- Joined
- Oct 30, 2012
- Location
- UK
Anybody got an opinion on this one? The way it works is that an alien being comes to Earth and shows amazing predictive abilities. He starts with sports, graduates to stock market stocks, then day-trading. In all he makes a hell of a lot of Earth money.
Before he leaves he decides to play a game with all the money he's earned. some people will be randomly selected and have the chance to select from 2 boxes; Box A is clear and clearly contains £1000, box B is opaque.
You can either take Box B only or Box A and Box B. If the predictor predicts that you will take Box B only the predictor will place £1,000,000 in box B otherwise he will leave it empty. You're the 20th person he's made the offer to and he's correctly guessed all 19 of the others, some taking both and some taking just box B.
What do you do? In one sense the decision has already been made, the money is already there or it isn't. A+B is guaranteed to be £1000 more than just B, simple mathematics. On the other hand an outside observer looking at you taking just box B will think there's an overwhelming chance that box B contains £1,000,000 and if you take both they will think there's a greater chance that there's nothing, which is perfectly reasonable analysis from the outside.
For whatever reason, you are certain there is no cheating going on. The box in front of you GENUINELY contains a million or nothing and cannot now be changed by sleight of hand or any other trickery.
I'm definitely a 2-boxer. I can see the 1-boxer view but I reject it. At the time you are opening the boxes it has already happened, you'd like there to be a million in box B but that decision is not yours. All you can choose is either B or B+1000 where B is a fixed but unknown as of yet number.
Before he leaves he decides to play a game with all the money he's earned. some people will be randomly selected and have the chance to select from 2 boxes; Box A is clear and clearly contains £1000, box B is opaque.
You can either take Box B only or Box A and Box B. If the predictor predicts that you will take Box B only the predictor will place £1,000,000 in box B otherwise he will leave it empty. You're the 20th person he's made the offer to and he's correctly guessed all 19 of the others, some taking both and some taking just box B.
What do you do? In one sense the decision has already been made, the money is already there or it isn't. A+B is guaranteed to be £1000 more than just B, simple mathematics. On the other hand an outside observer looking at you taking just box B will think there's an overwhelming chance that box B contains £1,000,000 and if you take both they will think there's a greater chance that there's nothing, which is perfectly reasonable analysis from the outside.
For whatever reason, you are certain there is no cheating going on. The box in front of you GENUINELY contains a million or nothing and cannot now be changed by sleight of hand or any other trickery.
I'm definitely a 2-boxer. I can see the 1-boxer view but I reject it. At the time you are opening the boxes it has already happened, you'd like there to be a million in box B but that decision is not yours. All you can choose is either B or B+1000 where B is a fixed but unknown as of yet number.
Last edited:
