"So, it seems the math of game theory is telling us something: that Copycat's philosophy, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you", may be not just a moral truth, but also a mathematical truth."
I also found it interesting how the success of cheaters requires a limited number of interactions (so their opponents don't catch on that they are cheaters). Perhaps that's why certain occupations such as used car salesmen have a reputation for being sleazy -- most people are not buying cars very often and so don't get the chance to get to know an individual seller over the course of many transactions. So while you might know that the corner-store merchant is screwing you and end up avoiding him, the used car salesman has a steady stream of suckers who don't know him.
Used car sales has its direct antecedents in horse trading and dealing.
There was a famous-for-its-time story called David Harum, (1899), made into a film in 1915, and a radio serial in the 1950s. Its principle legacy today is the use of the term "horse trading" to mean "underhanded dealing".
I'd run across it via H.L. Mencken's essay, "Bayard v. Lionheart", itself best recalled for its concluding sentence:
As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
... but containing oh so much more, in the foil of a critique of the 1926 U.S. Presidential Election. Really, read it:
Both used cars and horses have several characteristics in common:
* They are anti-commodities. That is, individual items for sale are highly disuniform, complex, and not readily assessed.
* They are expensive. For the ordinary consumer, they are not purchases likely to be made frequently. (A horse and a car each have fairly equivalent useful working lives: about 3-10 years, depending on use and care afforded.)
* Sellers of quality instances are much inclined to stay away from the general market. It's a case where selling to someone who is specifically aware of the qualities of what you're selling is a far better customer.
This has other cognates. Software and consulting services come to mind.
The treatment in the economic literature is somewhat disappointing. There's Ackerloff's "The Market for Lemons", of course (won him a Nobel prize), but it's a generally underserved area of theory.
More notable to me is the premise of the simulation that it is ok to kill off the poor to make room for the rich. Because using the simulation to justify moral/ethical/rational acceptability of cheating sometimes means accepting that premise.
This isn't the premise of the simulation at all. It explicitly says that the agent replacement phase is an abstraction and could just as easily be interpreted as agents changing their strategies.
"Note: you don't have to wait for people to literally die & reproduce for culture to evolve -- all that's needed is that "unsuccessful" behaviors go away, and "successful" behaviors are imitated."
The premise of the replacement is that poorest adopt the strategy of the richest and is premised on this being the right thing to do even if the change is from always cooperating to always cheating.
In some ways the description of replacement rather death is a more explicit example of the premise underlying the simulation that cheating is morally/ethically/rationally justifiable. The underlying moral/ethical theory behind the simulation is not even Utilitarian (never mind Deontological) it is purely Randian where the justification of behavior is only what is in it for me.
In that sense it completely misses the point of the Christmas Peace which from a deontological perspective reflected moral/ethical principles such as the golden rule and peace on earth and goodwill toward men. Even from a utilitarian perspective there was the idea that the greatest happiness for the greatest number included the enemy in that number.
The individual benefits were a side effect that was only possible because of the higher level principle. And the individual benefits were always going to trend toward a short life. The shell with someone's name on it was still going to be lobbed on 26/12/14.
The "reward" is an unspecified scalar value. You are casting the terms of the model into "poor" and "rich". It's a mathematical model, not an ethical one.
'Cooperation' and 'cheating' and 'mistake' are not mathematical terms. They are part of moral/ethical/rational frameworks. The realm in which the simulation is supposed to provide insight is moral/ethical/rational. Moral/ethical/rational conclusions are the point of the website.
If the point is just mathematical, then limiting interactions to one and cheating is the best strategy. The simulations assume autonomous decision making on the part of the agents, that's what provides insight into human behavior why considering the moral/ethical/rational premises of the simulation are relevant when evaluating what the simulation shows.
If you are complaining that the mathematical toys of Game Theory are inadequate for modeling human moral/ethical/rational behavior then I agree with you whole-heartedly.
I'm just insisting that we keep the math toy and the interpretation of the math toy on different "logical levels".
If the presentation of the models was an academic paper filled with equations, I would not find the insistence unreasonable. In this case the context for The Evolution of Trust is alongside the Parable of the Polygons and parables are not mathematical or game theory.
At the mathematical level, if there is nothing moral/ethical/rational to draw from the simulation, then what's the point? If it's just math, then why is it only the least successful agents that switch to the most successful strategy and why are they able to switch to the most successful strategy before it is clear that that strategy is the most successful? Going further why don't moderately unsuccessful agents switch strategies? And since mistakes are part of the simulation, why don't agents mistakenly switch strategies? Why does the simulation maintain a constant number of agents rather than varying based on outcome?
The reason is that the goal of the presentation is to encourage people to be more open to the possibility of mistakes before retaliation. The presentation is trying to appeal to people using mathematics. My criticism is that the price of the mathematical model is too high: justifying cheating because it is best for the individual.
I think I see what you're saying. The author is trying to use the Game Theory mathematical model to encourage a moral or ethical response, but the model itself is flawed for that purpose because it just as readily portrays a moral "poison", if you will: the idea that selfishness can justify cheating. Is that it?
"So, it seems the math of game theory is telling us something: that Copycat's philosophy, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you", may be not just a moral truth, but also a mathematical truth."
Simpleton and copykitten for the win!