History Main / ColdEquation

* In ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'' this trope is [[DiscussedTrope discussed]] by Shepard and Garrus, calling it "ruthless calculus." Shepard is tasked with making many hard decisions in the war with the Reapers, including allowing some planets to fall in order to save others.

* ''Webcomic/{{Narbonic}}'' parodies "The Cold Equations" [[http://www.webcomicsnation.com/shaenongarrity/narbonic/series.php?view=archive&chapter=10009 here]]; when the pilot is [[NonActionGuy Dave]] and the cute stowaway is [[PsychoForHire Mell]], it's not the stowaway who's going out the airlock.

* The reason for a series of murders in Manga/TheKindaichiCaseFiles. The victims are all survivors of a crashed ship, with the same initials. One of them had worked out this equation and pushed a girl off who was trying to climb aboard a full lifeboat; in falling, she managed to grab their keychain with their initials.

* Another scenario meant to teach [[StockAesop to never judge a book by the cover]] uses this, and runs thusly: You are in a balloon that is rapidly losing height at a rate such that any impact will prove fatal for all aboard. The passengers are you, a geriatric old woman, a wealthy looking man in a [[SharpDressedMan suit]], and a teenager about to inject himself. One person must be thrown out, but who? Turns out the old woman fought for women's rights, the businessman earns hundreds of dollars through fraud, and the teenager's actually injecting himself with insulin--he's diabetic. (Of course, many people would just pick the wealthy-looking man immediately, giving it a rather different message: EatTheRich. Or specifically in this case. . . [[LamePunReaction: yeet the rich]].)

* Another scenario meant to teach [[StockAesop to never judge a book by the cover]] uses this, and runs thusly: You are in a balloon that is rapidly losing height at a rate such that any impact will prove fatal for all aboard. The passengers are you, a geriatric old woman, a wealthy looking man in a [[SharpDressedMan suit]], and a teenager about to inject himself. One person must be thrown out, but who? Turns out the old woman fought for women's rights, the businessman earns hundreds of dollars through fraud, and the teenager's actually injecting himself with insulin--he's diabetic. (Of course, many people would just pick the wealthy-looking man immediately, giving it a rather different message: EatTheRich.)

* Lampshaded in ''Series/Babylon5''. The reason why the "Battle of Coriana VI" is not the "Battle of Centauri Prime" is quite simply down to respective population sizes.

--> '''Marcus Cole:''' 6 billion lives on Coriana. 3 billion lives on Centauri Prime. We have enough ships to make a stand at one of them, so which do you choose? It's numbers - cold, unsympathetic numbers.

* Lampshaded in ''Series/Babylon5''. The reason why the "Battle of Coriana VI" is not "The Battle of Centauri Prime" is quite simply down to respective population sizes.

--> '''Lyta Alexander:''' I've heard that some of the Vorlons would be within striking distance of Centauri Prime about the same time we reach Coriana 6. So... why are we here instead of there?

* In a mass casualty incident where there are minimal resources available for rescue, this becomes an aspect of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triage triage]]. Standard triage tags for injured people have four colours: green for minor injuries that can be safely ignored by first responders, yellow for a non life-threatening injury (such as a broken arm) that can have treatment delayed until resources are available, red for someone who needs immediate attention (such as as someone going into shock or having trouble breathing), and black. A black tag on someone who isn't dead yet means they're not to be given any medical treatment except pain medication until everyone else is dealt with because their injuries are almost certainly fatal with the resources available and efforts spent on them would end up unavailable to people who have a higher probability of living.

* The nuclear shelter scenario is spoofed in ''TheSimpsons'' episode "Bart's Comet". A comet is about to strike Springfield and so the entire towns' population tries to cram into Ned Flander's bomb shelter. They somehow manage this, but can't get the door closed. After arguing about who should be sacrificed Homer points out that the one skill future society doesn't need is the ability to sell left-handed products, so Ned gets thrown out of his own shelter. Eventually they all feel guilty about this decision, so leave the shelter to die with him. The comet ends up striking the bomb shelter and destroying it.

* ''Manga/AttackOnTitan'': Humanity's attempt at reclaiming Wall Maria by sending out 250,000 drafted citizens, many of whom came from the recently-fallen ward of Shiganshina, was done knowing that the operation would likely fail so that humanity would not starve from overpopulation.

* A couple from ''VideoGame/TheLastofUs''. The first happens in the prologue where Joel decides against his brother Tommy’s wishes to leave a family even though they have the room because he doesn’t want to put his daughter Sarah at risk. [[spoiler:The second, ironically, results in Sarah's death when the military official who rescues them is ordered to kill all survivors.]] Later on it happens with Henry leaves Joel to die to save Sam and Ellie. [[spoiler:And finally, the ending has Joel turn on the Fireflies after they reveal they'll need to sacrifice Ellie to produce a vaccine.]]

* In ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' during one of Cotton's war stories. His ship was attacked and was able to rescue Fatty, Stinky, and Brooklyn. A Zero fighter attacked him and he had to sacrifice Fatty to the sharks.

* ''ComicBook/StarWarsDoctorAphra''. In "Remastered", [[RoboticPsychopath Triple Zero]] puts Dr Aphra in this position just to KickTheDog. He hires one too many mercenaries for her mission so her spacecraft is too heavy to take off, then lets her choose [[EmergencyCargoDump who gets to stay behind and get killed]] by the Imperial stormtroopers he's tipped off about their presence. He's not the last person she ends up sacrificing on that mission either, which Triple Zero also knew would happen.

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13 Apollo 13]] ran into this dilemma. After an oxygen tank in the Service Module exploded, and the Command Module the crew was forced to use the life-support systems of the Lunar Excursion Module. Normally, this wouldn't have been a problem, but the LEM was only designed to support two people, not the full crew. [[note]]In an ordinary mission, two crew members would land on the moon in the LEM and explore the surface while the third stayed on the command module in lunar orbit.[[/note]] The problem in this case was actually of a buildup of carbon dioxide instead of a lack of oxygen, since the [=LEM=] was designed to support its crew for several days on the lunar surface, including being completely vented out every time they needed to open the door. The carbon dioxide scrubbers on the [=LEM=], however, were not up to the task of filtering the atmosphere with all three crewmembers inside, and the [=LEM=]'s ports did not fit the [=CM=]'s more powerful filters. Luckily, [=NASA=] was able to MacGyver up a solution that did ''not'' include murder, and all three returned safe and free of [=CO2=] poisoning.

* In ''Down To A Sunless Sea'' by David Graham, at one point the narrator's Boeing and his new girlfriend's Antonov are fleeing to Antarctica to escape the nuclear devastation of the entire civilised world. Unfortunately, they run into heavy cloud which is lethally contaminated with fallout, and the Antonov doesn't have the fuel to make the trip at the higher altitude required to clear the fallout. So the Russian co-pilot calls for volunteers and opens the Anti's cargo doors, and leads a procession of about one-third of the passengers on the long drop into oblivion. In some editions of the book, it turns out that they were the lucky ones when all was said and done.

* One of the pub crowd in ''Film/AnAmericanWerewolfInLondon'' tells a joke about a plane full of U.N. representatives who need to lighten the load or they'll crash. Just tossing out the baggage and seats isn't enough, so two of the diplomats jump out heroically ... and the third, a Texan, [[RememberTheAlamo tosses the Mexican diplomat out]].

* Played for laughs in ''Series/ThirtyRock'': Jack wants to prove that there's no way Kenneth is as selfless as he seems, so he fakes a setup where nine people are trapped in an elevator, and tells them all that they have only enough air for eight and there is a gun in a panel. Kenneth doesn't even hesitate before he tries to shoot himself. When it turns out it isn't loaded, he then pulls off his own belt and tries to choke himself, much to everyone's horror.

* Played for laughs in ''Series/ThirtyRock'': Jack wants to prove that Kenneth isn't really as selfless as everyone thinks, so he fakes a setup where nine people are trapped in an elevator, and tells them all that they have only enough air for eight and there is a gun in a panel. Kenneth doesn't even hesitate before he tries to shoot himself. When it turns out it isn't loaded, he then pulls off his own belt and tries to choke himself, much to everyone's horror.

** ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Dudley_and_Stephens R vs. Dudley and Stephens]]'' - an English case 40 years later that cited ''Holmes'', in which sailors [[NoPartyLikeADonnerParty murdered and ate]] the weakest member of their lifeboat crew, on the grounds that they were starving and he was likely to die anyway. [[note]] Precedent establishes that necessity ''is'' a positive defense to cannibalizing a corpse provided that the victim was ''already'' dead. [[/note]]

** Another Archer example has Archer, Lana, Cyril and Ray trapped in a room quickly filling with water and only three sets of scuba gear to swim out and to the surface. The dying station captain they're with tells them that one one them will have to drown and die, hopefully temporarily, while the other three took the scuba suits and tried to get themselves to safety and resuscitate the volunteer. [[HeroicSuicide Archer immediately volunteers after Lana reveals she's pregnant.]]

** Another Archer example has Archer, Lana, Cyril and Ray trapped in a room quickly filling with water and only three sets of scuba gear to swim out and to the surface. The dying submarine captain with them tells them that weakest swimmer would have to drown and die, hopefully temporarily, while the other three took the scuba suits and tried to get themselves to safety and resuscitate the volunteer. [[HeroicSuicide Archer immediately volunteers after Lana reveals she's pregnant.]]

** Another Archer example has Archer, Lana, Cyril and Ray trapped in a room quickly filling with water and only three sets of scuba gear to swim out and to the surface. The dying submarine captain with them tells them that weakest swimmer would have to drown, hopefully temporarily, while the other three took the scuba suits and tried to get themselves to safety and resuscitate the volunteer. [[HeroicSuicide Archer immediately decides that he'll volunteer to temporarily die after Lana reveals that she's pregnant.]]

** Another Archer example had four of them trapped in a room quickly filling with water and only three sets of scuba gear to swim out and to the surface. The dying submarine captain tells them that weakest swimmer would have to drown, hopefully temporarily, while the other three took the scuba suits and tried to get themselves to safety and resuscitate the volunteer. [[HeroicSacrifice Archer immediately decides that he'll volunteer to temporarily die after Lana reveals that she's pregnant.]]