“Game theory” is a segment of pure mathematics. It explains the possibilities of what “rational actors” can do when there is perfect knowledge, rules are known and enforced, and actions are limited. Left unsaid is that goals are usually clear and often singular.
That works well in the math world _ obviously little of it truly applies in human social “real life” where actors are irrational, knowledge is imperfect, there are no rules, goals are multifaceted and vague. And possibilities are infinite and change instantly depending, for example, on the mood of the actors.
I worry because my young grandson is growing up in a world of video games, like all his elementary school peers, adolescents and young adults. They tend to assume their real life will resemble the electronic worlds they have continuously inhabited. They are shocked – often into semi-catatonic withdrawal – when it is not so.
A pernicious fallacy of all games is that you can start over and play under the same conditions again and again. Military organizations and whole civilizations have discovered _ to their chagrin and sometimes catastrophe _ that such is not the case. “Fighting the last war” is not a way to get better prepared for the next.
I imagine that sometime the kids will have to grow out of it, as once-upon-a-time children left fairy tales behind and even I recognized that science fiction was a limited real-world skill. All grand theories tend to crash and burn whenever a few people and life situations are involved.
HuntingtonHarborThoughts 