Game Theory in the Fight Against Climate Change
Last month, Salesforce Research and Mila, an artificial intelligence institute in Quebec, teamed up to launch AI for Global Climate Cooperation, a competition focused on designing climate agreements and negotiation protocols intended to lead to a more sustainable future. The competition is open to applicants until April 2023 and features a fictitious planet that simulates the climate, economy, and geopolitics of Earth.
Each proposal entered will be tested in RICE-N, which is described as “a climate-economic simulation with AI agents that has been calibrated to real-world data.” This artificial intelligence simulation has various features such as investing, negotiation, and international trade that enable speedy trials of potential solutions. Following ethical and peer review, successful solutions will move on to the next stage: the real world. At this point, all parties involved will start to communicate these strategies to policymakers in an attempt to make concrete changes in the fight against climate change.
But at its core, climate change is an issue deeply rooted in game theory. The central idea of the prisoner’s dilemma is that despite it being in their best interest to cooperate, two completely rational decision-makers may make choices in a way that ultimately creates less than optimal outcomes for the individuals as a group. So even if there is a changemaker who desires to enforce the optimal strategy, no single authority has as much power as to completely halt the climate change crisis. Rather, successful agreements involve global cooperation and have supporting incentives that take place over longer periods of time.
Climate change is an interdisciplinary challenge. Beyond the science behind the ever-changing nature of our world’s environment, climate change involves economics, mathematics, political science, supply chains, and tax policies among many other disciplines. Artificial intelligence can only do so much to provide us with an idea of where the right direction is. So while game theory suggests that it isn’t in everyone’s interest to do what will ultimately benefit the planet, it is up to us to educate each other, pass laws, attend conferences, and sign bills that will make a real impact on the world.
https://www.ft.com/content/4d59a986-294f-4ef2-9b4a-33a52bec87af
https://www.ai4climatecoop.org/#