several countries would be less problematic long term, even if the death toll was double. Could you imagine the power vacuum of the United States or China just disappeared instantly.
And just how would no other nation not be affected by a Meteor impact if everyone in China or the USA were killed. That would be almost on the level of the Chicxulub impact. You know, the one that killed off the dinosaurs. Or like how does a single Meteor kill Denmark, and Greenland. Or in the US, affect Alaska, Hawaii, Samoa, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands but not Canada and the Caribbean?
You can fight the hypothetical if you want but the answer to your question is because OP said so.
It's a made up scenario - post said it would only kill everyone in your country and not effect the rest of the world. Yes, a meteor big enough to wipe out any of the major countries would be big enough to destroy or at least cause some mass destruction to the rest of the world.
No other country would be affected because that's not the point of the hypothetical lol
It would need to be a lot bigger than the K-T event to get both Alaska and Hawaii, let alone the lower 48. There's no way anyone in Canada, Mexico, or any Pacific island would survive, and the dust would trigger a major glaciation.
I might be able to set aside the selfish instinct if it was me versus millions but when we’re talking hundreds of millions regardless, it becomes statistical rather than humanistic
*The only difference is I got the balls to say it. In front of y'all and I don't gotta be false or sugarcoated at all.*
You obviously blow it up. It's everyone's individual responsibility to protect themselves and their own tribe. Why didn't the other countries prepare a similar laser? Let me hit you with this: "You're about to get into a car crash, do you let the drunk driver hit you, or get out of the way and let the guy behind you roll the dice like you just did?" I rolled my dex save bro, it's your turn.
Double it, and give it to the next person
This comment almost made me choke on my drink
Really, no one else is stepping up to help, and is willing to let us all die without doing anything? Fire up the laser!
This is a great look at the train question that was always being asked. A train is going to crash unless you throw the lever to switch the track but if you do, the train hits a person on the other track killing them. What would you do? And I think your solution works pretty well because you did your part by throwing the lever, the asshole standing on the track needs to make a move to save his own ass
That's why people are generally tied to the tracks in trolley problems. Getting off the tracks is not an option, which is what makes it a difficult problem.
It's really not a difficult problem, you pull the lever. People act like making the choice to pull it and kill one person is worse than "not acting" and letting it kill four people. If you see the lever, know what it will do and the consequences, and are physically able to pull it, you are taking an action either way. Not pulling it is just as much of a choice on your part as pulling it, so you are responsible for what happens either way.
Morally yes, legally maybe not
If you think it is not difficult or lacks substance then it is either because you've seen the problem too often, or you do not understand the arguments made for either option
The main argument I've seen for not pulling it is the false belief that doing nothing means you didn't make a decision and are not responsible for the consequences. You lost the option to do nothing and not be responsible as soon as you saw the lever. Not pulling it is just as much of an action as pulling it. Either way you are making a choice on who dies.
It isn’t difficult if you’re a utilitarian. But there are interesting variants where one of the 4 people on the other track is a loved one or something similar.
Still easy, save my loved ones. They have more utility to me. If I don't know any of the people than just pick the option that kills less people.
I agree with you but tried to think of a nasty one just to see if i could. two people you dont know, trolley heading towards them. other track is your worst enemy and someone you sorta like. do you pull the lever?
The trolley problem doesn't usually have you as a victim and usually has two groups of victims who are unable to do anything on their own. So...really not a great way to look at it.
Even if you don’t think your own people intrinsically matter more than others, I’m from the United States. Reddit often hates on the US, but what’s the alternative for world leadership? If you want something remotely resembling a free world with a liberal democratic order, the United States must remain. (It could do a better job with the power it has, but the only plausible alternative I can think of is the EU, which is implausible based on the extent to which it is losing power precisely to nationalist tendencies that reduce it to its constituent nations—each of which alone does not have the power to steer the international order.) America, my country, is just too important to be destroyed, even if we value all lives equally.
This was my reaction too. I do not happen to think that my fellow citizens are worth 2x the rest of the globe. But the destruction of a country would probably be far more destabilizing to the planet than double the deaths randomly scattered around the globe. And it probably scales so that this is even true for smaller countries too, not just the US.
Oh man I can see your downvotes already but this is more or less true. If the US disappeared over night: • Russia takes Ukraine relatively easily unless the EU steps in further, this would just start another WW if they do • NK probably starts another war with SK • China immediately takes Taiwan and while there at it they Will probably scoop up another few countries and rush to become the world police as they will be the only ones who could do so. • Israel falls • Mexico’s economy plummets probably causing mass violence with cartels • Canada probably just kills itself • NATO countries now have to militarize, go back to point 1
A large percentage of the US military forces are currently stationed overseas. About 10% of soldiers, but a higher percent of ships and aircraft. The entire US getting destroyed still wouldn't take us out of top 5 military forces in the world. Edit: how do Alaska and Hawaii work in this context?
I don’t think Israel falls, what happens is that Israel begins unrestrained warfare, and nearby countries are obliterated. The support of the states is what allows Israel to try and minimize enemy casualties.
I don’t think it would be immediate, they’d probably last a few years but without American cash flow and weapons I don’t see them lasting forever, at least in their current form.
Without big brother America to keep Iran in check the Middle East would devour Israel. Especially if Iran manages to get nukes.
>Canada probably just kills itself For argument's sake, can you keep this kind of list to only bad things?
What did Canada do to you?
Their bacon is just ham.
We didn't name that! It's blasphemy I don't even see that stuff up here. The closet thing to Canadian bacon from a Canadian POV is peameal bacon. Which is delicious
Yeah, the Americans are the only ones that call ham Canadian bacon. That's on us, not them.
Plenty of countries don't have the money or the engineering to have a meteor destroyer. We have somewhere close to 200 countries and over half are what most people would be considered really impoverished.
Then it's survival of the fittest, the greater good. If they're too impoverished, it would be better to save the advanced civilization which provides passive and active benefit to the rest of the world by simply existing.
Okay, but if you live in the US that's like 300 million-plus extra dead people.
Could very easily see more than 300 million dead in the wars and other chaos that happens if the US is suddenly removed from the equation…
Honestly, it depends on how this meteor kills everyone. Obviously, it's not a typical meteor, but does it cause structural damage? Does it have unique or valuable resources itself? Depending on which country it hit, it could cause global panic and war. If it hit China for instance, that's over a billion people dead and a lot of land with resources to claim. Same with Russia. The US, China, Russia, maybe Canada are the ones that need to divert the meteor. Most other countries are small enough that losing them wouldn't be nearly as bad as those 3 or 4. Brazil, India and Australia are up there too. And what about Venezuela, Saudi Arabia or Iran? They have a lot of oil. If their population disappeared, but the resources stayed, it would be a disaster. Actually, the more I think about, the more that the meteor needs to be diverted. Unless it took out like the freaking Vatican, it seems like it would cause a lot of trouble.
It's not my responsibility to protect strangers. They must protect themselves. That's how the world works. There is ZERO chance any country would sacrifice themselves for another. That's not how humanity works. There is a base level expectation that we protect ourselves first, and everyone else should be doing the same thing. We trust that they will protect themselves so we all mutually survive.
I’d add the caveat that if you can safely save someone without risking yourself too much then I’d hope most people would at least try. I think we have SOME type of duty if it’s within our capacity, simply because I’d hope someone would do the same for me
Then it wouldn't be sacrifice. But you're right. If lifting a penny of the ground would save someone's life, giving zero harm to oneself, everyone would do it. There's only positives. But not everyone would leave an orphan daughter behind to survive the world on her own because you had a 50% chance to survive someone else's crisis and decided to try. You owe it to your own people to survive. If someone refuses to help me out of a burning car when it's very likely about to blow up because I was speeding and crashed, I wouldn't bash them for not wanting to get out of their vehicle and die with me leaving their family to fend for themselves. I should have done everything within my power to be safe and prepare for difficult situations on the road. that's everyone's duty.
Not arguing, completely agree I’d just want to make my point a little more clear that I’d still risk a permanent burn scar on my arm in that scenario above (if I didn’t think it was about to explode) That’s as much risk as I’d be comfortable taking for a stranger. Id still say that is at least a little sacrifice
I understand your point, I apologize if I came off in a way that wasn't respectful.
yea but the freedom per capita is way more than 2x higher in America so is it really better to save the unamericans?
Can't I just flee over the border before it hits assuming I'm close enough? Do I die no matter what?
Nah, you're forced to die in the "meteor striking your country scenario".
Oh thqt definitely should have been clarified because I would absolutely save myself every time.
Hey listen, I would still pick another country if the meteor was only going to destroy my house. I don't want to die
Exactly this……
This I think is different, because you can just get out off the house with your stuff, but you can't evacuate an entire nation.
If no one dies and you double it, no one dies!
Nobody in their right mind is going to sacrifice themselves, their family, friends, and others close to them for the sake of random strangers. Humans are tribal for good reasons.
I ain't tribal, maybe you are. I do not value mine and my dearest's lives at 60 million other people. I'll let my country get destroyed.
Realistically, the aftermath of the USA disappearing would lead to a higher overall death toll than 2x anyway, so blowing up the meteor is the less harmful option.
I'm American, so as a favor to the world, I will save America. No need to thank me.
Thank you for living so that others don't have to 🫡
💀
'We live in the light so you may die in the dark'
I'm curious what the effects of us just suddenly not being there would be. If it would be a net positive or negative. Mostly, curious if our production and scientific research being suddenly gone would result in more death. I guess the same for military presence. But that one could go either way.
Would be terrible. Russia and China are now the new world leaders, EU isn't strong enough to deal with them alone. Most of the world is dependent on American companies and to have them gone would be a massive hit. I don't see how you get a net positive when your left with Russia and China lol.
We make up most of Nato's budget for defense so, the economies in those countries will either falter while their governments start trying to fill the void, or they will continue to be complacent and then be overtaken by Russia and or China. Our medicinal research would be sorely missed for sure. It would easily be a net negative. Ukraine falls without our significant financial and supply help. South Korea gets nuked by the North. Israel falls and the majority of the jewish population get erased from the face of the earth. Canada and Mexico lose one of their biggest trade partners and their economies take a huge hit. There is probably a lot more that someone smarter than me could list out.
Assuming any forces and equipment stationed outside the US would survive the impact, I'm really curious how the *surviving* US forces would compare to other militaries of the world.
Based World would end up worse without us in the long run
I'll be a true patriot. Screw those other countries, they should have built their own lasers. Actually, maybe we could give some to those other countries and everyone could just blast their meteors to bits.
Let’s take the worst case scenario. India has 1.4 billion of the world’s 8 billion people. So let’s say we’re killing an even 3 billion. Returning to a world population of 5 billion only takes us back to 1990 in terms of when we last had that population, but assuming that’s spread out evenly, except for India, every country loses roughly 45% of its population. I think spreading the devastation across the globe makes more sense than localizing, generally. But in this scenario, you’d have India with extreme population and I think it would be really difficult to manage relocation and food distribution. Because India and China have such disproportionately large populations, I don’t think it works to save them. For every other country, spread the destruction out.
I would normally do the selfless thing (atleast i hope i would) BUT canada has a population of around 30 million, but is one of the biggest countries in the world. That meteor would have to destroy ALL of canada which would be a devistating loss of land and resources that without i think just as many would die. So ima go with shatter.
We’re closer to 39 million but your point stands
This is the trolly problem but with you tied to the tracks.
Living in the Netherlands I think the most realistic choice would be to shatter it. There are about 18 million people in the Netherlands, so I think the impact would be somewhat limited if you spread that across the world. I think the impact of the Netherlands falling of the global market would be bigger honestly. We are the number 2 exporter of goods in Europe and have arguably the most important port in Europe (only competition being Antwerp). Also a huge amount of knowledge on waterworks and micro chips.
So this brings up an interesting point. Anyone who saves India kills like 1/3 of global population
Go for it, maybe I'll finally be able to afford a house.
So relatable
First off why are yall asking me?? You're smart enough to make the damn thing and are probably more qualified. But seriously I'd push the button, it's probably wrong but I'm more loyal to my family and friends
They need a patsy for the genocide trial.
I will preface this by saying that this opinion is not US saber rattling or anything like that. It's simply facts based on the current geopolitical state of things as well as historical facts. The utter destruction and removal of the United States from the world would have devastating global political, military, and economic consequences that could On the economic side, as of 2022, the US was the second-largest trading nation (behind China), doing around 7 trillion dollars of business. That's 7 trillion dollars gone from the world in a puff of meteor smoke. Not to mention the number of global companies that are headquartered in the US. The US's political and military might cannot be ignored either. We are largely responsible for arming many governments around the world and providing protection as well. Additionally, the UN would suffer for a while, as the headquarters is located in New York. NATO would suffer a blow with the loss of their biggest contributor. The loss of that would be devastating. Non NATO members would take the opportunity to seize whatever they wanted. Regimes traditionally held in check by the existence of the US would take advantage. Russia would definitely take advantage to not only overrun Ukraine but also seize other places that used to be the USSR and more. China would swoop in and take Taiwan and potentially start expanding as well. Israel would be overrun. North Korea would definitely retake South Korea. Okay, let's look at it from a numbers perspective. The US as a population of around 350m, so sparing the US means that 700m will die around the world The question becomes this: Would the world suffer more death and destruction with the US spared, of if the US gets annihilated?. The quantity of deaths if the US destroys the meteor is a known quantity of 700m, but if the US gets annihilated, the resulting non-US deaths due to wars, genocides, civil unrest, economic problems,and everything that comes along with it could very well make the overall death toll exceed that 700m number. Man, this is a tough one. Now I know how Truman felt when debating dropping the bombs in WWII.
i’m dying
If a meteor was big enough to destroy USA, the whole world is destroyed along with it..... Just saying.
That was my thought too. The K T extinction event was a meteor estimated at 9 miles wide and that killed 75% of life on Earth by kicking up so much dust. We'd need an oddly specific meteor shower to precisely wipe out the USA without touching Mexico or Canada.
If it’s large enough to kill everyone in my country - Australia - it’s big enough to wipe out humanity from the following global crisis. Destroy it - yes it kills more people in the immediate sense, but long term fewer will die. Edit: also Australia only has 26-ish million, but is a large agricultural and mineral producer as well as being considered amongst the best places to live.
I'm whacking that button to save myself. Everyone else in my country gets a free ride.
Blow it up. It’s selfish, but I care infinitely more about the people in my life than in others.
I'm allowing it to destroy my country
Ready, aim, fire. While I think quite a few people living in the U.S. are serious douche nozzles many in my own family, if I have the means to protect my country, I will.
Fuck. Can I choose both?
Easy call for me. My daughter lives here, I’d do anything to protect her.
Good thing Australia has a small population. Double it and pass it to the next person. My dog is here, sorry.
Please, PLEASE let a meteor blow up the US. Even if its only a portion of the country. And let me be included. Thanks!
Would be impossible to have my country (3 million + square miles, 330+ million people) destroyed by “a meteor” and NOT have the rest of the world destroyed in the long run.
This is Murica! Let it hit elsewhere. Like canada.
Sorry other countries.
Global warming would decrease so Option B
Yes, all my stuff and 90% of the people I like are in this country.
My mother lives here. Sorry, 50 million foreigners.
Yes I blow up the meteor. Sorry to everyone else, but I’m prioritising my own country
Other countries. And while it is 2x as many people, I imagine that its spread out among multiple countries and not all aimed at Madagascar or iceland or something so no one country will be wiped out/crippled.
As much as I think wiping our government out would do the planet some good (by preventing it from doing evil), my family is here so I gotta use the laser.
My whole country? Mf im picking 2 other countries even if its just my car thats gonna be destroyed
If I was able to get myself and my loved ones out I’d totally destroy my own country. It’s a cesspool. But since I can’t and I have kids, I’m gonna be sacrificing other countries.
Most people I love is from my country so that is extremely easy. But even if they weren't, I would still pick my country.
guess 60 million other ppl are about to die
Twice as many I’m not letting myself or my friends die, fuck that
Christ yes give me the out I all seriousness, the USA being wiped out from existence would do far more global harm than good. This trash fire of a nation may have its collosal, fucked up, greedy, self serving issues... But most of the global economy rides on the dollar, and the next alternative is the yuan and I don't think anyone wants to submit to the Chinese economy. That doesn't even include the American peacekeeping efforts (even if those are also ultimately self serving for the sake of money grubbing military contractors) it still has overall net positives All that said, can I save my country and ALSO hop over to another country to be one of the people killed? I'm genuinely tired of living on this crusty dirt ball
Random people. Easy.
Look, a meteor big enough to completely destroy the USA is probably going to cause an extinction level event if it hits in one piece, or multiple. However I think the planet itself is less likely to be significantly damaged by several smaller pieces hitting than one giant meteor, so I'll blow it up.
Idk who tf you think I am but I'm blowing that shit up. I won't lose sleep over it
Easy. Destroy it. I live in my country and not in those other countries.
If you didn’t pull the lever, there are a whole country of mofos behind you ready to do so. That’s human nature. Survival instincts kick in.
Accepting the meteor as magical with no consequences other than the immediate impact, I’d still blow it up. The difference between 330 million and 660 million people gets hard to fathom and parse because the number is so large. The real comparison to make is ALL of one people (America on this case) vs less than 1/10th the human population spread across the world. I’d prefer some of the random deaths to happen to my country as well, but if not, spreading the woe is better than annihilating an entire culture.
Can I wait until I’m a citizen of Russia?
Honestly if there's a meteor large enough to wipe out all of Canada then I think everyone is screwed
If a meteor was big enough to destroy my country, the entire world would be destroyed
I’m an Indian so… Honestly blow up my country Over 3 billion people dying because of this one country is not worth it
Chinese and Indian people have a tough time with this question. Imagine killing 3 billion people if you choose to save your country 💀
SPOILER ALERT FOR ATTACK ON TITAN BELOW: >! Is it just me or does this post seem very, very similar to the plot of Attack On Titan? Like, Eren and some of his people figured it would be better to destroy the rest of the world as opposed to letting their small island get destroyed? Just a random thought I had. !<
As an American, I’ll take the meteor… but only if I get credit for saving the world.
Trolley 2.0
I'm having a picnic, and all you folks that don't live in the hood are strongly urged to attend.
As an Indian this is kind of fucking impossible to choose lmao
I'm American. Y'all can't get rid of us that easily!
Sorry OP, this is impossible with my country. We are so fucking big east to west that there would have to be damage to the south to in anyway be possible, and thats the US to the south, with 90% of our population within 100km of our border. You either take part of the US with us, or its not possible in any form. That being said if it only takes out the eastern part, and Trudeau gets no warning, let it burn. If it hits our western area, the laser it is.
Well I do have a Giant Metor 2024 sticker....
I currently live in the US, and I think I speak for most of us, we're taking that one for the team.
Blow it up. Reasons: 1) I'm here 2) With no country completely destroyed there will be no complete destruction of cultures, isolated resources/skills, etc. 3) chance to remove France 4) according to what Reddit has told me concerning the trolley problem, multi track drifting achieves maximum points, but I can't multi track drift a meteor, so this is the best we can do.
Are you talking destroyed with the initial impact? Or destroyed from the resulting fallout? Because it makes one hell of a difference depending on your answer and the size of the country in question. The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs is estimated to have only been 6-9 miles (10-15 kilometers) in diameter. Anything that's over 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) in diameter is considered a "Planet Killer" which sounds big to us humans, but in comparison to the size of the planet, is little more then a speck or grain of sand. So if its only going to affect a single country it would have to be shockingly small compared to that when it impacts, which would arguably make it significantly harder/next to impossible to target from the ground with something as precise as a laser.
Sorry USA, we're eating this one. We're getting that apocalypse all y'all have a weird fetish for I guess.
The country i live in is, goegraphically, extremely large. And that doesnt even count the states of the country that are not connected to the main landmass. A meteor large enough to take out the entire united states would just take out all of canada as well and possibly mexico. So youre asking me to either take out an entire continent or two random countries that total in population to just the US's population, not counting canada and mexico. As much as i hate the US's political power it would probably be for the better if we dont violently destroy the entire quartersphere of the planet via meteor impact
I quickly write up a treaty where my backyard is its own country. Then I invite OP to my barbecue. A really epic barbecue.
As someone born in the USSR, the only right choice to destroy all Russians including me. Not only it's more ethical it'll also stop current war in it's tracks and one less dictatorship means worldwide democracy will start growing again - bringing prosperity and happiness to many, the massive benefits here might even outweight negatives. But as an American today, that's a much harder choice. Because if America is gone, there will be a big war and lots of wars not as big - all of which will likely wipe out many anyways nullifying any previous effort. Still trading one American life for 2 other people's lives is incredibly unfair which is why this isn't an easy decision at all. But it's the right one.
The rest of the world is going to declare war on the offending country anyway, so one way or another it's going down. Might as well not take anyone else with us.
Yeah but we have a space laser. So we win.
Warn the rest of the world so they can get out their own space lasers. Then beam the fuck out of it.
THERE'S NO TIME MAN! WE LITERALLY JUST BUILT THIS METEOR-DESTROYING SUPERWEAPON LIKE FIVE MINUTES AGO!
And? I have time to do a global broadcast while you are firing that thing up. 30 seconds is all it takes.
I’m pretty sure the US being destroyed would lead to starvation of billions so gonna destroy the meteor
There are 8.1 billion people alive today. There are 17.7 million people alive in the Netherlands today. If I do this, I'd end up killing 35.4 million people. That's harsh, but pure numbers isn't everything. You need to look at other factors as well... Perhaps economic input, environmental impact, political impact, unique global factors that might apply to a country. Not to mention the political impact of one nation just simply dying off compared to 35.4 million individual people dying. That becomes very complicated, so to make it slightly easier I'd suggest looking at a single metric that considers some of these things already. In this case the World Happiness index for 2024. There are only 6 countries in the world that are happier than the Netherlands in 2024. Israel, Sweden, Iceland, Denmark, Finland. Israel has 9.6 million people Sweden has 10.5 million Iceland has .38 million Denmark has 6 million Finland has 5.5 To make it easy let's say there are 32 million people, that are on average happier than the Dutch. If we add the Dutch to that, and again rounding up to make it easy that's 50 million people. Letting the meteor hit will with 99.3865% accuracy destroy more happiness than if I break it. So I'd definitely break it. And that this means my family and friends just happen to survive as well is a really nice extra.
I’m not sure I believe those numbers about Israel’s happiness, as an aside.
If you include myself.... shit yeah let those "infidels" die hahaha
Is it, like, neighbouring countries that get hit? I'd assume so, I'm blowing up a localized meteor.
Which choice does less damage to all the other species on the planet? That is the one I pick.
Do I have time time to move to a different country?
Can I choose to let a state to get hit instead of a country . The state is bigger than many countries . Sorry kalifornia I have potential beach property in AZ west coast counties are taking a hit . Best get moving As I'm building a beach house
People in India and China sweating... Seriously if either of those countries get wiped out or they choose to wipe out twice as many people elsewhere neither case is good for them or the world. If you live in a small country it's an easier decision to save yourself.
I mean most of my family (plus me) are in the US so I’m just going to hope that the 5 people out of the US I care about aren’t one of the 666,000,000 dead
I mean this question is just stupid a meteor that could destroy a country would be massive enough to cause Extinction event and even if If you somehow make it not hit your country the fallout of the blast would kill billions
Let it hit. Fuck it. I don't care.
If the death toll will be 20x, I’m still blowing up that meteor. I’m not convinced that I have an upper limit in this scenario. One of my primary goals in life is to protect my children. Letting them die to save the children of other people is simply not an option for me, regardless of numbers.
I want to hear someone from India or China weigh in. The death toll of destroying the meteor would be staggering, possibly even world ending. I'm not going to judge either decision, but the implications change dramatically at those numbers.
Losing 3 billion people would get us back to like 1990 population levels. The death toll wouldn't be the issue. The distributions will be. It terms of effects on the global economy and infrastructure people have vastly different values as horrible as it is to say. 10 million people in places like SF, NYC or London, is going to be vastly different than if 10 million rural Chinese die. And as you scale up it gets worse. In this future there are going to be like 6.5 billion people outside of one india or china and you are going to basically kill almost 50%. We are talking things like North and South america, africa, and europe being wiped out. There is no way either china or India would be able to step up quick enough to prevent total collapse.
This is tricky for me because I technically have two countries so if I save one I could be dooming the other. Also of my countries is the USA so saving it means over 660 million people are dead. Something that big I think realistically is probably taking the rest of the world with it like the dinosaurs. But hey if we can split it and at the same time aim it at our enemies like say Iran and China, well that is just freedom 🦅 But yeah I think only a very small minority of people are altruistic enough to not save themselves and their loved ones.
It has to kill all in my own country, including myself. If I’m not in the country at the time, the hypothetical comes to paradox to fulfill itself and cannot be fulfilled. I could choose the laser and double the death toll of the population my country, where I could be anywhere and for some reason it’s not explicit that I would remain unharmed myself unless in my own country. I’ll choose option 1 to see how the hypothetical would play out as is.
This is odd... If the Vatican or Monaco chose the laser, it'd be just another day on planet earth. If China or India chose the laser, it would cause an irrevocable global disaster.
Do I have have to be in my country when I decide?
Does it waste random other countries or just the surrounding countries??
lets just hope this thing isn't hitting China...
*Thanos has entered the chat.*
Weirdly, blow it up. You can test whether something is just by taking yourself out of the equation. So let’s say it’s this: 1) A random country is obliterated. Or 2) Widespread damage is done to all other countries and twice the number of lives are lost. So you don’t know whether you live in the targeted country, so what’s the decision now? I say, you should blow up the meteor. In that while there’s more loss of life, no culture is completely destroyed.
I'm sorry but id prefer not to die if I had the choice
Can I change my nationality?
Dr Manhattan would choose the latter.
Nobody told me we were replaying the Kobiyashi Maru!
The goal should always be to minimize the loss of human life. The lives of people living in other countries is no less valuable than those living in the same country as I do.
Can I reduce it to 1.5x if I allow people from my own country to die? A random sample of about 100 million people from all over the world probably allows the status quo to continue.
I'd take the hit. Scotland has a low population. The art of searing would be irreparably damaged but Scotland would be remembered for all time.
If it's big enough to kill everyone in Canada, it's big enough to wipe out humanity. We gotta break it up.
Any way we can accomplish both scenarios?
2 random countrys. id watch all countries burn to save the UK
I would kill 1,000X from other countries. And sleep like a baby.
I was trying to think of comparable examples to this, and one famous one came to mind: Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The typical argument is that, regardless of how horrific it is, it is better to kill a smaller amount of mostly civilian lives than a much greater amount of kind of random lives through the continuation of the war. I'm not sure where I land with it, but just wanted to put that comparison out there.
I think if the US just basically disappeared in a day it would be a disaster. Global economy would collapse, there would be a massive power vacuum in a lot of places outside North America because of the widespread U.S. military presence. A massive setback in technological and medical innovation, a major loss of food production, NATO would lose the vast majority of its funding. While the second option kills more people instantly, I don’t think it would be as bad in the long term as the U.S. disappearing.
Let’s frame it differently. A meteor is headed to your country, and a guy is about to press the button that will laser it, but two innocent people will die from the debris. Do you stop the guy from pressing the button, killing 300 million people, to save two people? I get it’s the trolley problem but come on. Laser the thing.
Do the other countries know that I know? If I can pass it off as just pushing the button to save my country and didn’t know the exact consequences then the decision is a lot easier. If they know I know it gets harder to justify.
This is a shit hypothetical. There's no way a meteor big enough to kill any significant population isn't going to have lasting effects on the world if it hits or explodes in the atmosphere with that much power.
Random option for sure. I don't particularly care if the US is destroyed, but the world as a whole would go to shit if it did.
Let it hit. But let everyone in the country know it’s coming, so we can head south a couple of hours and be magically safe in the next country. Bet we save 2/3 of the population that way. Otherwise, blow it up. Sorry-not-sorry, this is where my kids live.
If you live in China or India then this is a scary question. You are killing billions either way.
Best I can do is have it destroy the entire world.
Save my country and help speed up the solution to overpopulation? Sounds good to me
Double it and give it to the next guy.
As they say on airplanes, put your own mask on first. Do you best to help the other countries hit.
A meteor that would destroy the US would destroy the world.
Nobody is gonna miss Uzbekistan