PRISONER’S DILEMMA AND ITS REAL LIFE APPLICATIONS

PRISONER’S DILEMMA AND ITS REAL LIFE APPLICATIONS
The prisoner’s dilemma is a situation under the economic concept, Game Theory, which attempts to define the thinking of individuals under pressure. he prisoner's dilemma is a standard example  that shows why two completely "rational" individuals might not cooperate, even if it appears that it is in their best interests to do so. It was originally framed by Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher working at RAND in 1950. Albert W. Tucker formalized the game with prison sentence rewards and named it, "prisoner's dilemma" (Poundstone, 1992), presenting it as follows:

Two members of a criminal gang are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of communicating with the other. The prosecutors lack sufficient evidence to convict the pair on the principal charge. They hope to get both sentenced to a year in prison on a lesser charge. Simultaneously, the prosecutors offer each prisoner a bargain. Each prisoner is given the opportunity either to: betray the other by testifying that the other committed the crime, or to cooperate with the other by remaining silent. The offer is:

If A and B each betray the other, each of them serves 2 years in prison
If A betrays B but B remains silent, A will be set free and B will serve 3 years in prison (and vice versa)
If A and B both remain silent, both of them will only serve 1 year in prison (on the lesser charge)
Prisoner's dilemma payoff matrix
B
A
B stays
silent
B
betrays
A stays
silent
-1
-1
0
-3
A
betrays
-3
0
-2
-2


Economists believe that in a rational situation, the first instance is bound to happen, because both individuals would only want to save themselves.
 This could be applied to commonplace situations as well. In fact the concept of game theory was part of a famous British T.V show called as Golden Balls which pitted individuals against each other. The two contestants would have a choice to Split or Steal, a certain amount of money.
The prisoner’s dilemma has applications in political situations such as the Brexit as well. In any case, Britain was under pressure. If it walked out of the European Union, then it would mean that that Britain’s share of the market would no longer exist and its economy would be rattled by this sudden change. However, if Britain decided to stay, then it would chaos and civil conflict from within all its countries, causing more problems. Also, if the European Union pushed out Britain out of its organization, then it would lose a significant contributor in its budget and the European Market would dip. Finally Britain opted out, and the changes were significantly visible.
The Prisoner’s Dilemma is applicable to simple situations such as two individuals struck in a traffic jam, because they each want to go in opposite directions. Here, they either have the option to work it out, with both cooperating, or they can both ignore each other and try to wrestle their way out, which may lead to an accident. Also one might move forward and one might try to cooperate, which again might lead to an accident.

Thus the concept of Prisoner’s Dilemma can be applied anywhere, as long as the outcomes are considered. 

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