No Friday this week, just Saturday

The Friday Five was (and is) down this week. So howzabout the Saturday-8: “Choices”?

1. If you had to choose between being gauranteed to live the rest of you life in absolute happiness regardless of the conditions of everyone around you or only being granted one more year of life and all of you love ones being gauranteed happiness for the rest of their lives, which would you choose and why?

   Cha. Unless Column B, then Column A isn’t possible. So it’s got to be Column B. The biggest problem that would cause would be deciding which projects to try to finish before then.

2. If you were force to choose to take at least one life of your choosing or two people you care about would die, could you do it? Why or why not?

   A variant on the Sacrifice of Abraham. If I were somehow convinced that this was the case (either through divine insight, overwhelming evidence, or some guy busting into our house firing off shots at random) … yeah, I could. Whatever it would take. Did I mention the baseball bat before?

3. If you were granted one wish, any wish that you want that would be guaranteed to come true, but to receive the wish, you had to sleep with someone that you absolutely hated, could you do it? And if so, what would you wish be?

   Somehow, that seems easier than the previous one. Work myself up into a froth, and I think I could kill. “Sleep” with someone I absolutely hate (which would be difficult to find, but let’s assume it’s an Ossama or a Saddam) would be a bit more difficult, oddly enough.

   That being said — yeah, I can think of some wishes (#1 at a minimum) that, with proper wordsmithing to avoid the Diabolical GM Syndrome, I would be willing to compromise myself that much. Of course, it’s a lot easier in the (very) hypothetical than in actuality.

4. A loved one is in the hospital dying and there is no doubt in anyone’s mind that they will be dead soon. You are given the option of bringing them back to their normal life, but in exchange, you would be reduced to a state where, in spite having an awake and alert mind, your relative control of your body and your ability to communicate with everyone around you will be almost entirely lost. Could you make this exchange?

   Yeesh. Serious hypotheticals here. Um … each one here seems to be a greater self-compromise — death, a violent act (of self-defense), a hateful act, and now a tortured act. I don’t know that I could do this. I’m pretty certain most of my loved ones wouldn’t want me to, but that doesn’t enter in here much. I think that were I in such an alert-but-cut-off state, I wouldn’t much want to live.

5. If you had to choose to allow one of your loved ones to be imprisoned away from everyone else for the rest of their lives in exchange for a life that is as near perfection as ever could be imagined for everyone else amongst you loved ones, could you do it? If so, who would it be?

   It might depend on the particulars (“the one loved one is going to be spirited away to an alien world where they, too, will live a happy, productive life”), but, in general, no I don’t think I could. I could sacrifice myself, but not someone else that way.

6. You are granted youth as long as you want to hold on to it, but in exchange, secretly someone else you know and care about will age faster for every time you slow down your aging, would you preserve your youth? If so, who would you choose to get youth from?

   I think the nature of the blessing/curse is such that “cared about” could not be the right verb to use. No, I wouldn’t.

7. You know that you will never receive another moment of sleep or rest for the rest of your life but you will recieve almost immeasurable wealth with which you could do whatever you want, would accept this?

   While sometimes it seems I don’t get nearly enough moments of sleep or rest, those I do are quite precious to me, and when I lack them too much, it’s hellish. So, no, this deal is a definite uh-uh.

8. You are told that you would be relocated to either the hottest or coldest place on Earth without the ability to leave and without protection from the condition, but in the process you are told that you can grant eternal happiness into the life on earth and beyond of only one person in your life, could you make that trade and who would it be?

   Presumably “survival” is guaranteed here. In either case, assuming I’m convinced of the deal (and some of the parameters of what constitutes happiness), yeah, I think I could do it. And it would probably be Margie. Or maybe Katherine. No, Margie.