The Selfishness of Minds

                The book of Len Fisher, ‘Rock, Paper, Scissors’, tells about some social dilemmas an individual face everyday in the society. He lay some possible solutions, which he believes can counteract the effects of the dilemmas not only in the personal level but also to the higher level of humanity. The game theory was proposed to be an answer into understanding one’s self that can lead to preventing such dilemmas to occur.

                In his first chapter, he introduced the concept of Nash’s Equilibrium in which he prefers to call as Nash’s Trap. This theory was proposed by John Nash, a mathematician, before he suffered schizophrenia. Also, in this chapter, the Prisoner’s Dilemma was mentioned where he gave the story of the prisoners, Bernard and Frank, as an example. Both of the prisoners were placed in a situation that made them decide for their own best interest. This example defined the Nash’s Trap in which, it is a theory where a person acts or decides base on what he/she can benefit from it. Some other examples were also given to emphasize the point of this theory and the Prisoner’s Dilemma.

                For the second chapter, the concept of ‘I cut and you choose’ was discussed. He pointed out that to promote cooperation, this strategy can work well. Fairness can be observed in this concept since the other party is let to decide to choose between the two concepts that the other party have decided to make. The principle of Minimax was also mentioned where it was defined as looking at a situation to see how much you might lose and then planning a way to minimize that loss. I personally like this concept because it offers a way to having a choice in a situation in which you are left with no choice but to lose in whichever option you will follow.

                The third chapter consists of the Seven Dilemmas, the author believes to be existing in the society. One of which is the Prisoner’s Dilemma which was discussed in the first chapter, the other six are ‘The Tragedy of the Commons’, ‘The Free Rider’, ‘Chicken’, ‘The Volunteer’s Dilemma’, ‘The Battle of the Sexes’ and ‘The Stag Hunt’. Each of this was discussed by giving examples and life scenarios in which the author was able to observe these dilemmas.

                The Tragedy of the Commons is when an individual thinks of an idea, for instance, buying a food for the week to prevent any long lines in a supermarket for a particular holiday. This concept comes in when other people also have this thought or idea, leading to the massive buyers in the supermarket. The concept of The Free Rider is when an individual take advantage of the resource of the community without contributing to it. An example for this could be the corrupt politicians. They usually keep money from the account of the government, even in such small amounts, thinking that this will not be noticed and could not affect the country’s fund. But then, other politicians might have this same idea leading to a big amount of funds lost. In this way, the politicians were able to benefit with the resource but they did not give back what they have acquired to the community. As for the concept for ‘Chicken’, it is when each party tries to push each other, expecting that the opposite party will back down. An example can be found from the introduction of this book about the one-lane road in which the two cars from different directions tried to pass on the one-lane expecting that the other will move back, giving way to the other car. But due to this thinking of both sides, the other cars start to accumulate on each side of the lane, making traffic in the area. The Volunteer’s Dilemma is when in a particular group, everybody thinks that at least one of them will volunteer to do the task but are not willing to do it themselves. A good example is in a sinking boat where a person must sacrifice itself to save the others. In this scenario, the volunteers lose out. For The Battle of the Sexes, this concept is defined as the differences in the preferences between two people, the book stated an example between a husband and a wife. The husband would want to go to a ball game while the wife wants to go to a movie. Each of them would prefer to leave their preferences to share the other’s so that they can will not go by their own ways. And lastly, The Stag Hunt is about having an alliance that can have a good chance of success with a high-return venture but when an individual goes to its own way of winning, there is a guaranteed winning with lower reward.

                The remaining chapters talked about some ways as to how to prevent the occurrence of such scenarios. These dilemmas do not just affect a personal life but can be expanded to some of the worldwide problems such as the global warming and wars. To prevent such, the author suggested that cooperation is a very important connection between each and everyone. To establish such connection, trust is needed and that selfishness can be eliminated from the minds of the people.

                Overall, the book was fun to read. It can be understandable to everyone and the thoughts of the author were well delivered through his writing. The words he used were simple and easy to comprehend and are not very technical. He established his purpose in the introduction as to why this book was written. It is about the bad situations a person can encounter in their daily lives, and some ways in how to get out of them.