As if the typical user (not anyone that browsers hn) actually reads the _big fat popup_ and would just click through anyways. With no care or worry about what that pop up said or the implications.

Apple “You clicked a pop up that said you accepted random shutdowns and reboots due to a degraded battery instead of allowing us to degrade performance to enable a stable experience with a degraded battery.”

How would you explain the above to tech illiterate people? Increase suppose calls because you allowed a user to chose between degraded yet stable performance versus seemly random (to the user) reboots and shutdowns?

Because one looks like a hardware defect and the other like a problem of old age and is "easier" to accept for most people.

Default to speed and then the first time a device has crashed "your battery has worn to a level that we will have to start slowing down your device or it will keep crashing, will you accept these crashes or slow your device?"

That would be transparent and also allow decisions, if AppleCare also allowed for free battery replacement after receiving that message it would be a PR boon, not a kerfuffle.