What Maths Has To Say About Good People 

THE GAME 

In 1950, two mathematicians, Flood and Dresher, made a simple game during their time at RAND corporation. The idea (modernised) was the following: there are two players who are trying to win money. Every turn of the game, each player can decide whether to cooperate or escape. If both players cooperate, they will both win 3 coins. If one escapes and the other cooperates, the former takes 5 coins and the latter gets none. If both parties escape, they both gain only 1 coin. These simple rules were played out a myriad of times in a myriad of places in a myriad of versions, but what is the best strategy to this game, and more importantly: how is this at all relevant to morality? 

 

Before anything, let’s take a closer look at the game. If your opponent cooperates, you can either gain 3 coins by responding in cooperation, or escape and gain 5. Obviously 5 is more convincing and therefore escaping must be the right option. If your opponent escapes, you can either gain no coins by cooperating or gain 1 coin by escaping. The results are clear: escaping is the best way to get the most coins regardless of what your opponent does. So that’s it - the key to success must be selfishness. 

 

This pessimistic view on how to succeed is not final, however, because we are still missing one key thing: almost never is this game played only once in real life. It happens over and over in a person or animal’s life. So, is selfishness still the best tactic in the long run? 

 

TIME CHANGES EVERYTHING 

Several years later, a professor at the University of Michigan, Dr. Axelrod, (Ph. D in political science) decided to run the experiment in 200 rounds on a computer where anyone could submit code for a “player.” Over 60 of these programs were submitted to play, and the results were shockingly clear. Every player that decided to be “nice” or “kind” by cooperating at least to begin with performed better than every single “mean” player (the ones who chose to escape with the money). It is rare experimentally to find such a drastic agreement. So maybe that is the secret to success? Simply being kind despite having a better opportunity before you?  

 

We can see this in nature. Take bonobos that share fruit with other bonobos whom they have never met (despite losing some of their own). Take impalas that clean each other of tics (despite wasting saliva, time and energy). Take chimpanzees that provide resources for their elderly (despite receiving nothing in return). All of these examples show us that this game, titled the Prisoner’s dilemma, is not a one-turn game. It is an ongoing game, one where our actions have consequences and escaping with the money quickly makes the other party distrustful in the future.  

 

 

BRINGING TOGETHER THE TRAITS OF A GOOD PERSON 

So far, this game has proved that kindness is a winning strategy for all involved, but it is not the only one. Prisoner’s dilemma presents other interesting trends. The players who scored highest overall were uncoincidentally also forgiving. When an opposing player escaped with the money, the best programs still gave plenty of room for change. Otherwise, both would fall into a sequence of escaping until infinity. This is particularly useful to us as humans. Miscommunication is common between us, and rash, selfish decisions are seen daily. Game theory tells us that the best way to respond to these problems is not to refuse to cooperate further, but to give more chances, and understand that mistakes are made but people are still always capable of change. 

 

This is a strategy that still has one fatal flaw: it is a pushover. When a kind, forgiving program goes up against a program that resists cooperation indefinitely, the former loses every single time. This brings us to the third principle to win the game, which is to retaliate when necessary. This was shown in the study as the player with the highest score always started by cooperating, gave the benefit of the doubt when the opponent escaped, but after too many escapes, resorted to escaping as well.  

 

Finally, there was one set of programs that had all three of these features but failed in one last thing. Many players were too complicated. Their code was too long, and their strategy was impossible for other players to decipher. Because of this opaqueness, the opponent most of the time decided that the best option was simply to escape - it was too risky to cooperate with a very complex program. 

 

All in all, the prisoner’s dilemma, a rudimentary simplification of the world we live in has given us four ridiculously undemanding traits to carry with us for the future. Be kind. Be forgiving. Do not be a pushover. Be clear.