The tortoise and the prisoners' dilemma
Mind 105 (419):475-483 (1996)
| Abstract | Simon Blackburn has claimed that on a theory of revealed preference it is tautological that any eligible player - one whose preferences are consistent - plays hawk, chooses a strategy of non-cooperation with the other prisoner. This claim is examined and rejected. A prisoner in the appropriate sense is defined not by preferences over actions (playing hawk or playing dove) but by preferences over the four possible outcomes which result from the players' actions jointly (both playing hawk, both playing dove, the first playing hawk and the second dove, and vice versa). It is not inconsistent to suppose that a prisoner has the appropriate preferences over outcomes but nevertheless chooses to play dove. This can happen either if the prisoner believes for some reason that the full range of outcomes is not available, or if the prisoner is simply a bad strategic thinker. It is perhaps tautological that a player with the appropriate preferences over outcome and with suitable beliefs will if rational choose to play hawk. However, rationality would then involve an appeal to a further principle, the sure-thing principle: if a prisoner would choose hawk knowing that the other will choose hawk, and would also choose hawk knowing that the other will choose dove, then hawk should be chosen when it is uncertain what the other will choose. | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,679 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesElias L. Khalil (2002). Is the Prisoner's Dilemma Metaphor Suitable for Altruism? Distinguishing Self-Control and Commitment From Altruism. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 25 (2):264-265.
Jordan Howard Sobel (2004). On Wakker's Critique of Allais-Preferences. Croatian Journal of Philosophy 4 (2):253-272.
Duncan MacIntosh (1991). McClennen's Early Co-Operative Solution to the Prisoner's Dilemma. Southern Journal of Philosophy 29 (3):341-358.
Scott L. Pratt (2001). The Given Land: Black Hawk's Conception of Place. Philosophy and Geography 4 (1):109 – 125.
Eva Sanchez, Pierre Auger & Rafael Bravo de la Parra (1997). Influence of Individual Aggressiveness on the Dynamics of Competitive Populations. Acta Biotheoretica 45 (3-4).
Duncan Macintosh (1991). Co-Operative Solutions to the Prisoner's Dilemma. Philosophical Studies 64 (3):309 - 321.
Daniel R. Gilbert Jr (1996). The Prisoner's Dilemma and the Prisoners of the Prisoner's Dilemma. Business Ethics Quarterly 6 (2):165-178.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads8 ( #123,092 of 549,090 )Recent downloads (6 months)0How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
