The Prisoner's Dilemma

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REFERENCES

[Redpill_]

Deny deny deny
Never snitch on ur homie

[ATier]

This is the Prisoners dilemma, but hey, its a paradoxing theory,

A THEORYYY!
Thanks for watching

...

Sorry had to do this.

[Haru-gbgh]

If a cop told me I'd walk free if I pinned the crime on my partner I'd think he was lying his ass off in order to attain information.

[ketansharma]

Joker: We really should stop this fighting, otherwise we'll miss the fireworks!

Batman: There won't *be* any fireworks!

[MindYourDecisions]

I liked the video overall and interesting to hear about the research! One question: is it just me, or is the payoff matrix at 0:45 off? In the textbook version, if you confess while the other person denies, you should be rewarded with 0 years while the person who denies serves 3 years as punishment. I think the payoffs in the upper left and lower right are transposed for the two players. Anyone else notice this, or did I confuse myself?

The matrix in the video it seems like deny is a dominant strategy for both players--it should be that confess is the dominant strategy, so they end up serving 2 years instead of the 1 years if both had stayed silent.

[jaimiedickinson]

I love paradoxes and topics like these! Great video and i look forward to seeing more videos like this in the future!

[stval]

Humans: Smart enough to conceptualise prisoner's dilema, too stupid to learn from it.

[ThatShyGuyMatt]

I'm blind, can you please add subtitles so I can hear the video better?

[evetteandrea]

I love these videos! Please do more brain teasers, and riddles in the future! Anyone with me? 😂

[oathblade]

Thank you for linking the survey. Ive been enjoying PBS programming for my entire life - I was very glad to have a chance to say thank you.

[doctorbobstone]

+BrainCraft I believe your table and accompanying description don't demonstrate the paradox. You said that if you confess and I deny, then you go to prison, but that case is supposed to be the reverse. Your "confession" is basically, "We did it, but he was the mastermind and you should let me go free."

If you don't reverse those 0/3 and 3/0 cases, then there's no paradox, because I have no selfish motive to ever confess. If I pick Deny, I will always be strictly better off. With the fix, then the paradox actually shows up. If we both deny, we do okay (1 year) but there's always that selfish incentive for one of us to defect getting 0 and giving the other 3 years... unless we both defect, in which case, we both get 2 years.

So, yeah, either you reversed it, or I just listened to your explanation 5 or 6 times and can't understand it in a way which matches what I said and which shows the paradox. (Or maybe I'm confused, who knows...)

[PsychShrew]

Just deny. you either get 0 or 1 year, instead of 2 or 3. Besides, the other person is just as likely to deny, and you will only spend 1 year, as opposed to 2 years if you both confess.

[DavidWillanski]

A few years ago, I heard this done as a radio game show. Two callers got the choice to either share or steal the prize money. If they both share, they get half each. If they both steal, they get nothing. If one shares and one steals, the one who stole got it all. And they got to discuss it before deciding...

Every time (at least, that I heard the game being played), they tried to convince each other that sharing was the best option, and then both chose steal. It was probably the cheapest radio game show ever, as far as paying out prizes went.

[Bobbenissimo]

The numbers are switched. In fact, is it supposed to be the other way around between the confess/confess and deny/deny. Confess/Confess should give 1/1 and the other 2/2. Otherwise we just both deny. I'm sorry BrainCraft, but you made a mistake in the video!

[copycat]

Didn't you exchange the sentences for contradictory confessions? In this case it should seem obvious for both people to deny...

[ClaudiaSketches]

There was a game show I watched (I think it might've been called Golden Balls ?) that has a similar dilemma. Money is earned throughout the show and the two contestants at the end have to choose whether they will "share" the prize money or "steal"- take it all for themselves. If both choose to "steal" neither get any money. Before choosing their answers they try and psych each other out, or try and gain trust. It still surprised me how many times I saw people choose "steal" when it was mutually beneficial for them both to choose "share"... And I'd imagine there would be some kind of public shaming involved in taking all the money for yourself too. The game show itself was terrible but that part was interesting!

[cimmik]

Very interesting video. I've heard of this dilemma here on youtube before, but you dig much more knowledge up than most other.
Who made the music for this video?

[seemslegit]

Shouldn't the 3 and the 0 be switched in the drawing? Because what I get now is that no matter what, both will get 1 year? Since it's about rational thinking, prisoner 1 will have his best outcome when denying (either 0 or 1) as does player 2. So since both will deny, they get 1 year?

[gvs]

How has nobody pointed out that the example @0:44 is wrong?
I mean, it's a correct example of a dominant strategy, both choosing deny, but there is no real dilemma. The best individual choice is also the best group choice. Both are better off choosing deny.
The REAL dilemma comes when choice A yields the best group result (if both choose A), but choice B yells the better result for each participant individually (if the other chooses A), which leads to both choosing B, when the both would've been better of choosing A.
It's the most basic example of game theory...

[felipeybarra]

Saw "Prisoner's Dilemma" and immediately thought Zero Escape series.