6 Player Poker, Nash Equilibria, and Algorithms
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/365/6456/885.full This article discusses the algorithmic implications of Nash equilibria. An important problem in computer science is the idea of discovering polynomial time algorithms to solve problems. However, it is often not possible to discover polynomial algorithms (these are called NP Hard problems). In the context of game theory, this applies to “two player zero-sum” […]
(Sea)Hawk-Dove Games in the NFL Talent Market
The NFL Season has gotten off to a great start thus far: high scoring games, rookie QB’s battling for their jobs, and our fair share of wide receiver drama. But the early season would not be complete without GM’s making trades and playing the games that accompany them. Two weeks ago, Seattle Seahawks general […]
The Joker Adapts Game Theory in Cynical Plan in “The Dark Knight”
https://www.polygon.com/2018/7/18/17578526/the-dark-knight-ferry-boat-dilemma-game-theory In the 2008 film The Dark Knight, the Joker sets up two ferries with bombs, and places the detonator on opposite ships. One boat is filled with civilians while the other is filled with convicted criminals. If one group detonates the bomb of the other ship, that group will be spared. However, if neither […]
A House Divided? A Network Modelling Approach
http://snap.stanford.edu/class/cs224w-2013/projects2013/cs224w-054-final.pdf This paper detailed network analysis of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate and sought to devise a method for detecting whether a certain congress member would vote for a certain bill, or more importantly whether a congress member would betray their party’s vote on a certain bill. This analysis is important because it […]
Playing a Dominated Strategy: The Prisoner’s Dilemma
http://www.u.arizona.edu/~mwalker/10_GameTheory/RepeatedPrisonersDilemma.pdf The Prisoner’s Dilemma is a classic game theory problem where two player’s are given a choice between cooperation and non-cooperation. In the game both player’s choose one of the two options at the same time without knowing the choice of the other. Due to the set up of the matrix for this game it […]
Get Vaccinated
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/year-s-flu-season-may-be-bad-one-here-s-n1054856 This article, in summary, discusses the potential severity of this season’s flu as well as the results of last year’s flu vaccine. They begin with a segment discussing the first flu death and a reference to the flu season of Australia, which they state “can be an indication of what’s to come in the […]
Toilet Seat Dilemma
One of the most significant steps in a relationship is moving in together. When it comes to members of opposite sexes living under one roof, a seemingly trivial issue often arises: should the toilet seat be left up or down? What may start out as an offhand comment can spiral into full blown fights. Hammad […]
The Future of Traffic
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/11/watch-just-few-self-driving-cars-stop-traffic-jams The article argues for the validity of self-driving cars. Particularly, the source references a study that used the simulation of roadway events to gauge the benefits of self-driving cars. The researchers found, when simulating traffic conditions with a combination of self-driving and manually driven cars, traffic jams were reduced significantly and the average car […]
Structural Balance to model trust and mistrust in social networks
https://www.groundai.com/project/structural-balance-and-opinion-separation-in-trust-mistrust-social-networks/1 This article talks about the polarizing trends of relationships with both trust and mistrust connections in a social networks. They first analyze relationships that are not strongly connected. When there is a subset of the network that is strongly connected containing mistrust, the effect on opinions to the rest of the network neutralizes to […]
Nash equilibria – benefits and shortcomings
https://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/the-triumph-and-failure-of-john-nashs-game-theory This article contemplates the successes and failures of Nash Equilibria in describing phenomena. Game theory had existed prior to John Nash’s research however it only explained outcomes in zero-sum-games such as poker in which one person’s gain is another person’s loss. Nash’s discovery built on this idea of game theory and allowed for […]
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