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The Evolution of Trust

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Re: The Evolution of Trust

#11

Post by larsiusprime »

brudgers wrote: post #7
arca_vorago wrote: post #6

This caught my attention: "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!

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."

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#12

Post by cryptica »

Wow that is extremely insightful.

Now I understand why globalisation is dangerous; if people start to favor short term relationships (both personal and business) with many different partners (smaller number of rounds per match ), then society will evolve to become full of cheaters.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#13

Post by sgk284 »

cryptica wrote: post #12

Wow that is extremely insightful. Now I understand why globalisation is dangerous; if people start to favor short term relationships (both personal and business) with many different partners (smaller number of rounds per match ), then society will evolve to become full of cheaters.

Interestingly enough, seemingly to compensate for this phenomenon, almost every new platform that requires people to interact with each other has a built in trust and reward system with ratings (e.g. Uber).

And for physical businesses, we have things like Yelp. We are effectively trying to anticipate our opponents behavior through a trusted intermediary.

There was a Black Mirror episode on giving every person on the globe their own rating. It seems that may be the actual destination that we're headed for.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#14

Post by tpeo »

The little animated chums strike me be as a bit too cute.

One has to take care to not anthropomorphize models. Even models ostensibly created to model aspects of human behavior, such game theoretic models.

Anthropomorphism might induce people either to think there's more under the hood than there actually is, and thus lead them to a hold a wrong mental representation of the model, or to naively assume that it's conclusions are robust to specification changes by making the conclusions a bit too familiar, even though even somewhat simple model extensions might significantly change their behavior (e.g. going from single to repeated games, which makes cooperatives strategies viable).

Comparing tit-for-tat strategies with the Golden rule, while mixing in references toe the Christmas truce somehow seems to go in the opposite direction of being cautious regarding model interpretation.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#15

Post by [deleted] »

DanAndersen wrote: post #8
arca_vorago wrote: post #6

This caught my attention: "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!

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 m…

[deleted]

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#16

Post by dredmorbius »

DanAndersen wrote: post #8
arca_vorago wrote: post #6

This caught my attention: "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!

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 m…

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".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Harum

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:

http://amomai.blogspot.com/2008/10/hl-mencken-bayard-vs-lion...

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.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#17

Post by larsiusprime »

tpeo wrote: post #14

The little animated chums strike me be as a bit too cute. One has to take care to not anthropomorphize models. Even models ostensibly created to model aspects of human behavior, such game theoretic models. Anthropomorphism might induce people either to think there's more under the hood than there actually is, and thus lead them to a hold a wrong mental representation of the model, or to naively assume that it's concl…

> even though even somewhat simple model extensions might significantly change their behavior (e.g. going from single to repeated games, which makes cooperatives strategies viable).

He explicitly examines this in the application, did you not run through it? He actively encourages you to modify the rules and see how it changes the results.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#19

Post by tpeo »

larsiusprime wrote: post #17
tpeo wrote: post #14

The little animated chums strike me be as a bit too cute. One has to take care to not anthropomorphize models. Even models ostensibly created to model aspects of human behavior, such game theoretic models. Anthropomorphism might induce people either to think there's more under the hood than there actually is, and thus lead them to a hold a wrong mental representation of the model, or to naively assume that it's concl…

> even though even somewhat simple model extensions might significantly change their behavior (e.g. going from single to repeated games, which makes cooperatives strategies viable). He explicitly examines this in the application, did you not run through it? He actively encourages you to modify the rules and see how it changes the results.

I ran through it. I didn't suggest he didn't cover it. I just used it as a trivial example, because other readers supposedly also ran through it. Some other commenter suggested communication between agents as an extension, I could've used that if I knew what results from it.

Re: The Evolution of Trust

#20

Post by nothrabannosir »

sgk284 wrote: post #13
cryptica wrote: post #12

Wow that is extremely insightful. Now I understand why globalisation is dangerous; if people start to favor short term relationships (both personal and business) with many different partners (smaller number of rounds per match ), then society will evolve to become full of cheaters.

Interestingly enough, seemingly to compensate for this phenomenon, almost every new platform that requires people to interact with each other has a built in trust and reward system with ratings (e.g. Uber). And for physical businesses, we have things like Yelp. We are effectively trying to anticipate our opponents behavior through a trusted intermediary. There was a Black Mirror episode on giving every person on the…

> There was a Black Mirror episode on giving every person on the globe their own rating. It seems that may be the actual destination that we're headed for.

"Nosedive".

One of the scariest things I've ever seen on screen. I joke about how realistic black mirror is but that episode was too much. Beyond uncanny. It was incredibly hard to watch and I hated every second of it. Awful. Cannot recommend it enough.

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