Two people are accused of a crime and must either confess to the crime or remain quiet. They are put in separate rooms, if one testifies and not the other, then the person who confesses is free and the other goes to jail for 10 years. If they both confess they each spend five years in jail. If they both keep quiet they each serve 1 year for other minor crimes. So it looks like this:
Confess Keep Silent
Confess 5/5 0/10
Keep Silent 10/0 1/1
When my new prof proposed this question he immediately labeled confession as the most rational choice. This symbolizes human rationality and collective irrationality. Acting individually despite the needs of the larger whole or "the tragedy of the commons," as it was explained to our class.
When I first looked at it, I immediately saw a combined two year sentence as the result of mutual silence to be the most profitable for both parties and therefore the most rational. But when I raised my hand to protest, he gave me an answer similar to this:
"No matter what a suspect believes his partner is going to do, is is always best to confess. If the partner in the other cell is not confessing, you would be free instead of serving 1 year if both were not confessing. If the partner in the other cell is confessing, you will both serve 5 instead of him being free and you serving 10 years. You are far better assuming the other person is going to act according to their self-interests."
My roommate and I were talking about "The Game," and I was trying to see if she thought human nature was inherently selfish or altruistic. By this I was just assuming that whichever was natural was right or the best, because if we were designed to be altruistic it would benefit the common good, but maybe we were designed to be selfish for independent survival. She without hesitating, explained that she determined human nature to be self serving but that this was wrong. We had evolved in a way that changed our natural desire to fulfill basic needs into a skewed vision of what is necessary for survival or "happiness" and developed an excessive thirst for money and basically materialistic junk. Ava thought the human race was failing and this is because we do not consider the bigger picture as we make our daily choices. The thought of doing so seems pretty futile when the rest of society is seemingly working against you.
Ava has a delightful way of expressing opinions on topics that I've spent hours/days/months trying to even understand, as if it has always been apparent to her or is just completely obvious. My friend from D.C. had explained to me that he didn't think it was beneficial to actively pursue "the common good" because it actually alienates you from the rest of society. He thought our civilization is actually set up so if you were to act and sacrifice in order to be aligned with the greater good of mankind as a whole and the health of our planet (what exactly both of those entail are not obvious to me) you would be so far removed from "mainstream" society that you would actually end up suffering from it. Ava explained to me, "I don't want to live my life in vain." And honestly, that makes perfect sense, why dedicate your life to a failure?
My only question is, if "the life of man, [is] solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" what other cause is worthy of dedication at all?
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