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Good-option dilemma

The good-option dilemma is that typical scenario where—for example—some evil authority figure holding you hostage gives you two options: one where you suffer the most and the other where you don't suffer as long as you give them what they want. Obviously you pick the second option out of desperation, but the dilemma here is that no matter what option you choose, in the end the evil figure will still make you suffer (typically by being killed or watching your loved ones die).

I had a good-option dilemma today where my computer's SSD got corrupted and I either had two options: wipe everything and do a clean reinstall of Windows, or pay a few hundred bucks to have some specialist recover the contents. So I paid for the recovery but the people shipped back the wrong drive with somebody else's files! So in the end, I had to wipe my drive no matter which option I went for. This is the good-option dilemma in a nutshell.

by Mary Mary Quite The Contrarian December 26, 2022