#3 The false consensus experiment
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@Ebony Vetra
@Olivia Cuthburt
@Robin Lockett
@Lillian McMason
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━sta 06|eva 05| str 03| wis 08| arc 07| acc 06━━━━━━Prodigal Astronomy Learner━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━It was time for Day 3 of her experiment saga. She was really glad she remembered to bring a foldable table back with her after Easter, it was proving to be very valuable this week with how much she had to use it for these experiments.
Today's experiment would be conducted in the courtyard. Why? No particular reason besides the fact moving it around would make people more aware and give her a bigger sample size. Also cause it was funny but not the point. Today was a pleasant day which meant there was a higher chance of more people coming outdoors for whatever reason.
She set out the table and put out the materials. Today it consisted of a piece of parchment with instructions, smaller pieces with 2 questions on it and a couple of quills with ink. Along with that, there was also a box with a hole in it. This would be the easiest way to keep the answers completely annonymous.
The experiment today would be the false consensus experiment. It was to prove how many people thought that someone else would choose the same thing as them. In a nutshell it was to show how many people assumed others shared their opinions whether it be morally right or not.
On the parchment were the instructions. Write your answers to the questions and then drop the parchment into the box. Whether they wanted to write their name or not was up to them. The two questions on the parchment were simple ones. The first was asking which option they would pick while the other asked if they thought others would pick the same one.
The choices she gave her participants today was simple. There are two buttons, Blue and Red and there are 100 people. If less than 10 people pick the blue button, they get 1000 galleons while the other people lose their lives. However if everyone picks the red button, they don't get any money but they get to keep their lives. If more than 10 people pick the blue button, they lose their lives but the red button people live.
To her the experiment was simple. It asked if you would bet on everyone else picks the red button and pick blue to get the money or hope everyone picks red and you all live. Morally dark? Yes. But this was a hypothetical scenario after all. She needed it to test morals for this experiment to work. She left the table there and headed away. She would come after dinner and before curfew to grab everything.
OOC instructions
- All are welcome to perform in the experiment!
- To participate all you need to do is put one post mentioning you answered the questions and placed it in the box.
- For godmodding Fawkes: She's not in the area so dont!
- There's a two week deadline for this. After the two weeks are up i'll post a conclusion post based on the results of the experiment and update the experiment index.
- The link to the experiment index
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#3 The false consensus experiment
Date June 16, 2026
Time 16:10
Location Courtyard, Hogwarts
Tags @Fawkes Chaos
A typical Tuesday for Robin ended in his favorite class—Defense Against the Dark Arts—two of them taught consecutively, even. It was a generally pleasant afternoon, a bit of sunshine just enough to warm him like a blanket, but not enough to annoy his chill-loving self. It was also approaching the end of Robin's first year at Hogwarts, meaning also the end of a semester, indicating that a series of finals are around the corner. Usually the boy prefers to work indoors, but recent events boosted his mood.
On his way to find a tree to sit underneath, Robin noticed a table set alone in the courtyard. Nobody was sitting near it, the only clue given about the situation is a piece of parchment and its content.
As someone interested in academic research, the Ravenclaw almost immediately realized what this was about. Someone put out surveys for people to fill out, intended to collect some sort of result and answer their question about . . . something. In this case morality and consensus, maybe? After reading the questions once, Robin already had his answer in mind. He'd seen something similar to this, not exactly, but also of the "choose your own dilemma" variety.
The boy took out his own quill, set a piece of the smaller parchment aside, and leaned over the table to write on it.
Robin wants to live. His family is quite comfortable as of now, so there's no reason for him to risk his life to get a thousand galleons. Of course, picking red doesn't eliminate the risk, but if the participants can discuss beforehand, convincing everyone to pick their lives would be easier. From another angle, if the participants are all cooperative, rational individuals, then they could also agree to have nine people pick blue, get the galleons, then distribute them evenly afterwards. Of course, that would probably never happen, despite it being the most mutually beneficial choice.question 1: red
question 2: no
Robin believes that there's no way everyone would actually choose the same option as him. He also couldn't say that everyone else would pick blue. Whichever way you think of it from, the human mind is too unpredictable to measure.
After writing his answers and putting away his quill, the boy slipped the parchment into the box, then headed off to his original objective—the perfect reading tree.
Reduciohihi im finally here:) feel free to tell me if i answered in a wrong format or something (if there was a format i was supposed to follow)
#3 The false consensus experiment
Avis tilted her head, examining the folding table that had appeared in the middle of the courtyard. The thing basically screamed muggle - any self respecting wizard, in Avis' opinion, surely knew enough transfiguration to at least make a table. However, she had to respect the effort. Maybe the setter-upper didn't know much transfiguration yet, maybe they simply had bigger spells they were working on, or maybe it was a first year.
Either way, the folding table was interesting enough to pull Avis closer, and she bit her lip, in intense thought as she read the questions, ignoring any input from anyone else who may have been at the table. It was fascinating, really, but Avis thought the bigger question was not whether other people would do the same, but simply the first part of the first one. Potential for 1000 galleons, while risking the life of other people? Honestly, though, the answer seemed quite simply. The only way to get 1000 galleons was if at least 90 people died, and either way your life was risked, which made the question were 1000 galleons worth it?
Absolutely not. The level of guilt, in Avis' opinion, that was sure to follow her around for the rest of her life was by no means worth the 1000 galleons that could buy her what? 10 brooms? None of which she would use. The second question was a harder one. It was basically a test of the faith that you had in people, and though Avis had about zero. In a group of 100 people someone was surely selfish enough to pick galleons over lives, which was absolutely absurd.
Either way, the folding table was interesting enough to pull Avis closer, and she bit her lip, in intense thought as she read the questions, ignoring any input from anyone else who may have been at the table. It was fascinating, really, but Avis thought the bigger question was not whether other people would do the same, but simply the first part of the first one. Potential for 1000 galleons, while risking the life of other people? Honestly, though, the answer seemed quite simply. The only way to get 1000 galleons was if at least 90 people died, and either way your life was risked, which made the question were 1000 galleons worth it?
Absolutely not. The level of guilt, in Avis' opinion, that was sure to follow her around for the rest of her life was by no means worth the 1000 galleons that could buy her what? 10 brooms? None of which she would use. The second question was a harder one. It was basically a test of the faith that you had in people, and though Avis had about zero. In a group of 100 people someone was surely selfish enough to pick galleons over lives, which was absolutely absurd.
q1 - Red
q2 - for 90% of people, yes. Everyone? No.
Avis Marlong | ”She won't cry or beg for help...she'll isolate from the world and fight her own demons so that nobody can throw it in her face later.” |
"The odds of hitting your target increase dramatically when you aim at it." Benji Marecos |
#3 The false consensus experiment
Word count: 225
Interacting with: @Fawkes Chaos
While making my way through the courtyard, a small table caught my attention. There was no one standing beside it, only a set of instructions, a stack of parchment, and a small wooden box with a slot in the top.
Curious, I stepped closer and read through the scenario. It sounded simple enough at first, but the more I thought about it, the more difficult the choice became.
A thousand galleons was certainly a lot of money, but I couldn't imagine risking other people's lives just for a chance to have it. No matter how tempting it might be, it didn't feel like the right thing to do.
Without hesitating any longer, I picked up a quill and wrote down my answer for the first question: the red button.
The second question made me pause for a moment. Did I think other people would make the same choice? I certainly hoped they would. Maybe it was a little optimistic, but I like to believe that most people would put lives before money. I wrote down my answer for the second question: yes.
After writing down my answers, I folded the parchment and slipped it into the box. As I continued across the courtyard, I couldn't help but wonder what everyone else had decided, and whether my faith in them would turn out to be right.