Game Theory

Focal Points in Collective Free Improvisation

by Clement Canonne

To be published in Perspectives of New Music
Draft only

Making Choices in Social Situations

by Jeremy Seligman

This is work in progress, to be included in the present state in the 2011 Logic and Interactive Rationality (LIRa) yearbook, Amsterdam:
http://www.illc.uva.nl/lgc/seminar/?page_id=727

Comments very welcome

We propose a general account of decision making in social situations based on an analysis of the role of three... more We propose a general account of decision making in social situations based on an analysis of the role of three concepts: knowledge, preference and freedom of choice. The normative aspect of decision making is sharply contrasted with the descriptive aspect, as is the distinction between a priori and a posteriori rationality. As a partial validation of the analysis, we apply our account to the theory of strategic games with both pure and mixed (probabilistic) strategies, showing that the concept of a dominated strategy and Nash equilibrium are correctly predicted by more general norms. Our account is purely model-theoretic but uses discrete relational structures that are well-suited for future application of the techniques of modal logic.

COMPANHIAS DE OUTRO MUNDO: UM BREVE OLHAR SOBRE A SOCIABILIDADE EM RPGS ONLINE.

by Felippe Thomaz

"La liberté de chasser le cerf"

by Hugo Clémot

De Philosophia, vol. XV, n°1, Printemps-été 1999, p. 65-90

A partir d'une interrogation sur les relations entre liberté et déterminisme, cet écrit prétend résumer la démarche... more A partir d'une interrogation sur les relations entre liberté et déterminisme, cet écrit prétend résumer la démarche adoptée par Jean-Jacques Rousseau pour poser puis résoudre le problème dont son fameux contrat social donne la solution. La thèse soutenue est en effet que ce problème est celui de la liberté dont dispose l'individu face au déterminisme social, face aux lois qui émergent nécessairement des interactions humaines et qui précèdent et règlent tout acte individuel. En établissant la validité d'une telle affirmation, ces quelques lignes traitent du thème proposé en éclairant d'un jour nouveau la pensée politique de Rousseau en s'aidant notamment de quelques exemples empruntés à la théorie des jeux.

Pravidlá: spoločnosť¨, jazyk a racionalita (Rules: society, language and rationality)

by Ladislav Koren

IN: Teorie vědy / Theory of Science, Vol 33, No 4 (2011), pp. 591-615.

Pravidlá: spoločnosť, jazyk a racionalita

Abstrakt:

Táto kritická štúdia sa zameriava na... more Pravidlá: spoločnosť, jazyk a racionalita

Abstrakt:

Táto kritická štúdia sa zameriava na problematiku spolupráce a pravidiel, diskutovanú Jaroslavom Peregrinom v knihe Človek a pravidla (Praha: Dokořán 2011). Okrem extenzívneho exkurzu do osnovy Peregrinových hlavných myšlienok a argumentov budú systematicky analyzované niektoré kľúčové otázky patriace do tejto interdisciplinárnej teoretickej oblasti, pričom sa kriticky posúdia niektoré prvky Peregrinovho špecifického prístupu. Konkrétne, budem argumentovať, že Peregrinom preferovaná koncepcia pravidla - ako propozičného poznania, že niečo by malo (nemalo) nejako byť - nemôže dobre slúžiť jeho zámerom, ak chce udržať jeho evolučný prístup k pravidlám.

Rules: Society, Language, Rationality

Abstract:

This critical study focuses on the topic of cooperation and rules discussed in the book by Jaroslav Peregrin: Človek a pravidla [Man and Rules] (Praha: Dokořán 2011). Except of an extensive excurse into the structure of Peregrin's main ideas and arguments, it aims to provide a systematic analysis of some central issues in this interdisciplinary theoretical field, while discussing some elements of Peregrin's specific approach. In particular, it will be argued that Peregrin's preferred conception of rule - as propositional knowledge to the effect that something ought to be (or ought not to be) a certain way - cannot serve well his purposes, if Peregrin is to keep his evolutionary perspective on rules.

Spontaneous Orders and Game Theory: A Comparative Conceptual Analysis

by Nicolas Cachanosky

2010. Revista de Instituciones, Ideas y Mercados 52:52-88

This article studies the difficulties of the argument that Hayekian spontaneous orders can be modeled using game... more This article studies the difficulties of the argument that Hayekian spontaneous orders can be modeled using game theory and thus help integrate the Austrian School of economics with more mainstream economic schools
of thought. I posit that there are central aspects of Hayekian spontaneous orders that cannot be fully incorporated into game theory.

TRUSTS: Scheduling Randomized Patrols for Fare Inspection in Transit Systems

by John P. Sullivan

Co-authored with Zhengyu Yin, Albert Xin Jiang, Matthew P.Johnson, Milind Tambe, Christopher Kiekinteveld, Kevin Leyton-Brown, and Tuomas Sandholm, Emerging Application Paper at 'Twenty-Fourth Annual Conference on Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence (IAA!-12),' 2012 IAAI Conference, Toronto, Ontario (Canada), July 2012.

In proof-of-payment transit systems, passengers are legally required to purchase tickets before entering but are not... more In proof-of-payment transit systems, passengers are legally required to purchase tickets before entering but are not physically forced to do so. Instead, patrol units move about the transit system, inspecting the tickets of passengers, who face fines if caught fare evading. The deterrence of such fines depends on the unpredictability and effectiveness of the patrols. In this paper, we present TRUSTS, an application for scheduling randomized patrols for fare inspection in transit systems. TRUSTS models the problem of computing patrol strategies as a leader-follower Stackelberg game where the ob- jective is to deter fare evasion and hence maximize revenue. This problem differs from previously studied Stackel- berg settings in that the leader strategies must satisfy massive temporal and spatial constraints; moreover, unlike in these counterterrorism-motivated Stackelberg applications, a large fraction of the ridership might realistically consider fare evasion, and so the number of followers is potentially huge. A third key novelty in our work is deliberate simplification of leader strategies to make patrols easier to be executed. We present an efficient algorithm for computing such patrol strategies and present experimental results using real-world ridership data from the Los Angeles Metro Rail system. The Los Angeles Sheriff’s department has begun trials of TRUSTS.

An Economy of Physics & a Physics of the Economy?

by Frank Witte

Slides of a Talk.

These are the slides of a presentation I gave at Grinnell College as International Visiting Fellow on April 12, 2012.... more These are the slides of a presentation I gave at Grinnell College as International Visiting Fellow on April 12, 2012.

In this talk I attempt to illustrate that there is merit in studying economic questions from the perspective of physics-inspired inspired methods, for both disciplines. I argue hat questions related to the "geometry" of an economy and the measurement problem of its microscopic structure are surprisingly similar in some ways.

Monstrous Textuality: Game Fiction between Postmodernism and Structuralism

by Tamer Thabet

Linking institutions to economic performance: The role of macro-structures in micro-explanations

by Cyril Hédoin

published in the "Journal of Institutional Economics"

A merge-and-split mechanism for dynamic virtual organization formation in grids

by Lena Mashayekhy

Co-authored with Dr. Daniel Grosu

Published in: Proc. of the 30th IEEE International Performance Computing and Communications Conference (IPCCC 11), pp. , Orlando, USA, November 2011.

External Subsidies and Lasting Peace

by Phil Arena

Co-authored with Anna Pechenkina

Third parties are thought to face a tradeoff in that those actions most likely to bring peace in the short run appear... more Third parties are thought to face a tradeoff in that those actions most likely to bring peace in the short run appear least likely to ensure its long run stability. Yet the tradeoff between conflict management and conflict resolution may be overstated. Analyzing an iterated three player bargaining model with both information and commitment problems, we first demonstrate two conditions under which third parties may produce lasting peace through conditional subsidies, even without addressing underlying informational or commitment problems. Second, we illustrate this possibility by analyzing the impact of US foreign aid on patterns of conflict and peace between Israel and her neighbors. Our analysis indicates that the termination of the rivalry between Israel and Egypt was most likely not brought about by the Camp David accords or peacekeeping operations, but by sustained foreign aid provision. We discuss the implications for both this conflict and conflict management more broadly.

Videogame é droga? Controvérsias em torno da dependência de jogos eletrônicos

by Guilherme Meneses

The effort to be undertaken in this research will be mapping the practices of the various agents around the issue of... more The effort to be undertaken in this research will be mapping the practices of the various agents around the issue of video game addiction by investigating the manner in which the rhetoric of drug addiction works in the social regulation of the use of electronic games. In this sense, we’ll map the varied semantics of notions, categories or concepts of dependence and addiction, such as enunciated and practiced by the various individuals involved in the controversy: the players themselves (in its multiple gaming environments such as home, school or work), parents or people close to these players, the games industry professionals, scientists from different fields (psychiatry, psychotherapy, education, game studies), politicians, laws and news. Through the analysis of practices and discourses of the actors, articulating the dimensions of the so called "real" world and the “virtual” worlds, without, however, falling into an asymmetrical dichotomy between true and false, we intend to understand the meanings of their relationships with videogames.

Psychological game theory: a review of current literature

by Daniel Neicu

published in the Review of Business and Economic Literature, 2012, vol. 57, p. 37

Experimental evidence appears to contradict traditional game theory predictions in numerous settings. Although a solid... more Experimental evidence appears to contradict traditional game theory predictions in numerous settings. Although a solid basis for characterizing equlibria, game theory needed to – and to some extent did – go through some major developments and transgress the barriers between different social sciences to more accurately depict human behaviour in economic circumstances. Psychological game theory, first developed in the 80s, is one such advancement. By integrating beliefs directly within utility, it seeks to tie affective psychology to economic choice and thus better predict decision making. This paper reviews existing literature on psychological game theory and a strand of prospect theory relevant to emotional decision-making, and proposes further refinements and possible extensions.

Feature-Based Choice and Similarity Perception in Normal-form Games: An Experimental Study

by Sibilla Di Guida

Co-authored with Giovanna Devetag

In this paper, we test the effect of descriptive “features” on initial strategic behavior in normal form games, where... more In this paper, we test the effect of descriptive “features” on initial strategic behavior in normal form games, where the term “descriptive” indicates all those features which can be modified without altering the (Nash) equilibrium structure of a game. Our experimental subjects behaved according to some simple heuristics based on descriptive features, and we observed that these heuristics were stable even across strategically different games. These findings indicate the need to incorporate descriptive features into models describing strategic sophistication in normal form games. Analysis of choice patterns and individual behavior indicates that non-equilibrium choices may derive from incorrect and simplified mental representations of the game structure, rather than from beliefs in other players' irrationality. Of the five stationary concepts analyzed (Nash equilibrium, QRE, action sampling, cognitive hierarchy, and payoff sampling), QRE turned out to be the best in fitting the data.

Oyun Kuramının Uluslararası İlişkiler Yazınına Katkıları

by Uluslararası İlişkiler

Özgür Özdamar, " Oyun Kuramının Uluslararası İlişkiler Yazınına Katkıları ", Uluslararası İlişkiler, Cilt 4, Sayı 15 (Güz), 2007

Bu makale, oyun kuramının uluslararası ilişkilerdeki uygulamalarına bir giriş ve katkılarının tartışılması olarak... more Bu makale, oyun kuramının uluslararası ilişkilerdeki uygulamalarına bir giriş ve katkılarının tartışılması olarak tasarlamıştır. Oyun kuramının araçsal akılcı ve formel metotları kullanmasının uluslararası ilişkilerin stratejik doğasını anlamaya nasıl ve ne kadar yardımcı olduğu yazından örnekler verilerek tartışılmıştır. Buna göre, oyun kuramı son elli yılda uluslararası ilişkileri anlamamıza ve açıklamamıza büyük katkılarda bulunmuşlardır. Makale ilk olarak akılcılık belitinin bir tartışmasını yapmaktadır. Daha sonra oyun kuramının yazında nasıl kullanıldığı örnekler verilerek gösterilmiştir. Kısa bir yazın taramasını oyun kuramı kullanmanın uluslararası ilişkiler çalışmalarına katkılarının tartışıldığı bölüm izlemektedir. Son olarak kurama getirilen eleştiriler ve kuramın sınırları ve geleceği üzerine düşünceler tartışılmıştır.

[Appel à communications] de la 2ème édition de la journée d'études "Game Studies ? à la française !" intitulée "Les jeuX vidéo au pluriel. Quelles diversités ? Industries, métiers, interfaces, règles, publics, pratiques, circonstances, expériences, mémoires."

by Manuel Boutet

Bonjour,

La deuxième édition de la journée d'études "Game Studies ? à la française !" aura... more
Bonjour,

La deuxième édition de la journée d'études "Game Studies ? à la française !" aura lieu les 16 et 17 juin prochains à Paris. Cet événement est organisé par l'association OMNSH (Observatoire des Mondes Numériques en Sciences Humaines - www.omnsh.org).

Cette 2ème édition sera intitulée : "Les jeuX vidéo au pluriel. Quelles diversités ? Industries, métiers, interfaces, règles, publics, pratiques, circonstances, expériences, mémoires."

L'appel à contribution est joint. Les propositions de communications - sous forme de résumé - sont attendues pour le 10 mai.

En mai 2011 la 1ère édition de cette rencontre pluridisciplinaire a vu intervenir 22 chercheurs français de tous les horizons des sciences sociales et des sciences humaines. La 2ème édition des "Game Studies ? à la française !" en juin 2012 sera centrée sur un point de convergence qui est alors apparu : la nécessité de passer de la question DU jeu vidéo à la question DES jeuX vidéo.

N'hésitez pas à faire circuler cet appel.

Cordialement,

Manuel Boutet, pour l'OMNSH (www.omnsh.org)

Post-doctorant à l'IDHE Nanterre
Université de Paris Ouest - Nanterre La Défense

manuel@boutet.com
http://manuel.boutet.com

Experimental evidence on product adoption in the presence of network externalities

by Sujoy Chakravarty

Ill-Defined versus Precise Pre-Play Communication in the Traveler's Dilemma

by Sujoy Chakravarty

Product adoption and pricing with network externalities

by Sujoy Chakravarty