The Morality Machine Experiment!

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A thought experiment.

You heard of the Milgram experiment? Well, this is something like that. Imagine you're taken into the laboratory of a mad but very wealthy scientist. She wants to run a social science study. She sits you down in front of a chair, where she has an innocent victim strapped down to a mess of electrodes. She gives you a device with a button to push. If you push the button, two things happen. First, the victim (you don't know him, but he kinda reminds you of a nice guy you went to school with) dies a horribly painful death right in front of you (it takes, like, 30 minutes). Secondly, an ATM slot opens up and gives you US$10. You can of course instead press the "no" button, in which case nothing happens. Except that a counter displaying your reward for pushing the murder button goes up a significant figure -- and now you get another round of playing the game. This time, the figure is US$100. Every time you decline the offer likewise increases, to a maximum of US$1,000,000,000. (The mad scientist will help you convert this amount into your local currency or an untraceable offshore account or whatever suits your needs. She's very friendly and helpful that way.)

The victim, of course, is going to beg and plead and please don't do this to me for God's sake!! ! Remind you that he is a human being with a family. His mother needs him. Tell you about the wonderful girl he's in love with. Feebly grip your arm. The mad scientist promises you (you somehow know she's always telling the truth) that if you refuse to take the offer for any amount of $$$$$$$ the victim will be released with no harm done. You'll also lose your only chance at the money. Also you know (let's assume) that's there's absolutely zero chance you will be caught or held accountable in any way for this. So if you kill the victim, he'll scream in agony and you'll have to watch the whole thing without turning away. But no one except you will ever ever know.

Let's assume a few other stipulations. Any money you get has to be spent on you. Meaning your personal goals and lifestyle. You can afford that university degree, start a business, travel the world, migrate to a better place, get a sweet apartment in the city of your choice, get any clothes/food/medical care/drugs/toys/wild sex parties you ever wanted. But you can't spend it to help people, or give to charity, or save refugees, or mitigate climate change. Yes, there's an impossible grey fuzzy line here (does pursuing the partner of your dreams and making him/her happy count as selfishness or altruism? IDK) but the mad scientist's point is she doesn't want you to take the money for utilitarian reasons that taking one life will give you enough money to save many others. The idea here is how much it will take to get you to watch someone die purely for your selfish benefit. She cheerfully reminds you that they did a study which said 1 in 14 Americans admitted they'd murder someone for US$3,000,000. But you don't have to be like that if you don't want to.

Oh, and you can't kill the scientist, rescue the victim, report the evil laboratory to the authorities, or just steal the money. Our social scientist approves in principle of trying to take a third option but in this case she's covered the bases to make sure you face the question. So, here's the button. Cash dispenser in the front drops the bills directly into your lap.

Please select how much has to be offered before you decide to push the button. This poll is completely anonymous and no one will ever judge you for your feelings. One vote each. (the mad scientist would appreciate if you refrain from voting if you don't think you're on the autism spectrum)

I would take the money, then not do the evil deed.

I'd like to change mine from $10 million to $1 billion please.

When you add so many artificial assumptions the experiment becomes utterly irrelevant, as it has no real world equivalence...

The assumptions also contradict each other: If you can have the money deposited into an untraceable offshore acoount, how is the mad scientist going to prevent you from spending it to help people, hmm?

... it is completely free to answer in any way one likes, because one will never be confronted with a real world situation even remotely resembling this experiment...

As such, I will proudly proclaim that I will push the button for $ 434,609,925, but not for one cent less (or more)... I could be lying through my teeth, of course, but how would anyone know???

As tempting as the money would be I simply couldn't live with myself afterwards if I killed someone for financial gain. No amount of money or riches would ease my emotional torment.

lol that would be suicide. do you know how much a billion dollars weighs?

if there were an alternate reality where it's actually possible to kill people with no chance of consequences and absolute and realistic certainty of not getting caught and not having to worry about retaliation ever, then why even bother with any morality? morality doesn't exist without fear of consequences. it's that simple. and if you still fear consequences, then, more than anything else, what you would be selling is your peace of mind (or "your eternal soul", if you believe in god and such). you can't dissociate morality from fear

without fear of afterlife consequences, the question simply makes no sense

No amount of money could get me to push that button.

Also, money cannot buy the thing you would likely get for setting the dude free: a friend. And possibly the rarest kind, one you could trust from the bottom of your heart. It can't buy you a clear conscience either. (At least, I don't think it can. I don't think it can be surgically removed.)

Beat me to the thing about being crushed under a billion dollars.

Life is cheap for someone here. They'd do it for a thousand.

trollish answer, maybe? coz... seriously, if you're talking about something as dramatic as that, what's the difference between $0 and $1000?

anyway, i don't even understand what could possibly be the use of something like a billion dollars for an individual. without some kind of technology for supernatural longevity, two million dollars or a billion dollars have the exact same monetary value to me. both mean "not having to work ever again"

I'm not sure how honest (with themselves) people will be when answering this, keep in mind OdysseusNemo, that everybody is fully aware they're not actually going to see a penny. Also, how many of the Milgram experiment participants would have guessed before going in what they'll end up doing? It's quite common to react in a very different way that you thought you would, particularly when it comes to extreme situations.

As for myself, I have all the money I need, so to even consider your proposition you'd have to offer something more valuable.

rip nts never cared about me, ill enjoy the money and live off the interest

This, and we all believe our selfs to be (and want others to perceive us to be a million times more than) the perfect version of ourselves.

You won't get many real answers from this experiment.

I don't think I could do it for any amount. Even if it was only out of truculent spite at the rich, mad scientist for having cast such aspersions on my character. what could I do with that money anyway? I'd only spend it on a bunch of stuff. I already have a bunch of stuff.

I hope I'll never have to find out.

I am much too selfish to push that button.

I can live with a lack of money but I can't live with murder. That is all.

The only way I would accept money to kill someone might be if my own life was immediately threatened. I still might not do it though. I might kill off someone who was soon to die of cancer for example, but only if my own life depended on it.

The hidden assumption in this thought experiment that the person debating already has enough food to live on and won't be killed or destroyed if he chooses to let the innocent human go free.

I don't think my conscious could take killing another person. If I was homeless I still don't think I would do it. But I can see why a person pushed to their limits might consider it.