Theory of the Games: conditioning the past and shaping the future

(To Gino Lanzara)
25/09/17

Forecasts are extremely difficult. Especially on the future. (Niels Bohr)

Speaking of science, of course, have come to think of subjects such as chemistry or physics, but not on subjects such as Political Science; this is because science is a method based on logical arguments to experimental evidence to be able to understand how the world of things and people work. The scientific method therefore applies also to politics as to physics, bearing in mind that politics remains animated by non-occasional choices.

Like particles, people interact, but strategically: this is the juice of "Theory of the Games". In spite of the name that it brings, then Game Theory is a true science that uses complex mathematical forms to analyze and study how each subject involved interactively in a competition can generate strategies and work out the most appropriate decisions to maximize both its own and others' own actions. Interesting may be the distinction, lost in translation, between the English terms game (game-problem) and play (Game-function). The theory deals with games, so a game that only indicates an interaction of choice in which there is no full control of the results determined by the actions of a single subject but by a plurality of independent agents.

Upstream of an analytical / descriptive phase, one finds balancing strategies that can invest a large constellation of situations, according to a rational one that a player reacts to the different circumstances, resulting in what appears to be the best action plan according to deductible conjectures, both in rational hypotheses based on the knowledge of others (strategic reasoning), or according to inductions based on feedback. The TdG can therefore be interpreted as a label for a very simple concept: people do what they consider to be in their best interests, so beware of how others might react if they choose to do something instead of another.

Observing how the interests of the various actors are intersecting or colliding is fundamental to evaluating the potential outcomes of a decision-making process; in order to be able to form an idea of ​​how people will behave, it is necessary to calculate approximately what they think about the situation and what they intend to derive, so predicting events also makes it possible to predict what will happen by modifying the idea that others have formed about events. In summary, it is possible to use the same logic to advance to predictions, to shape the future by adopting a rational attitude, beginning to look at the surrounding reality through the eyes of others, and by setting optimism in human nature; even a person like Mother Theresa of Calcutta can be subject to the theoretician of the games and paradoxically this can help us understand how apparently diametrically opposed roads such as her and that of a suicidal attacker can be equally rational and strategically sensible. Resign yourself: the theoretical dG, in its rationality, inevitably shows the crude and less acceptable aspects of the human soul.

The TdG is presented under two main variants: the TdG cooperative, systematized by Von Neumann and Morgenstern, which in its conceptual originality should have allowed a constant anticipation of moves and countermoves, but based on a conditioning limit based on the axiom that every commitment would be honored according to an optimistic zero-sum cooperative spirit , and the different typology hypothesized by John Nash, who shifted attention to the innate propensity that people have to NOT collaborate with each other. In non-co-operative games, promises do not mean something, for lying is in itself a strategy that, however, can force the negotiation of the very high costs due to the need to create precise warning. Rational choices involve risk assessment and the consideration of costs and benefits, often difficult to define, which can be a major impediment to the definition of a rational choice, with the consequence of having to often make decisions whose consequences are out of step , as in foreign policy. Rationality means doing what is best suited to pursuing one's own interest, but what these interests must or must be is not always rationality to establish it, so it remains to be defined when the behaviors actually taken in the field of irrationality, considering that often, some of them, seemingly meaningless, have meaning instead.

Logical inconsistency is not allowed, and theorists prefer to use mathematical language, because they lack misunderstandings and mistaken plurality of meanings. In games like Mastermind, it is in the very nature of the game to confront logic by adopting the best possible system for probing beliefs; the information gathered during the game accumulates and, recording the information on what is true and what is false, progressively eliminates options by proceeding to the correct view of the solution, as the difference between knowledge and conviction is established. It is not logical to give credit to persuasions refuted by objective events, and the understanding of the inconsistency of beliefs and actions is in determining the incentives that induce people to bluff: in order to shape the future, it is therefore necessary to find the right incentives for people not to they lie or believe in the lies they say. Getting good results is therefore reduced to combining actions and beliefs by exploiting information that generates coherence between what people think and do, as in Mastermind.

One of the highlights of the TdG is that the future can be conditioned if it does not cause the past, more often than it does not happen. It's kind of inverted causality crucial to the way the theorists deal with the problems to look ahead to the latest outcome, going in contrast with conventional conventional thought. Considering that armed races caused conflicts, it is agreed to control the production of war to consolidate the prospects of peace by limiting the number of victims in case of war, without taking into account that this is not the inspirational principle, because what you want is making war less likely, and reducing the potential of arsenals is not needed. In this way, both in war and peace comes into action the principle of endogeneity: By using arms control agreements, you assume the responsibility of a number of higher risks than it does not seem, and neglecting reversed causality leads to incorrect predictions on the foreseeable future by reinforcing the idea that correlation it is not causality, and the logic of reversed causality means that the cases that are being observed are only partial samples.

What matters is that choosing the most convenient way to act, in the practice of predicting and shaping the future, also depends on recognizing what are the obstacles present to achieve a particular result. It is no coincidence, never having a certainty that an agreement even if signed will be honored, in an economic context, attention is being taken to prevent any renegotiation. According to the TdG, no one will do their will to help someone else, which means that we all need to think about what others would do if we changed the action plan ("and if").

While historians reflect on what has happened, the game theorists dwell on what it did not happen, considering the announced consequences of the fact that it did not come as a basis for the cause of what has happened. In all games that involve a relatively small number of participants, there may be many results; This event adds a further strategic dimension since the games, in reality, have been repeatedly made by them competitors, lead to one mixed strategy, which can affect events. In this strategic form, each player opts for the actions to be carried out probabilisticly, aiming to influence what the other players expect to achieve by making it clear that the TdG does not generate puzzle jokes, but becomes a tool to replenish the surrounding reality.

What are the information needed to form reliable predictions and tactical-strategic recommendations?

It is crucial to define the questions to be answered by defining the objective and knowing all the range of choices available to the counterparty; it is necessary to know which cultural political background should be put in order to begin to set the answers to the various "and yes"But bearing in mind that they are a useful, but not essential element for shaping a political change. Once problem, options and scenarios are defined, the objective facts are evaluated according to logic; this conceptual facility, in order to offer a reliable prediction, needs to recognize every subject with an interest in influencing the outcome by evaluating, with the information available, what policy the players are conducting when they confer privately with others or what each one claims wanting, then approximating the real importance that each one attributes to the question, and calibrating the influence to be exercised in order to change the positions.

Given the amount of information available for technological advancement (and computer technology) is crucial, and the creation of algorithms is needed to organize data, and to simulate exchanges, such as in a chess or Mastermind played in multidimensionality with a number "n" of chessboard or plan, with a computer that weighs the actions of each comparing them with the others, and placing the various data on ascites and sorting according to a precise order of values. The most difficult task is to "translate" calculations for "matrices" into sentences, taking into account the interpretation of words in the face of the uniqueness of the figures.

Experimental tests have shown that the nature of the forecasts obtained with the more "technological" system does not collide with the substance of the answers provided by analysts of international situations in the ordinary way, demonstrating that access to information normally available with targeted searches provided more than reliable if compared with what developed by sector experts. Once the idea of ​​how (and where) to find information has been acquired, by identifying the wishes of the players it is possible to interpret the key to form predictions and shape the outcomes, making the predictability of choices feasible. Hitting pre-established targets and gratifying one's ego become two generally shared objectives, even if the different and subjective attribution of value leads to yielding “gains” on the one hand to acquire them on the other. The structure of the predictive game assumes choices regarding three aspects: cooperation, competition, coercion, with the added variable of the simulation put in place by the players.

The problems of foreign policy, in terms of predictability, arise in the difficulty of being able to focus players, problems and incentives. Preventing violations of international agreements helps to understand the reasons why they are committed, even if the substantial difference between business and politics it resides in the single national modes of government, less vulnerable in the presence of leadership authoritarian, on the basis of the selectorate. The principle of global village of Mcluhan, it is not unrelated to the ratio of the JPG, now more than ever sensitive to the issues raised by the media and popular perception; the algorithmic model elaborated considers both these variables, and the fact that the group that has gained the leadership is larger, the greater the chances of losing it in the absence of positive results. What is clear is that the sectoral study of specific areas is not exhaustive of the combination of practical knowledge and expertise of game theorists regarding the evaluation of the most unpredictable variables, the human decision-making process; in addition to obtaining the negotiation result, there are the various "ego" of the protagonists to be considered always in the simulation of information, evaluating and systematizing the various behaviors on the ordinate and abscissas.

The theoretician of the games to come to a predictive analysis must maintain a neutral attitude that leaves room for personal opinions and must guarantee independence and credibility of the vision, allowing logic and concrete evidence to form the elements on which to decide whether and how to attempt a different approach to initial understanding. The added value of the mathematical model, the strategic thinkingor of the TdG, lies in the fact that a logical alternative is provided to the problems envisaged, with a possible structured solution through an assessment of reality, and then finding how to act with and not against it through precise interactive sequences. The fact that players accept a deal to resolve an impasse indicates a search for a dynamic capable of breaking static, an act aimed at exploiting or modifying the perceptions that players have matured, looking at the mathematical model result step by step, to determine who is responsible for changes in positions and how to counteract those changes if they can cause negative consequences.

In the TdG any promise is affected by a "pathology"temporal incoherence, for which a player grants an irreversible benefit in the hope that the other party remembers to reciprocate it even if, almost certainly before keeping the promises made, the beneficiary will exploit it to obtain further advantages. The problems of temporal inconsistency arise, for example, in North Korea, where the failure to keep the promises about nuclear armament after the opponent has interrupted his action, does nothing but trigger a new spiral, avoidable only in the case of a new program in which, with the abandonment or the downsizing of the atomic program, the hoped-for aid arrives. The key to understanding is found in the proposed strategy, that is, if the agreements are indeed self enforcing with a valid incentive not to deviate, or whether it is a mutual but weak collaboration.

In Prisoner Dilemma the greater convenience lies in mutual co-ordination and joint co-operation rather than competition; the problem is that for each player it is much better not to cooperate if the contender chooses to do so, with the result that neither of them collaborates, resulting in a worse situation than the one predicted. One way to shape the game is to ensure that costs and benefits change directly and automatically depending on the actions chosen and undertaken by each player with a self-propelled strategy that will allow for strong and continuous interest sharing, emphasizing the assessment of the interests that focus on a given problem, evaluation it gives always the opportunity to take the best steps alternative to ensure optimum results.

The always possible violations of the agreements, allow us to introduce two technical elements not just: the statistics, with her estimate of maximum likelihood, which identifies the various factors that might cause the contraversion, and the paradox of the past evaluation. The utility of such an analysis allows to verify the existence of abnormal signals in past times that had not been verified, and allows it to verify its risk assessment capability even at a time after a possible repeat of particulars warning. The paradox of past evaluation therefore helps evaluate the present. The prediction of the unpredictable, in its apparent banality, is the most difficult rock to overcome.

Mathematical models may fail for three fundamental reasons: logic fails to grasp what people really think about when making decisions; information entered as data in the template is incorrect and therefore results in unreliable results; events outside the reference frame change the situation by offsetting the ratio of the set model. Obviously, there are many good (and also bad) reasons to be skeptical about attempts to model the future; beyond the possible bugs there is a limit to the fact that these are models and not real facts, although it is to be considered that, for this reason, there is always a margin of improvement. Adding complexity is justified only when the improvement in reliability is greater than the cost represented by the increase in hypotheses, according to principle of parsimony; the models follow the conceptual and technological evolution, becoming more and more dynamic because, in fact, the discovery process is infinite: the progress of scientific knowledge always improves the human condition and the drive towards luddism only allows the transfer of knowledge to others.

The TdG, a time-honored daughter in every field, is a young science with several "noble fathers": John von Neumann, the "outsider" of the Manhattan Project, Oskar Morgenstern, the versatile economist, John Nash (photo), genial and schizophrenically crazy mathematician1, have brought this discipline to dimensions that do not endear to wonder for the conceptual amplitude that leads to being at least one step ahead of what is reality; a science that, by revealing principles that allow to give an interpretative key in a predictive sense for understanding the political phenomena of the contemporary world, allows the possibility to look to the past by interpreting it according to the canons of strategic mathematical equilibriums aimed at "reading" the future, and systematizing the mathematical constituent parameters of the events according to an algorithm that has been perfected over the last thirty years, and which has followed in symbiosis the evolution of the computer tool. When balances are confined to smaller sizes due to the difficulty of predicting the effects of interactions made by multiple players, they can now be calculated for exercises that, as in the case of Iran's nuclear capabilities development predictions, have seen the participation of more than ninety political subjects.

The human being has always tried to predict the future, to know it in order to be able to shape it according to the wishes and necessities of a changing present; once used to look at the interiors of sacrificial animals, or to interpret the auspices offered by flying flocks of birds, they now use mathematical tools and models that can lead to surprising predictions in countless areas, including the international political one.

(photo: US Navy / Présidence de la République française / KCNA / Peter Badge)

1 At the time of the Nobel delivery, in 1994, Nash, in his speech, thanked the royals of Sweden and the audience with "whenever you are all here."