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Return to Europe

5 (11.4%)

Weather the Storm

4 (9.1%)

Go to Madeira

35 (79.5%)

Total Members Voted: 43

[Rolan7]

The response makes sense to me.  The options you've presented are:
1) Being forever harassed both by individuals and "on a national level".  After spending so much on this chance at escape, and a new life.
2) Possibly all dying in the storm.  We don't know their chances, but the professionals they met advised against it.  Even if the odds are good, it's still risking a loss of everything and everyone.

Choosing between these two is tough, and by tough I mean there isn't enough information.  Only the people in the situation would really know whether they want to risk their lives a bit farther to escape their old life.  It does get complicated if there isn't consensus, though. 

Fortunately there's a third solution:
3) Going without food for two days.  Nobody's going to die of starvation in that time, and they get the whole lifetime of freedom they were looking for.  These people are already willing to risk an ocean voyage and considerable resources.  Temporary (agonizing) hunger isn't enough of a problem to throw away everything they already invested, either back home or by drowning.

[Frumple]

... two days isn't really that agonizing, iirc. It's certainly not pleasant, but I've done that just... incidentally. Forgetting to eat for 48 hours. It would likely be a fairly different experience after a indeterminate amount of time on short rations, but... a couple of days without food generally isn't that bad, insofar as things go.

[Rolan7]

Yeah, but that's after the food runs out on "the strictest rations".  So they're already going to be hungry for probably a few days at least.

[IronyOwl]

To be honest, I really don't see the point of the other two. Was "two days without rations" supposed to mean "some of us will starve to death?" Because otherwise, it seems like the scenario is:

You are uncomfortable. Would you like to:
A) Remain uncomfortable
B) Risk your life becoming comfortable
C) Become uncomfortable in a different manner, then become comfortable

[Baffler]

The implication (though I did a poor job illustrating it) was that some people would probably starve or become very sick if the weather wasn't excellent the whole way through. Also recall there are more than just the sailors on the ship. People bring their families when they flee someplace, after all.

[Frumple]

Would probably want to bump the fasting period up to a week or two, then. Couple days really isn't that worrisome And there's still a pretty large amount of wiggle room for fairly handy survival. Humans can go pretty ruddy long without food, all things considered. Or just include a water shortage, though that would largely make option C effectively suicide.

Kids or elderly, I think, are somewhat more of an issue (if they're even there, which, considering the situation, is actually something I'd call somewhat unlikely) but some of the (stronger, healthier) family members voluntarily going off food a day or two early could likely deal with that well enough.

As for the more general thing re: families, back in that period people didn't get on a boat without knowing damn well there was a very much non-zero chance they weren't going to survive, s'far as I'm aware. Especially considering it's a trans-atlantic trip. Anyone on that ship is almost certainly understanding of just what they're in for.

Though... if they weren't aware of the dangers beforehand, that does give an incredibly different light on the scenario. It would mean the expedition leader and/or ship crew has almost certainly been lying like hell to the other passengers. More info! More!

[Flying Dice]

The implication (though I did a poor job illustrating it) was that some people would probably starve or become very sick if the weather wasn't excellent the whole way through. Also recall there are more than just the sailors on the ship. People bring their families when they flee someplace, after all.

They're not going to starve from two days without food (nor would it measurably affect the chance of illness), they're more likely to have deaths weathering a storm, and they'd face the same potential dangers on a second attempt.

It's a false dilemma. You're presenting three options to a group whose overriding focus is "Achieve Goal X while keeping as many of the group as possible alive. The options are:
1. Abandon Goal X.
2. Risk losing their only means to achieve Goal X, additionally risk deaths.
3. Endure discomfort and a slight risk of illness or death to achieve Goal X.

[Baffler]

I'm glad I did this. I was going to wait until Friday, but I didn't anticipate a problem this big. I had an ulterior motive posting this here, you see.

The experiment I'm conducting (per the conditions of the assignment) must be conducted in-person. Another group will be asking the same question over the internet, but I don't know where. I put this up here to catch problems before we started collecting data, knowing that we couldn't possibly catch everything wrong with it.

Again, I didn't expect such a glaring issue (and it is a glaring issue for our purpose.) I'm going to close the poll early and begin revising the scenario. I may put the revised edition here for fun, and I'll still put up the amalgamated data, but unless the internet group decides Bay12 is worth asking again it won't be included in the final collection.

[penguinofhonor]

Revision makes everything better!

[IcyTea31]

Usually when I've come upon dilemmas such as this the options have been 'try to save everything, risk losing everything' versus 'save some with certainty, lose some with certainty'.

How about this to fix the option? Instead of risking starvation for anyone, some people have to go, either back to whence they came or to stay in the Azorites.

[Zangi]

There is also fact that the decision is made by the ship captain.  Is he the expedition leader?  Or someone hired to take them on?

Is the expedition leader the rich merchant?  Or someone else?  Did the rich guy spend everything he had to finance the trip?  Or does he still got stuff back home?