The prisoner's dilemma and the systems that resolve it
Give it a moment to consider the concept of the prisoner’s dilemma.
It’s important, because its implications play out in our lives at nearly every moment. The concept is relatively simple: with two parties there’s only one degree of freedom within which to act. Selfishly or selflessly. And we all know what choice we should make, but fear pushes us to make the wrong one, because evolution has necessarily ingrained in ourselves one fundamental drive: self preservation. And nothing, in isolation, can truly make us certain that the other person will act in the correct way, because of one salient fact: both parties must make their decision in isolation.
Perchance, give it a fair second to really consider how deeply this concept drives the decisions we make on a daily basis.
Cooperation is clearly the best outcome. But the risks, when known, make the decision that you need to make apparent and depressing. But, when you view it on a larger scale, there are solutions, and they involve the development of systems.
Organized crime figured out one way: dominion. Hijacking the motive of self preservation, it telescopes out and extends the consequences on a larger scale. The local, isolated decision of self preservation is expanded. Making the right choice the clear and necessary one, because the outcome is allowed to bleed over to self preservation on a larger scale. Your personal consequences, when known, are amplified, as well as extending to the security of your kith and kin. This solution is, naturally, a brilliant one, and its effectiveness is foolish to deny.
Nature figured out another way. It evolved love. Imagine the person sitting in the other room is not just a seedy casual criminal accomplice, but instead it’s your spouse, or child, or any central loved one inherently compelling your sensibilities of protection. With this in place, once again it’s the right choice and the self preserving one that become the same. Because to choose to cause harm to the other party now has additional consequences. Innately, the action to cause harm will now do something quite lovely: it will hurt you too. The fates of the prisoners are now tied together. Think about that a moment.
I’m not going to push you to decide on which system is better, I’ll leave that to you. But I think I know which way I’d rather lean.
The point I’m hoping you take away is this: the solution to this dilemma is the development of systems. Systems that make the right choice, and the one you’ll make, the same. Both of these explored systems are interchangeable, with the outcomes identical. But let me ask you this: which one makes you happier to think about?
W.w.
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