Prisoner's Tit-for-Tat
Variations on the Prisoner’s Dilemma game are widespread in financial studies. The idea is that two people are faced with a dilemma: if they both support each other and stay silent they get a short sentence, if they both rat on each other they both go to jail for several years but if one of them spills the beans while the other one doesn’t then the latter is banged up for a long time and the other goes free. On a single shot basis it doesn’t pay to be cooperative.
On the other hand, if the game is repeatedly iterated, the strategy of Tit-for-Tat – start by being cooperative and then simply copy the last action of your opponent turns out to be the best solution, as described by Robert Axelrod. Over long periods of time exploiters get found out and people prepared to cooperate win. This leads to the suggestion that self-interest dictates that we should operate as though we’re altruistic because this is the most successful strategy. So even if we're altuistic we're actually deceiving schemers. Don't you just love the businessman's view of human nature?
Variations on the Prisoner’s Dilemma game are widespread in financial studies. The idea is that two people are faced with a dilemma: if they both support each other and stay silent they get a short sentence, if they both rat on each other they both go to jail for several years but if one of them spills the beans while the other one doesn’t then the latter is banged up for a long time and the other goes free. On a single shot basis it doesn’t pay to be cooperative.
On the other hand, if the game is repeatedly iterated, the strategy of Tit-for-Tat – start by being cooperative and then simply copy the last action of your opponent turns out to be the best solution, as described by Robert Axelrod. Over long periods of time exploiters get found out and people prepared to cooperate win. This leads to the suggestion that self-interest dictates that we should operate as though we’re altruistic because this is the most successful strategy. So even if we're altuistic we're actually deceiving schemers. Don't you just love the businessman's view of human nature?