Structural Balance in International Affairs
In class, we recently learned about the structural balance property, which states that a graph which has edges between all present nodes has balance between the positive and negative relationships within. One of the examples given in class was alliances in WWII, and an article I found by Roger Cohen for the New York Times […]
Olivia Rodrigo, Paramore, and Game Theory
On May 14th, rising singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo released the song “good 4 u” to critical acclaim. The song quickly rose on the charts, reaching number one in sixteen different countries, including the U.S. The song also became quite popular on the app TikTok, leading some users to discover the song was quite similar to […]
Kant Stop Won’t Stop: Game Theory and Moral Evolution
Ethical decisions have always been the subject of intense debate, largely because of their failure to produce a satisfying solution for moral dilemmas through logical means alone. One of Kant’s most prominent philosophical principles is that of the categorical imperative: according to his formula of universal law, one should only act on a maxim that […]
Rock-Paper-Scissors and Game Theory
The main objective of this article is to provide a new perspective on the game of “Rock-Paper-Scissors.” Essentially, Patrick Honner talks about how a short game of “Rock-Paper-Scissors” can instantly turn into a never-ending cycle in which no player ever gets the upper hand for a significant amount of time. Due to the fact that […]
Strong Ties, Weak Ties on Clothing Brand
There are so many clothing brands and incentives within each brand, it’s so difficult to attract new customers. Many stores have loyalty programs in order to retain loyal customers as well as attract new customers. However, it seems as though most programs are similar in simply giving out rewards within their stores. This only builds […]
‘The Pandemic Is a Prisoner’s Dilemma Game’
Throughout the past two years, the Covid-19 pandemic has changed the way that we as a society conduct our lives. Most people share the common goal of eradicating the pandemic, and allowing life to return to normal. This includes infectious disease specialists, who have been constantly tracking the spread of the virus in order to […]
How Homophily and Triadic Closure Prevent Diversity
In this research study, the researchers set out to analyze how homophily, the tendency of people to be attracted to those similar to themselves, and triadic closure interact. One type of homophily is choice homophily which refers to people’s preference when choosing who to interact with. Another type is induced homophily which happens when there […]
Testosterone and the Hawk and Dove Game
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0018506X16301775 In class we learned about the Hawk-Dove game, where multiple Nash equilibria arise. The story of the game is that two animals are in a competition for food and their behavior decides how the piece of food will be divided between them. If the animals both act aggressively, like a hawk, then both their […]
Autonomous Vehicles and Braess Paradox
Belkina, Elizaveta & Zhestov, Egor & Shestakov, Artem. (2021). Methods for resolving the Braess paradox in the presence of autonomous vehicles. Computer Research and Modeling. 13. 281-294. 10.20537/2076-7633-2021-13-2-281-294. http://www.mathnet.ru/php/archive.phtml?wshow=paper&jrnid=crm&paperid=884&option_lang=eng While consumers and media outlets have been concerned about the safety of self-driving vehicles, have we truly thought about whether they would make our commutes faster? […]
Game Theory in Nuclear War
Link: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/08/16/what-game-theory-tells-us-about-nuclear-war-with-north-korea/ Last week, we learned about game theory in relation to how actors make decisions and what considerations they make when they take action. We learned about this through the prisoner’s dilemma at first, where prisoners had a dominant strategy and made decisions according to what the other party would choose. We also […]
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