NORMS AND THE THEORY OF GAMES
Norms
Game theory
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Norms
Norms are rules of behavior that are accepted within particular
societies and groups. For example, the fact that people in Great Britain drive on the left
is a norm. The fact that we do not walk across our neighbors' lawns is based on a social
norm. Philosophers often think that norms have no special moral standing. For example,
some philosophers think that they are only proper if they are supported by moral
principles.
Others, for example,
cultural relativists,
think that all morality is
ultimately based on social
norms.
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Game theory
Many philosophers use game theory, implicitly or explicitly, to
defend norms, arguing that norms arise as a natural result of attempts to mediate human conflict.
Game theory is a mathematically formulated approach to situations involving human
conflict. A game theorist tries to predict how rational people would act when confronted
by various adverse or beneficial circumstances. The application of game theory to
ethics is sometimes helpful because game theory can dramatize conditions that show the
need for norms and instruct us about the way norms may be preserved. Nevertheless, the use of game
theory can be taken too far. Game theory typically depends on assumptions that are not
normative. In a game theoretic approach, any power one person or group has over another
person or group is usually taken as given and is not evaluated. Of course, in life
differences in power are sometimes compelling. We might be willing to give our money to a
person making threats with a gun. Although we may defer to the use of power, this does not
make the use of power morally acceptable.
In Theory of Games as a Tool for the Moral Philosopher, the
contemporary British philosopher, R. B. Braithwaite, uses game theory to give us a taste of a resort to power that he considers morally appropriate. Two musicians live in adjoining apartments and each desires to play when the other does not play. One player, A, would rather not play than play when the other, B, plays. B, on the other hand, would rather play alone,
but will play even if the other also plays. This gives B a threat advantage. Braithwaite
provides the solution to the bargaining game. B plays on 26 days, while A plays on 17. This
solution may be thought of as the analogue of a norm, only on an individual level. The
solution depends on the power B has over A. B may be able to threaten to practice on all
nights. A has no such realistic threat. A loses in the bargaining process, but we may
question whether the solution is morally fair.
This solution appears to be a prudential solution on A's part, yet A
may complain that it is immoral. Just because A plays a more delicate instrument or can
only concentrate with silence does not mean that A ought to get less practice time than B.
A may understand that this is the best deal that he or she is going to get, but that
doesn't make it morally right. Braithwaite's use of game theory takes the moral dimension
out of the bargaining situation. Morality cannot be derived from threats any more than it
can be derived from the
received view of
rationality.
The solution is to view some social norms as morally charged, to accept
them as part of
moral experience
and evaluate them in terms of other moral and practical values. Game theory may come in handy if we start with assumptions about the relative power of the players. If they are equally endowed, physically, economically, and
intellectually, then perhaps the bargains such equally endowed people strike are morally
proper, and any "norms" based on their decisions may be considered morally compelling. This
may provide a way, a hypothetical way, to judge the moral acceptability of norms.
But norms that come from a fair bargain, or what we consider a fair bargain, may not
be our norms. Inventing norms based on what we take to be a fair bargain may be difficult;
people may refuse to accept them because they are too complex, foreign to them, or
perceived as unfair even if developed from a fair perspective. Even though the norms of
any actual society are not based on fair initial conditions, norms do regulate behavior and we often expect others to act according to them. Thus, actual norms of a society seem to have, typically, some moral standing. Top