The Tragedy of the Commons
Game theory relates to many aspects of everyday life. One of these applications is shown in “The Tragedy of the Commons” by Garrett Hardin. In this article Hardin discusses an open public pasture, to which anyone can bring their sheep to graze. Everyone benefits by taking their sheep to this pasture, because by going to the pasture, their sheep get more food than they would have otherwise. Another reason people are motivated to take their sheep to this pasture is because if they do not go, there is more food for the other herders and their sheep, so the other herders can buy more sheep and benefit more. The other herders are benefit when one herder does not take their sheep to the pasture.
Since it is beneficial to take your sheep to the pasture, and detrimental if you do not, in game theory, taking your sheep to the pasture is a strictly dominant strategy. In every scenario, it is better to feed your sheep at the pasture than to not take them. You benefit when you go to the pasture, and the other herders benefit when you do not go.
Considering the fact that every herder will always take their sheep to the pasture, we face another problem, one of overgrazing. As more herders take their sheep to the pasture, there are fewer and fewer resources available. This problem is something that can be seen in our world in many places. One is overfishing. To feed our growing population, we continue to take more and more fish, which we all benefit from. However, our resources of fish are slowly but surely depleting. This is also true for coal and oil. We benefit by taking and consuming these things in the short run, because it is the dominant strategy that we have. Nonetheless, in the long run, this strategy hurts us, because we run out of whatever resource we were benefitting from. This is the tragedy Hardin refers to in his article.
It is interesting to see that we use game theory as a society to decide to act upon the things that will benefit us. It is also interesting to see that although game theory may point to a strictly dominant strategy for us, that strategy may not be the best course of action for us as a society in the long run, as Hardin discusses in his article. We must understand how our actions now will affect us in the future before being able to make the best decision we can.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/162/3859/1243.full