Question

A. Explain the Prisoner's Dilemma.

B. According to Robert Axelrod, how does cooperation emerge in a population of agents playing an iterated prisoners dilemma game?

Answer 1

A). Prisoner's dilemma was initially introduced by Melvin Dresher and Merrill Flood and it is and one of the components or games of the famous 'game theory'( game theory explains about the interaction and cooperation between two rational individuals which can applied in science ,social sciences , political science etc) the prisoner's dilemma tries to explain why two individuals with similar mindsets and same goals don't cooperate each in an organisation even if they want to do it in every possible way.in this the two extremely rational individuals calculate about their own benefits and apprehensions at every stage of the game . For example take telecom industry when all are working at the same for the same money one company suddenly offers services at a cheaper rate by doing lots of advertisements in order to reach out to the people and maximise profits there by compelling the others to do the same hence a dilemma arises out of this whole phenomenon .

B).When Robert Axelrod discovered that TIT FOR THAT won the tournament twice (he conducted the tournament among the game theories of prisoner's dilemma) he analysed it .He understood they 'being equivalent' to your opponent both in your vengeance and cooperation will fetch good results in the game .One shouldn't try to over someone by retaliating more or supporting too much to any individual ,he must give what he gets is the spirit of this approach.in his research he understood some occasions and termed them as "don't be envious", ' Being nice', Don't be too clever are some of the quotes he used to emphasise the need of cooperation in the game .So through his works we can say cooperation developed between two rational individuals only when two act wisely and not try to overreach each other at any stage ,he says trying to surpass your counterpart will only result in breaking the realtions but not in building the cooperation.