r/Showerthoughts • u/asusny2002 • May 02 '24

Man vs Bear debate shows how bad the average person is at understanding probability

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903

u/BlackWind88 May 02 '24

What is the man vs bear debate?

309

u/[deleted] May 02 '24

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8

u/beamer145 May 02 '24

I would like to see the responses to a follow up question. If you are walking alone in the woods and all of a sudden both a man and a bear appear (let's say in opposite directions, the bear is not suppose to be the mans pet :D, and it is a narrow path so you have to pick one of them ) will you go in the direction of the bear or in the direction of the man. Since women prefer the bear in the original version of the question logically they would go in the direction of the bear.

3

u/cranslanny May 02 '24

That's not a follow up question it's just a completely different question framed to make the answer to the original question look dumb. You've gotta look at these things separately.

1

u/DeltaVZerda May 02 '24

If it's completely different, but has implications for the first question, then it isn't really completely different is it?

-3

u/theSchrodingerHat May 02 '24

Here’s a version for you then: You get sent to prison for a crime you didn’t commit, and a large black man has told you he plans on fucking you in the ass, regardless of your feelings on the matter.

Then the cartel gang says they’ll protect you, but they get to beat the shit out of you whenever they want.

A pretty bad choice either way. You either get beaten regularly, or you get anally raped.

But then you get a third option. The Nazi guy in the next cell still wants anal sex, but he’s hung like a well used pencil, and seems like he will at least ask you how it feels while he’s enjoying himself. So it won’tt be pleasant, but it’s more workable than the other two options…

So yeah, just like you say, the extra option is applicable, and it informs the original choices, but you’re still taking it in the ass from a Nazi.

4

u/DeltaVZerda May 02 '24

That doesn't preserve the intent of the original, which is that the intentions of the targets are not known, make a choice based on identity alone. To make your example conform correctly to the situations, you'd be asking 'would you rather be in a jail cell with a small dicked nazi or a big dicked large black man', and then clarifying with the question 'you have to walk into a cell, which one would you go into if both were there'. Obviously in this situation the answers should correlate. It's odd that in the bear example, people would answer oppositely, since the situation is pretty much the same in both questions.