blonde poker forum

Hypothetical scenario:

You and your mate have had a wild moment and committed a serious offence.

You're nicked, as is your mate. You are about to be spoken to by D.I. Plod, he knows you've done it but can't prove it.

You don't know what your friend is going to do, no prior arrangement for how deal with the police, there will be no chance of interaction.

If you both stay silent or deny the crime, you both go free.

If you admit it and your mate denies the offence you will be rewarded for your co-operation and set free, he will go down for a long time. The reverse is also true if he admits and you deny.

If you both admit the offence you don't get a reward but get sent down for a short time.


Q What would you do, admit or stay silent.

(I know there are unrealistic facts involved and it ignores certian rules of evidence but they are the facts in this situation, no other issues to be considered other than desore for freedom)

This is the prisoner's dilemma but you have it slightly wrong. In your scenario you obv just deny it and you both go free.

Both denying should carry a penalty. In which case you should admit to it.

It is that dilemma, though there is no penalty for both denying the offence. I am using Warburton's scenario and he thinks your wrong.
How do you know the other is going to deny the offence?

You're both wrong. It's actually the traveller's dilemma but he forgot to tell us how many suitcases there are while giving us a lot of superfluous information about being nicked.

Or it's the Whopper with Cheese, in which case...

zomg where is the mthr-fkin cheese.

I was trying to give Thomas something to think about other than s Ms Black's music video art or not.

STEAL

It's not original G2L, I know that, I said so above. 3 posters, none nailing their colours to the mast

its the gavvers, always keep schtum

Just caught on Rups, I thought your were accusing me of plagarism.

Steal in DOND is always the right choice.

Why wouldn't you deny it when you know you'll both get away with it if you both deny?

Denying results in either: going free or jail for long time
Admitting results in either jail for long time or jail for short time

Therefore you should deny.

A good decision in real life but it's these facts that matter.

+1

I can't believe that programme had more than a few episodes aired. It really should have just been a few eps of steal/steal and them realising the whole thing was pointless.

Misread

Ah yes sorry. The admit/deny terminology confused me lol.

Admit to it. You either go free or get a short jail term. Denying results in either going free or a long jail term.

That's obv the game theory answer and doesn't take into account real life stuff such as not grassing on your mates etc.

Does that effect your answer?

Originally, i.e. not by me, it was asked as a purely philosophical question but interesting how game theory can creep in.

I hope I read and got it right that time. I shouldn't reply to math topics whilst i'm half asleep lol

Well yeah in real life you might trust your friend to do the right thing.

Golden Balls is perhaps a simpler to understand example. If I made the final of that against someone I consider a friend I would happily split the money even though strategically it is the wrong choice. Against anyone else i'd steal.

(These cases all assume a single playing of the game of course. Repeated plays make split/deny the correct choice)

In your prisoner's dilemma when both parties keep quiet and serve a small sentence it is still considered to be a "win". (With the getting no sentence and the other guy going down for a long stretch being "win more")

In Robert's dilemma when both parties keep quiet and serve no sentence it is also a "win."
The theory should be no different as when the other guy goes down for a long stretch in Robert's dilemma and you go free, it is still a "win more" as a reward is mentioned.

I said DOND earlier, thanks for not flaming me peeps, I meant Jaspers awful output GB.

Actually i've changed my mind again.

You'd deny.

The fact that you both go free for denying is key. Unless you're trying to get each other sent down there's no reason to admit to it as you both know that denying results in going free.

The only way to "win" at the game should be from admitting/defecting/stealing. That isn't the case in your scenario.

How much do you trust your mate?
Does he trust you?

Id grass him up and walk free!

In real life you'd keep quiet because it's real life. Pride, self respect and all that.

Even from a completely selfish point of view the game theory goes out the window because there is massive potential for untold negative consequences in the "win more" scenarios. (ie, folk don't like people who grass)

"no other issues to be considered other than desire for freedom"

I would do a proper forum quote but there is a horrible typo there.

Can you clear something up then with regard to "being rewarded for your co-operation and set free"

Is the reward being set free, or are we rewarded in some other manner as well as being set free.

If the latter, does "no other issues to be considered other than desire for freedom" mean that we should discount this reward?

There will be an unquantified reward as well as being set free.

If freedom is my total desire, I would be tempted to discount the reward, wouldn't you?

If I'm told that freedom is my only desire (as I believe is the case here) then I would have no choice but to discount the reward from the decision making process would I not?

The original dilema included the reward, me thinks it is a red herring or included to make a point.

Is immediate freedom the total desire? In which case the length of sentence would also be irrelevant.

This would bring about a scenario where admitting you and the other guy did it would guarantee the other guy loses his freedom, and your freedom is dependant on his answer.

Staying silent would guarantee the other guy wins his freedom, our freedom still being dependant on his answer.

While staying silent looks better, if we're strictly only concerned with our immediate freedom then there's no answer better than the other.




If we are considering the length of sentence, then the lose scenario from staying silent is worse than the lose scenario from admitting the crime. We should therefore admit the crime/betray our pal

Losing less and (if we're counting the reward) winning more is pushing us from one direction and pulling us from another towards admit the crime/betray our pal.
Take away the push and you still have the pull.

Nowhere does it say that "immediate" freedom is the total desire. However my conclusion would be based on the fact that there is a finite span of life.

The tables taken from the wikipedia page on the prisoners dilemma.

To avoid confusion I should point out that where it says co-operate that is the equivalent of staying silent in the OP and to defect is to admit the crime/land your pal in it

(http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii177/tigmong/pris.jpg)

The quantifying of things is to illustrate a scenario whereby it may well be in the collective interest of the players to do one thing (winning 6 points in total when they both stay quiet) although they have strong incentives to do the other (admitting the crime means losing more when they lose and winning more when they win)

Take away the reward if you must, then it becomes an example of how players may have an incentive (singular) to do something that is not in their collective interests rather than incentives (plural)


The reward I think is included by whomever made your version so that then a connection to a win-lose table like the one above is more intuitive.

The "win" now is to go free (rather than a very short sentence in the original) and the "win more" can mean winning (more!) money (in the original, "win more" is to go free immediately)

I think there is a logical error in there, somewhere but my brain is to addled at 2.30am, though a good night's sleep my leave it in the same condition, I will read your post again. However I would like a simple admit or silence from you eventually.

At least it has kept you off youtube looking for "art"

I'd deny, win win.

If my mate denies aswell we can go free but if he admits I can go play pool, watch TV, play cards and win lodsa packs of cigs (I don't smoke but will trade them for luxury items) and enjoy free meals on Cameron's dime.

Only downside is that I'd have to shave my hair off to look hard and ugly but for all the perks listed it would probably be worth it.

One of my best friends went to prison for a long time for something he didn't do.

One of his mates did it, but my mate refused to grass him up.

The logic behind my friends behaviour totally baffled me, if his mate was a real friend, when he saw that his friend was going down for something he did, he would have confessed.

So why protect someone who isn't a true friend?

Keep shctum, then fuk him up when you get out if he don't do the same.

LOLz at BH looking hard if he shaved his head, can't see it, but maybe.

FML @ wiki page about this.

Given me a headache and I'm less than 10% through it.

From Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosphy

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/prisoner-dilemma/

(http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii177/tigmong/pd2.jpg)

(http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii177/tigmong/pd3.jpg)

So what this is saying, is that your dilemma where T is greater than or equal to R. (being set free with reward greater than or equal to being set free with no reward - where we may not count the reward as being something that matters) does not change the nature of the dilemma.

ie that in choosing to confess you can only benefit yourself and by choosing to stay silent you can only benefit the other guy (while exposing yourself to the risk of S) and so the rational desicion for the individual is always to confess.

The paradox being that if both players make this rational individual decision they are worse off than if they both made the irrational individual desicion.