Game Theory: Game of Hawk-Dove (aka Chicken)

Evolution, through survival of the “fittest”, is commonly thought of as a very harsh process that results in zero-sum outcomes - one organism thrives at the expense of another.

In the movie, A Beautiful Mind, there was a scene wherein John Nash was fuming mad when he lost in a board game against his intellectual rival Martin Hansen. Believing that he had played a perfect game, there is no way that he is going to lose the game. As intellectual as John Nash is, he probably thought that the worst outcome of his perfect game plan is a draw, if the other player would be able to respond with a perfect strategy of his own. But this is not to be. John Nash lost the game because he had failed to anticipate the next move of his opponent which surprises him. He knew very well the “analytics” of the game but he forgot to include the human factor in his analysis.

In 1996, Gary Kasparov the Russian Chess Grandmaster and the world's undisputed chess champion was pitted against a super computer named Deep Blue developed by IBM. After 6 games of grueling encounter, Kasparov won 3 and Deep Blue won once, with 2 games ended in a draw. The IBM team went back to work, developed their program more, and improved the system to beat Kasparov in their next match which was held a year later. This experiment exposes the limits of the human brain.

Game theory has been used to study a wide variety of human and animal behaviors. It was initially developed in economics to understand a large collection of economic behaviors, including behaviors of firms, markets, and consumers. The use of game theory in the social sciences has expanded, and game theory has been applied to political, sociological, and psychological behaviors as well.

The Hawk-Dove (aka Chicken) game is an influential model of conflict for two players in game theory. With two players and two strategies to choose from, the outcome of the game is easier to predict. The hard part is: which strategy better suits which situation.

According to Wikipedia, the game of Chicken, also known as the Hawk-Dove or Snowdrift game, is an influential model of conflict for two players in game theory. The principle of the game is that while each player prefers not to yield to the other, the outcome where neither player yields is the worst possible one for both players.

The name "Chicken" has its origins in a game in which two drivers drive towards each other on a collision course: one must swerve, or both may die in the crash, but if one driver swerves and the other does not, the one who swerved will be called a "chicken," meaning a coward.

HAWK: very aggressive, always fights for some resource. While the outcome maybe favorable to them, the other consequence may proved fatal.

DOVE: never fights for a resource -- it displays in any conflict and if it is attacked it immediately withdraws before it gets injured.

In game theory, a system is said to be in an equilibrium called a Nash equilibrium if there is no strategy which any of the components can improve their state in the system. In the Game of Hawk-Dove (aka Chicken), the hawk has the best chance of getting the bigger payoff, unless it faces off with another hawk, in which case a duel becomes inevitable. The bigger the payoff, the bigger the risk. Unless you don't mind being called a chicken, playing dove is like playing it safe, with little reward and sometimes none at all.

In the run-up to the U.S. led invasion of Iraq in 2003, the hawkish advisers of the Bush administration were able to convinced then President George Bush to wage war against Iraq, in particular the regime of the late Saddam Hussein. They have successfully argued that Iraq was a threat to America and to the peace of the world, through its alleged arsenal of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and ties to terrorist network. Everybody knew now that there were no WMD found in Iraq.

This type of behavior is typical of a hawk, very aggressive, always fights for some resource (oil in Iraq) and in retaining its world's only superpower status.

Time and time again, the game of Hawks-Doves in the political spectrum is being played repeatedly all over the world. The struggle for supremacy to shape the country's foreign policy lingers on, while the number of casualties of war continues unabated.

Looking back at the classic (non-quantum) evolutionary game as applied to the financial crisis which started in 2008, we will call the Doves in the game those bank investors who acquire rather low risk products that return moderate payoffs. The Hawks are those bank investors who seek out high risk products that have the potential to return large payoffs–but, these also could result in huge losses.

Although the risk of destabilization in the investment market was obviously increasing for the last few years prior to the crisis, the behavior of some aggressive investment bankers did not change. However, instead of ending in a stable state, finally the market crashed and almost all aggressive agents disappeared from the population. This could have been prevented, if any aggressive behavior were inhibited completely.

As for the political hawks, they should be the first ones to be sent to the front line of any war they have advocated. This will give them the first hand experience of what it felt to be in a war zone. It will also give them the lesson they duly deserve about the agonies of war, if ever they would be lucky enough to survive and tell their own stories.

The evolutionary game theoretic predictions of this particular version of the Hawk-Dove game are that the ratio of aggressive vs. non-aggressive behaviors would not reach equilibrium. That is, it predicts a crash!

In choosing the best strategy, it would be wise to read the situation very carefully, weigh the benefits of winning and the cost of losing, and decide accordingly based on what you really want to achieve. If the end result is worth your own life, by all means, play the hawk. If other people's lives and livelihood are on the line, for God's sake, play the dove.

In my opening paragraph, I choose the words “survival of the fittest” to describe the kind of attitude that is most prevalent in this day and age. People becoming more materialistic to the point of being greedy. The last financial crisis and the fight for oil in Iraq are both a case in point.

Based on the many articles I have read, I have stumbled upon many ideas on how the Hawk-Dove game can assist theorist in analyzing the best possible scenario that will emerge if a standoff between two protagonists occur, or that a market crash is forthcoming, and so on and so forth. But I have yet to read an article on how to resolve a long standing conflict between feuding nations. We are all witness to the never-ending cycle of violence in the Arab-Israeli conflict. It has been going on for as long as I can remember. In fact, this is being used as an excuse by some extremist terrorists organizations to justify their terror campaigns around the globe.

I have mentioned earlier the innocent and ordinary people falling victims to wars, atrocities and the financial meltdown. And I read somewhere that it only takes the good men to do nothing for evil men to triumph. Only few people had orchestrated these appalling events, while the rest of us just watched idly by.

Free market economy as espoused by the Americans is not bad. This is part and parcel of democracy. People can choose freely what they want and how to use it. The problem occurs when people become too aggressive and felt compelled by the promise of good returns to any investment that was offered to them. In a dark and narrow alley, where certain danger lurks ahead, the hawks are most willing to face the danger, while the doves will shy away and find another route to reach their destination. It will take them longer, but they will surely get there and live another day to mingle with their own species.

Why can't the human race follow the example of a dove?

In the second paragraph, I have told the story of how frustrated John Nash was because his beautiful mind failed him. And in my second story, I have shown the limits of human brain when pitted against a computer. From these two examples, I can fairly assume that the best human intelligence is possibly only comparable to a pentium-based computer, with probably, a 1 gigabyte of RAM (Random Access Memory). But even with these limitations, man will stop at nothing to find the answers to what they sought to discover.

Any studies about human behavior can only be considered complete if it can manage to grasp the complexity of the human brain. Even the Omnipotent Divinity does not assert its power over it.

Crowdsourcing

In 1915, a man named Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, or better known worldwide as Mahatma Gandhi, organized protests by peasants, farmers, and urban labourers concerning excessive land-tax and discrimination. Gandhi led nationwide campaigns to ease poverty, expand women's rights, build religious and ethnic amity, end untouchability, and increase economic self-reliance. Above all, he aimed to achieve the independence of India from foreign domination. He was the pioneer of resistance to tyranny through mass civil disobedience, firmly founded upon total non-violence---which led India to independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.

Since then, many other countries had followed the example of Gandhi, and utilized the power of the people to resist tyranny and overthrow their rulers, whether they are foreign colonizers or their own corrupt government.

In recent times, the term “people power” is no longer confined to politics. It has generated interest in the business community as well. Companies that offer new products invite crowds of people to test the product before it finds its way through the market place. They then get the crowds’ reactions and feedback that eventually help to improve the quality of their new creation. It is a sleek new idea that makes inroads to product reviews across the business horizon, including movie reviews in the film industries There is no better way to get a proper judgment for a certain product other than from the very people that are going to buy and use them.

The technology sectors are not immune from this either. With so much money going into R&D projects, the IT people are always on the lookout for any potential money-spinner. Business model innovation is happening at a lightning speed. Some of these have already found their way in the service sector, software development, and in the web community. First there was outsourcing, then open-sourcing, and then crowdsourcing.

Companies have been outsourcing to India and China for years. Then, they took it to another level by using social networks such as MySpace, Second Life, Friendster, Facebook and Twitter, just to name a few, and a multitude of virtual communities to solve their most intricate business problems. Crowdsourcing is a new and nascent business tool for innovation. It had its genesis in the open source movement in software.

As defined by Wikipedia, crowdsourcing is neologism for the act of taking tasks traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, and outsourcing it to a group (crowd of people) or community in the form of an open call. For example, the public may be invited to develop a new technology, carry out a design task (also known as community-based design and distributed participatory design), refine or carry out the steps of an algorithm, or help capture, systematize or analyze large amounts of data.

It is interesting to note how often and how much assistance people are willing to provide to an idea that really excites them.

The term has become popular with business authors and journalists as shorthand for the trend of leveraging the mass collaboration enabled by Web 2.0 technologies to achieve business goals.

Crowdsourcing can also be looked at as an application of the wisdom of crowds concept, in which the knowledge and talents of a group of people is leveraged to create content and solve problems. Used properly, it can generate new ideas, shorten research and development time, cut development costs, and create a direct, emotional connection with customers. Used improperly, it can produce silly or wasteful results. Crowds can be wise, but they can also be stupid.

A recent article in the Irish Times mentioned two examples of how crowdsourcing works. The first example is Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, a web application that lets you allot work to anyone on the net that wants to do it for the money you have promised to pay. It is a service that lets you outsource work to workers around the world. It’s the faster way, cheaper alternative to staff a wide range of projects. You could ask workers to tag images in a product catalogue to improve search results on your retail site or ask workers to determine if content is consistent with your site guidelines. You can even ask workers to jump start your website content by writing a book, movie or product review. And you pay only when you’re satisfied with the results. Mechanical Turk is the new way to outsource information work by utilizing the power of crowdsourcing.

The other one is the recently launched project called TransparencyCorps. It is the brainchild of Sunlight Foundation, a group that focuses on increasing US government accountability through data transparency. It may be getting closer to an effective model – and the trick may be replacing financial incentives with good causes. Joining TransparencyCorps gives a glimpse into the inner workings of American power, along with something to do about it. Even if the glimpse is fleeting and the action small, the hope is that with a crowd, it will build a powerful accountability tool.

In his final analysis, Quinn Norton of Irish Times has this to say: “While Amazon’s Mechanical Turk also has something of a community, psychology studies would suggest an important difference: the Turk is ruined by money. Studies have consistently shown that tasks people do because they enjoy them lose their charm as soon as people doing the tasks get paid for them. Being paid once can take away the pleasure forever.”

Another interesting article about crowdsourcing appeared in Irish Independent. Jeff Howe gives his take on the subject, the highlights of which I have quoted below:

“Crowdsourcing uses technology to foster unprecedented levels of collaboration and meaningful exchanges between people from every imaginable background, in every imaginable geographical location. It is a flattering portrait of the human race. We are more intelligent, more creative and more talented than we tend to give ourselves credit for. I've seen cases in which electricians solve complex industrial chemistry problems, and forklift operators show a knack for investing in the stock market. We see something similar on You Tube, in which budding comedians and filmmakers have been able to secure first a cult audience, then industry contacts and finally paying gigs and mainstream recognition.”

“The amount of knowledge and talent dispersed among the numerous members of our species has always vastly outstripped our capacity to harness those invaluable quantities. Crowdsourcing is the mechanism by which such talent and knowledge is matched to those in need of it. It poses a tantalising question: what if the solutions to our greatest problems weren't waiting to be conceived, but already existed somewhere, just waiting to be found, in the warp and weave of this vibrant human network?”

It will take some time before the idea of crowdsourcing would reach its full potential. And to be able to do that, we would have to address the following to make it work the way that will benefit everybody.

• Crowdsourcing is a very powerful political tool to expose and weed out corrupt public officials. We should be able to distinguish between the legitimate sites that promote public accountability, to those that are being used as a lynch mob to exact personal/political vendetta by groups with vested interest.
• As more and more people are willing to ride the wave of change, the era of opportunistic business enterprise taking advantage of the people who are willing to play their part in improving product innovations are not far fetch. There should be a reward system wherein people’s ideas are recognized and his contributions to the development of the product are well documented as well.
• Another challenge for anyone entering the co-creation/crowdsourcing arena is how to compensate people fairly for their ideas.
• While crowdsourcing will take the slack out of the system, it could seriously depress wages for anyone pursuing a career in advertising, graphic design, and industrial design.

The opportunities presented by crowdsourcing far outweigh any concern about its effectiveness to insulate itself from unscrupulous business and political practices. As exemplified by Gandhi, the world can be a better place if we can utilize the power of the people to decide what is best for them. Jeff Howe described it aptly, the solutions to our greatest problems are out there just waiting to be discovered. The possibilities are far and wide, the answers within sight. It’s just a matter of time.
 

I personally wish that crowdsourcing would be as successful as cloud computing and outsourcing in the near future. If not in monetary terms, at least in cleansing the world's political system of scalawags.

The best minds don't always have the best ideas. Otherwise, most of the world's problems have already been solved by now. Ordinary people are just that, until they are discovered to have the extraordinary talent.

Vision is all about the ability of seeing the future based upon on-going developments that  are happening around us, and how it would shape-up to be in the future.
 
We need people with visions to make this world a better place. People who are able to see beyond what a normal person can see. These kind of people are not found in any government agencies. They are out there waiting to be tapped. If we can reach out to them, then the work ahead is halfway done.

Foreword

As the 'New Millennium' dawns on us, rapid changes take over our lives. . . . . where 60 seconds is not enough for one minute, 60 minutes to an hour, 24 hours to a day, and so on and so forth. These changes make us think and re-think on how to make our knowledge and expertise stay relevant in a fast changing world. In trying to cope with this development, we tend to catch up with the whole world. . . . by learning new things, exploring new gadgets that we can put our hands on, and anticipate with excitement every news of advancement in science and technologies. For most of us, there's no other way but to ride the wave of change.

But wait, there's more to life than being a 'techie' or a 'knowledge-based' worker, right? With so many preoccupations, coupled with a busy working life, we've forgotten about the other half of our existence in this 'dog-eat-dog' world. We have forgotten about the meaning of friendship. . . . . we have forgotten about the smell of roses. . . . . and hopefully, we have not yet forgotten why we exist in the first place.

Well, I must admit I am one of the fallen victims of this rapid change.

But not anymore. I thought that we can work doubly hard and give 100% in everything that we do or ask to do, and still find time to pursue other interests in life. . . . . like walking the kids in the park, having a candlelight dinner with your love ones, playing your favourite sports or doing outdoor activities with your friends, trying to keep in touch with your relatives who are posted anywhere around the world. The list is endless.

But how in heaven's name can we do all that? Time management my friend. Remember, it's not how long, but the quality of time we spent that matters. Stay focus, set your goals, prioritise things, work systematically, and never forget to have fun, working or otherwise. Worries will only cause you more harm than good. It affects your efficiency. As long as you give your best, and you give your all, the 'present' will no doubt take care of 'tomorrow'.

Failures are part and parcel of life. Don't let it deter you to pursue your dreams. Rather, use it to create a better 'you'. Most people equate success with money or a person's net worth. But some people have different sets of parameters and benchmarks. What is the use of the most expensive bed if you cannot sleep properly, or the most delicious food if you do not have the appetite to eat? The choice is yours.