What would you do?

[Charliere]

I didn't expect my last post to get responses, so I'm thinking of making this like a mini series if you guys are interested

I love having conversations with people that actually make you think, so I propose this little philosophical thought experiment

If you're familiar with psychology you may know about the "prisoners dilemma". It basically goes as follows:

"Gary and Steve have been arrested for robbing a bank and have been placed in separate cells. Both care much more about their own freedom than about the well being of their accomplice. A prosecutor makes the following offer to each. “You may choose to plead guilty or remain silent. If you plead guilty and your accomplice remains silent, you will go free and I will use your testimony to ensure that your accomplice does serious time (5 years). Likewise, if your accomplice pleads guilty while you remain silent, they will go free while you serve the time (five years). If you both plead guilty, I get two convictions, but you'll have a lesser sentence (2 years). If you both remain silent, you'll both only be serving one year. You need to give me your answer by tomorrow."

So, if you were in this situation, what would you do? Would you plead guilty, while risking taking the higher sentence? Or would you remain silent to try to get the chance of serving the smaller sentence?

 

I'll give my response from a more realistic perspective after a few people have replied

[roux]

The Game Theory would suggest that to optimize everyone's benefits, we'd both have to predict that the other prisoner is thinking about us and not simply about ourselves. Meaning that to achieve the optimal situation, I'd have to shut the fuck up, hoping that my friend won't talk.

 

This dilemma is great in explaining philosophy and economy. At the same time, nobody knows what they'll pick if it had to happen to them, which is why neo-classical approaches conclude that the average rational person would be snitching on their accomplice. I'd personally risk silence.

[Venom™]

Can I use my get out of jail free card?

 

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Jokes aside I would stay silent.

[Nate S]

Him em with the k everytiume the judge asked a question, plead insanity if my partner snitches, come out of the physch ward a "new man".

[tana]

i feel like id stay silent but i hope im never in that situation

[Here comes dat chin]

I'd sell out my friend lol. Unless we agreed to silence before hand, I don't expect him to keep quiet, so it's in my best interest to snitch.

[Cept For Her]

I honestly would keep quiet because I dont really care what happens to me, so long as my friends and the people I care about get to enjoy their lives and live them happily and to their fullest potential. Me snitching on them would go against that, and would probably just make them angry with me (which is annoying when people dont get mad at me when i do dumb shit). I just tend to care about people and I want to make everybody as happy as they can be even if I dont get to be happy, so I think silence is the best choice for me with the prisoners dilemma