(a) A dusk speck hits you with probability one,
(b) You face an additional probability 1/( 3^^^3) of being tortured for 50 years,
(c) You must blink your eyes for a fraction of a second, just long enough to prevent a dusk speck from hitting you in the eye.
Most people would pick (c) over (a). Yet, 1/( 3^^^3) is such a small number that by blinking your eyes one more time than you normally would you increase your chances of being captured by a sadist and tortured for 50 years by more than 1/( 3^^^3). Thus, (b) must be better than (c). Consequently, most people should prefer (b) to (a).
You don’t even have to go that far. Replace “dust specks” with “the inconvenience of not going outside the house” and “tiny chance of torture” with “tiny chance that being outside the house will lead to you getting killed”.
Torture,
Consider three possibilities:
(a) A dusk speck hits you with probability one, (b) You face an additional probability 1/( 3^^^3) of being tortured for 50 years, (c) You must blink your eyes for a fraction of a second, just long enough to prevent a dusk speck from hitting you in the eye.
Most people would pick (c) over (a). Yet, 1/( 3^^^3) is such a small number that by blinking your eyes one more time than you normally would you increase your chances of being captured by a sadist and tortured for 50 years by more than 1/( 3^^^3). Thus, (b) must be better than (c). Consequently, most people should prefer (b) to (a).
You know, that actually persuaded me to override my intuitions and pick torture over dust specks.
You don’t even have to go that far. Replace “dust specks” with “the inconvenience of not going outside the house” and “tiny chance of torture” with “tiny chance that being outside the house will lead to you getting killed”.
Yeah, I understood the point.