"The odds of anyone from this web site having seen her is astronomically small."

I agree, but I think that point is derivative and not just because it is an opinion but also because it is based on a probabilistic analogy rather than a deductive logic.

I assume a double bind proposition:

Either:

1. It is possible that someone visiting this website might be able to help and viewing this video might prompt them into action. While they may not have specific information, they may be able to help in another way such as donating to the reward money or setting up a website, for example.

Or

2. It is impossible that someone visiting this website might be able to help in any way and that viewing this video might prompt them into action.

I don't think the overall likelihood of each assumption can be calculated (which is what I think you are trying to do when I describe your point as a 'probabilistic analogy') because there are too many unknowns. And the benefits of finding out all of these unknowns far outweighs the cost of making the wrong voting choices because by the time we figured out the respective probabilities it could be too late for this girl and her family.

So, I argue that we should make the choice which leads to the least possible harm given the extent of our unknowns and the cost to us of making a wrong choice compared to the benefits to the girl and her family of us making a correct choice.

In this situation, when we cannot know which assumption is correct, up voting is the choice which leads to the least possible harm for Madeleine and her family and not voting or down voting always has the potential to cause greater harm than up voting.
Here’s why:

If we assume 1, then down voting or not voting at all would be harmful and up voting would be helpful.

If we assume 2, then up voting will have no effect on Madeleine’s return and at the very worst will prevent other videosift users from enjoying a higher position in the queue. Down voting or not voting at all would at the very worst lead to this video being discarded.


That is my argument to everyone who reads this for upvoting.

For a real picture of how interrogation works, watch this over 24 ridiculousness.

Closet Land is a 1991 independent film directed by Radha Bharadwaj and stars Alan Rickman as a sadistic, ruthless interrogator and Madeleine Stowe as a young author of children's books accused of embedding anarchistic messages into her particular book entitled: Closet Land, a story about a child who, as a result of bad behaviour, has been locked in a closet as punishment. While in there, the child is greeted by a choir of childhood ally archetypes who innocently attempt to comfort the scared little girl. While the novel, as the viewer will later on discover, is actually a form of escapism and provides a coping-mechanism for the author who endured sexual abuse as a child, the seemingly simple content is questioned by the government of encouraging and introducing anarchism among its audience of naïve children. Whilst the interrogator is obstinate in his belief that the author is guilty of hidden propaganda, the audience is convinced of the victim's innocence.

The film takes place in a purposely unspecified country, and is quite reminiscent of George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. The film exhibits the use of brutal and inhumane torture to coerce confessions from innocent victims. The human rights organization Amnesty International served as consultants for the film.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closet_Land

I'm not a huge Alanis fan, and yeah, she misses the definition of "ironic" several times over. But I love this video because I know that weather, that lowering winter light, that salt-scarred car, and those colourful wool clothes. I can smell that damn car, too, with its mixture of old cigarette smoke and that dank underground garage odour.

So call this submission a combo of nostalgia and synaesthesia. Proust had his madeleines, I have Alanis.

(And thanks to firefly for this video, which reminded me to look for this one.)