[Ultimate Either-Or] A great conversation starter and a chance to get to know each other!
Have you heard of the ultimate either-or questions? They’re two-choice questions where it’s hard to pick one, but you have to choose, and they can reveal a person’s values and spark conversation.
They’re perfect as conversation starters with friends or partners and for getting to know each other.
In this article, I’ll introduce a collection of ultimate either-or questions related to life and personal values.
There are plenty of prompts that will make you agonize over which to choose, so have fun giving them a try!
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Ultimate life and values choices (1–10)
If you could buy it with money, which would you choose: a healthy body or free time?
It’s a question that asks whether you would choose health or time, assuming either could be solved with money.
The debate is likely to heat up—some argue that without health you can’t make use of time, while others say that without time you can’t make use of health.
What you choose reveals the feeling with which you live each day and what you value in life.
Would you make the most of limited time with a healthy body, or forcibly increase your time to feel a sense of freedom? It’s a question that seems to ask how you want to seize your freedom.
Wear the same clothes for the rest of your life or eat the same meal for the rest of your life
No matter how much you love a particular outfit, it’s hard to imagine wearing the same clothes for your entire life.
On the other hand, eating the same thing forever would normally be a no, too—there are concerns about unbalanced nutrition and such.
But if you had to choose one or the other, what would you do? For clothes, whether you can at least wash them might be the key point.
If you pick food instead, you’d have to seriously decide what your lifelong companion will be.
Choosing something junky, like fried foods, could make aging tough.
It’s a pretty extreme question—try sharing it with the people around you and see what they think!
500-million-year button: press it or not?
This is a question that asks you to consider whether you would press the “500-Million-Year Button,” a device that gives you 1,000,000 yen just for spending 500 million years in an empty void, if it were right in front of you.
It’s a gadget that appears in Sota Sugawara’s manga and its anime adaptation, and it has become established as a sci-fi motif.
Because your memory of the 500 million years is erased, it seems like you would receive 1,000,000 yen immediately after pressing the button; however, the key point to consider is that there is still a version of you who actually experiences those 500 million years.
Is it acceptable if you don’t retain the memory of suffering, or do you fear the unconscious psychological toll? Let’s discuss how each of us thinks about it.
Through this question, it also makes you curious about how the story ultimately ends, doesn’t it?
Ultimate Choices in Life and Values (11–20)
If you had to be told either the date of your own death or the cause of your own death, which would you choose?
It’s a question of whether you want to know when your life will end or how it will end.
If you knew the date of your death, you could plan how to live your life up to that day; if you knew the cause, you could think of ways to prevent it.
It’s the kind of question that can prompt us to reflect on how we live, and it might reveal each person’s life goals and what they fear.
Perhaps the best approach is to value both perspectives and aim for a fulfilling life while staying mindful of accidents and health.
If it had to be either summer all year round or winter all year round, which would you choose?
This question asks which you would prefer if the entire year had to be either hot summer or cold winter.
Answers may vary not only based on the simple preference for summer or winter, but also on whether someone handles heat or cold better.
Beyond differences in comfort, there are foods and activities that can only be enjoyed in each season, so some people might focus on those.
It’s a question that also reveals how people spend each season and what they look forward to.
Which would you choose? 10 million yen guaranteed, or a 50% chance to get 100 million yen?
The moment you’re asked, your personality shows—this is the ultimate either-or question.
Those who choose “a guaranteed 1 million yen” are safety-first types.
The peace of mind from a solid gain is powerful, and the fact there’s no risk of ending up with zero is a major draw.
On the other hand, those who choose “a 50% chance at 10 million yen” are challengers betting on dreams and romance.
Since it’s an amount that could change your life in an instant if you win, the thrill is on a whole different level.
Even if the expected value is roughly the same when you think calmly, the answer splits depending on emotional sway and personal values—that’s what makes this question interesting.
Are you a gambler or a steady type? It’s a classic, crowd-pleasing either-or that smoothly leads into a friendly personality talk.
Which would you dislike more: if everyone else disappeared from the world except you, or if you were the only one to disappear from the world?
This question asks which you would dislike more: being the only one left behind in the world, or being the only one to disappear from it.
If you vividly imagine each scene—the life of surviving alone in a world with no one else, and the world continuing on as usual for others after you’ve vanished—you can probably gauge the intensity of the discomfort each evokes.
Thinking about what would be difficult if you were alone can also prompt reflection on how you and others are interconnected in daily life.
If opinions arise like “I couldn’t stand people living happily in a world without me,” the differences in viewpoints would become clear and the discussion would likely become lively.