Mindscape 164 | Herbert Gintis on Game Theory, Evolution, and Social Rationality

Рет қаралды 16,634

2 жыл бұрын

Patreon: / seanmcarroll
Blog post with audio player, show notes, and transcript: www.preposterousuniverse.com/...
How human beings behave is, for fairly evident reasons, a topic of intense interest to human beings. And yet, not only is there much we don’t understand about human behavior, different academic disciplines seem to have developed completely incompatible models to try to explain it. And as today’s guest Herb Gintis complains, they don’t put nearly enough effort into talking to each other to try to reconcile their views. So that what he’s here to do. Using game theory and a model of rational behavior - with an expanded notion of “rationality” that includes social as well as personally selfish interests - he thinks that we can come to an understanding that includes ideas from biology, economics, psychology, and sociology, to more accurately account for how people actually behave.
Herbert Gintis received his PhD in economics from Harvard University. After a long career as professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, he is currently a professor at Central European University and an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. His book Schooling in Capitalist America, written with frequent collaborator Samuel Bowles, is considered a classic in educational reform. He has published books and papers on economics, game theory, sociology, evolution, and numerous other topics.
Mindscape Podcast playlist: • Mindscape Podcast
Sean Carroll channel: @Sean Carroll
#podcast #ideas #science #philosophy #culture

Пікірлер: 54

@mainsequence5712 Жыл бұрын

Replaying this episode now. Such a great conversation. Rest in peace mr Gintis.

@p.seetharaman6407 2 жыл бұрын

Greatly enjoyed the conversation! Explained the limitations of the rational actor model as it is embraced today yet emphasizing the importance of its mathematical backbone for appropriate game theoretic extensions to correctly reflect human behavior.

@tookie36 2 жыл бұрын

Yay! A video on the origins of psychohistory :)

@cariolast3761 2 жыл бұрын

That was a great conversation. Thank you.

@Mike-ig7cb 2 жыл бұрын

Enjoying the podcast. My only suggestion (take it with what it's worth) would be do the ads/sponsors at the beginning or end of the video in order to not interrupt the flow/intrigue of the conversation.

@TheFuzzician 2 жыл бұрын

Definitely. Getting interrupted every 20 minutes is distracting. Putting them in the beginning (or end) would be much better.

@deansundquist9601 2 жыл бұрын

Even better, you can get 0 ads if you become a patreon supporter. Just sayin’

@shaun906 2 жыл бұрын

@@TheFuzzician I pay for premium... but I've heard you can use a ad blocker

@Mike-ig7cb 2 жыл бұрын

@@deansundquist9601 I'm talking about the ads he reads a few minutes into the podcast. I'll be consuming free on youtube.

@TheFuzzician 2 жыл бұрын

@@shaun906 Yea, this is about the ads during the podcast itself. No adblock can help with that one.

@steve112285 2 жыл бұрын

In the honesty game (around 46m), if I were player B, I'd choose the box that player A says has less money. If they're telling the truth, they get the box with more money, as a reward for their honesty. If they're lying, they get the box with less money, as a punishment for their dishonesty.

@vanessacherche6393 2 жыл бұрын

That is a solid reasoning, i never considered the player b move in that situation... Good way to play in the long run.

@tarmon768 2 жыл бұрын

Such a great conversation. Thank you

@_ARCATEC_ 2 жыл бұрын

Insightful Episode 💓 Thanks Sean and Herbert🐜

@scrubjay93 Жыл бұрын

Enjoyed this engaging discussion!

@thewiseturtle 2 жыл бұрын

Maslow, and other developmental psychologists have shown how human brains move through many different levels of attention, starting with serving the body's input and output needs, and then moving to immediate companion's needs, and then moving outward to the larger community's needs, and, if we're lucky, onto existential needs for life as a whole over time. These four general levels are what we call physical, emotional, intellectual, and philosophical forms of thinking. As our environment meets our needs at the lower levels, we feel more and more comfortable and curious about expanding our attention to larger and larger circles of individuals' needs. And as our environment fails to meet our needs, we feel more and more uncomfortable, and slide down ever more, into a physical survival state, where no one else's needs can matter. This is where most of us humans end up thinking most of the time, given our current insanely anti-social society, where competition and point score collecting games are the norm.

@ahad2k11 2 жыл бұрын

This guy is crazy, and I'm totally here for it!

@naturallaw1733 2 жыл бұрын

enjoyed it very much.👍

@seionne85 Жыл бұрын

Herb may have left us, but his contributions will live on. Rest in peace

@Annibals 2 жыл бұрын

Hi Sean, better if on KZfaq the podcast is uploaded as video; you'd get a greater reach and make far more people involved in the subject

@user-qf3lq4zj8g 2 жыл бұрын

Yes, there are several *Music Visualizer Tools* that automatically create interesting videos based on sounds.

@Life_42 Жыл бұрын

I am young, being inspired by this episode and channel!

@vorador4365 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Juan

@dahveed72 2 жыл бұрын

I love caroll in these non physics discussions. He always asks the questions i myself want to ask the guest.

@Mrmarshrandy 2 жыл бұрын

Dang you smart. 95% of hes questions i would not think of ever haha.

@teapot_ 2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Sean found that very interesting and thought provoking. I was wondering if you or Herbert had any thoughts on why people get set in their ways, because it's passed on or some other reason. As you both mentioned, the internet gives us a wealth of resources to help us make informed decisions, from peer revenues papers. But some people still refuse to use that information?

@7star7storm7 2 жыл бұрын

My humble opinion.. our psychology is susceptible to forming grooves ,either mentally or behavioural .. the longer we spend in a groove the deeper it gets worn .. Habitual creatures that find it hard to create new grooves and remove old ones

@teapot_ 2 жыл бұрын

@@7star7storm7I came across this after doing some research. The New Yorker, "why facts don't change our minds". It was writen in 2008, but I thought it gave an insight into what's going on. We become convinced of something and refuse (I think that's the correct term), to accept what we may have learnt, could be wrong. So continue infinitum.

@7star7storm7 2 жыл бұрын

@@teapot_ kzfaq.info/get/bejne/o9mmgriGzNyanWw.html

@naturallaw1733 2 жыл бұрын

there's also the Physiological aspect of how our ideas, beliefs affect our Emotions, Feelings, Mental State, Mood etc.

@michaeldao2249 2 жыл бұрын

@18:17 Heidegger is rolling over in his grave "why does nobody read me!?"

@enisten 2 жыл бұрын

In physics, a potential function exists if and only if the force field is conservative, i.e. curl-free. So, maybe a utility function also exists if and only if some conditions are satisfied?

@virkotto8651 10 ай бұрын

Rest in peace.

@PilsnerGrip 2 жыл бұрын

The big variable that's missing from the Dictator (ultimatum) game is, where is the pool of money coming from, but that's just my gut reaction, gonna read up more on it right now

@naturallaw1733 2 жыл бұрын

why does that matter?

@paxdriver 2 жыл бұрын

"It's not how much the stakes are, it's the unevenness that bothers people enough to act irrationally out of spite, not the amounts" That is a really profound realization from the splitting $10 game

@justdata3650 2 жыл бұрын

You vote because, let's use the number he used, 40k, because your effect on the outcome of the election is 1/40k - WHICH IS NON-ZERO - and while that in itself is not much it is no less than any other individual's influence assuming a lack of shenanigans in the process. I don't see this being a hard question to answer but all in all, a great talk and very interesting and I learned a lot so not bashing the guy at all.

@bbd9719 2 жыл бұрын

He kind of sounds like Danny DeVito

@WitzyZed 2 жыл бұрын

Dr. Gintis Toboggan, perhaps?

@johnphil2006 2 жыл бұрын

Please bring Julian Barbour here to hear more.

@derschutz4737 Жыл бұрын

RIP

@DrDress 2 жыл бұрын

47:00 Doesnt player B ever choose the box with less money, to recipricate the fairness?

@TheFuzzician 2 жыл бұрын

The Dictator Game has a serious flaw, because the amount of money is too low. Imagine if the game was played with 10,000 dollars instead. If i offer you 2,000, would you really pass up just to be an asshole? What about 1 million dollars in the game? If we play, and I offer you 100k, most people would accept, because only a fool would pass up such a large amount of money. It comes down to a conflict between an internal sense of right and wrong, vs the amount of money in question. Punishing the greedy behavior will be worth passing up a few bucks, but once the amount gets high enough, it will override that instinct.

@naturallaw1733 2 жыл бұрын

I think you will be very surprised to see it still happen even with Higher amounts of Money. something about Greediness and Selfishness really cuts us deep at the core... might be imbedded deep in our Subconscious from Evolutionary Survival?

@TheFuzzician 2 жыл бұрын

@@naturallaw1733 Certainly, I could imagine someone from an honor-based culture would pass up a lot more money in order to punish the greed. Alternatively, someone deeply religious might do so as well, thinking they will be rewarded in some kind of afterlife.

@charlesalexanderable 2 жыл бұрын

58:43 you only need two bits and maybe a pause for denoting the end of communication unambiguously (morse code), so this doesn't necessarily follow that monkies with 6 articulations can't achieve rich communication. We also might have evolved articulatory apparatus more for luring animals in hunting and stuff (some forms of autism have shown apparent recidivism to this), and parrots and some songbirds have it as well. We know with sign language we don't even need the vocal articulatory apparatus at all (though that requires diverting visual attention which is a big downside for communication).

@melekhine 2 жыл бұрын

You're missing his point. He's not saying monkeys can't achieve rich communication. Of course they could conceivably develop sign language or codes in their grunts. They do utilize simple signals in that way. And if they needed to develop that into language in order to specialize in cooperative hunting (like humans did), their grunts would gradually become more varied and reproductive reward for more effective communication would select for monkeys with progressively lower larynxes.

@tassomat0r 2 жыл бұрын

Do you know that historically there have been 2 completely different schools of economics that use different methodologies and frameworks? You always invite guests representing mainstream Keynesian economics ideas but never invite anyone representing the Austrian School of Economics, which would give you a very different story of what's going on (like Copenhagen vs Everett). It would be cool if at least once you invited someone like Bob Murphy from the Mises institute to have a real economics talk. The best treatise on Economics in the 20th century was written in 1949 by Ludwig Von Mises and was way ahead in its analysis of even today's Keynesians (for example explains why the concept of rational actors in Keynesian economics is nonsense that makes it impossible to explain anything happening in the real world and advocates for a completely different approach). If you want to learn the real stuff in economics, have an Austrian like Guido Hulsmann or Bob Murphy!

@melekhine 2 жыл бұрын

The only problem with that idea is the only way to get invited on the Mindscape Podcast as a conservative, economic or otherwise, is apparently to reshape and integrate entire fields of science Professor Carrol is interested in, then write several reknowned books about it.

@sarthakmunda3914 2 жыл бұрын

This guest talked about some interesting things, I found certain of his ideas very intriguing, but on many occasions he also sounded very full of himself - this group of people think this is how it happened and the other group thinks this is what happened. But they're both wrong, I will tell you what happened... Like the part about weapons leading to language (I don't think there is ever that clear cause and effect situation in human development historically, it's always been interconnected, layered and often with a loopback effect) and the bit about chimpanzees only being able to make 6 sounds... is that true? or just selection bias on his part?

@JK-xp7pg 2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, found him quite insufferable.

@naturallaw1733 2 жыл бұрын

needing to Eat probably had something to do with Language?