From episode 34: Hunt a Deer to Save the Climate; Improve Neighborhoods; Win Talladega:
In this episode, the boys review an element of Game Theory that seems to fly in the face of every basic tenant of self-interest.
The Stag Hunt, established by French Philosopher Jean-Jacque Rousseau in his work "Discourse on Inequality," creates a game wherein two hunters can either work together to secure a large shared bounty or work separately for a significantly smaller bounty.
Listen to episode 31 wherever podcasts are found.
This contradicts the Prisoner's Dilemma in which self-interest is always the rational move. In the Stag Hunt, collaboration is the way to go.
It works like this:
Imagine you and your best friend go deer hunting. You each have a rifle, but to get harvest a deer, you'll need to work together with just one shooter. But, it's fine. You've agreed to split the harvest.
With only 3 hours of daylight left, a hare runs across your site line. The prospects of getting a deer are still very, very good. But, the hare is in front of your face right now.
If you go for that hare, you're screwing your buddy. But if your buddy goes for a hare, he's screwed you. So, what do you do?
It's called the Stag Hunt and it's probably the most important aspect of game theory out there impacting things like climate change, policing, and of course, sports.
And while half of a deer is many, many times as bountiful as a hare, the hare could sustain you and is better than nothing. Right?
Wrong.
Unlike the prisoner's dilemma, the Stag Hunt creates a situation where blindly collaborating with your partner is the rational thing to do.
In the prisoner's dilemma, the move is always to collaborate with the authorities, cut a deal, and take the lesser punishment. (We're assuming you know the Prisoner's Dilemma, but if you don't, Click Here and view the table below.)
The Nash Equilibrium shows that snitching on your partner is the only way to go.
In the Stag Hunt,both players agreeing to collaborate to hunt the deer is indeed the best outcome, but it isn't the only way to achieve some form of success.
Unlike the prisoner's dilemma, there is a way for both players to wind up better than before. Observe the two tables.
In the bottom right-hand corner, we see that in the Prisoner's Dilemma each player finished with an (arbitrary) score of -2. But, in the bottom right-hand corner of the stag hunt table, we see both players finish with a score of 2. The only way to lose is to not be on the same page with your hunting partner, wherein one of you harvests a rabbit and the other wastes time hunting a deer solo.
In the table, we see that both parties choosing to hunt the hare is better than one choosing a hare and the other still going for the stag. But, to explain this game better, it helps to change the variables.
What if instead of choosing between 50% of a deer and a rabbit, you had to choose between living and dying? Say you're on a rowboat stranded in open water. It takes two people to raw all the way to shore. So if even one player chooses not to row, death is certain.
Of course, the Stag Hunt metaphor is perfect because it isn't as simple as life and death. In the stag hunt:
winning both a skill that both players must posses;
collaboration is built on trust, not on communication channels;
there can be more than 2 hunters;
and all parties must agree on both what a deer is and that a deer is that much better than a rabbit.
The most obvious example in the real world is climate change. But the idea that "snitches get stitches" or collaborating with police for convictions and even NASCAR superspeedways like Talladega are examples of participating in the hunt for the sake of your fellow players and for yourself.
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