Comments on: The right side of fair play

By: Tony Sidaway

Tony Sidaway — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 00:16:59 +0000

How strange. I wouldn’t hesitate to accept the offer, but I would make sure my friend paid for dinner!

By: miko

miko — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 11:01:19 +0000

Humans, according to economists, don’t try to maximize money. They maximize a hypothesized, unitless thing called “value.” Maybe it’s dopamine. It’s perfectly rational to reject an “unfair” offer if fairness is something we biologically or culturally prize, which we do. All apes (and probably monkeys and other smart, social mammals) have a sense of “fairness” that is easily offended–it sets your habenula firing and stopping the release of dopamine in the VTA.

By: chemniste

chemniste — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 10:32:10 +0000

Hmm, I wonder how people with Borderline Personality Disorder would respond in this sort of game, since we have reason to believe that BDP affects a persons sense of fair play.

By: eddie

eddie — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 13:23:57 +0000

What if, as a result of your friendship, you’re already 50 quid indebted ‘cos he helped you get that ebay item you so craved and stood you drinks to celebrate and?…

By: romunov

romunov — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 08:19:26 +0000

Grief may have evolved and stayed around because the other person believes you. For instance, you cheat a friend, but you feel grief (and tell/show him/her that). He/She forgives you and you have just dodged one bullet. Maybe.

By: Matthew L.

Matthew L. — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 22:13:12 +0000

Sam: There’s two problems with claiming that it’s rational to turn down the unfair offer because of the satisfaction value of punishing the other player.
The first is that the subjective value of punishing someone presumably varies between people. Depending on your ethical/religious views, punishing someone might have negative value.
Secondly, even if punishing a cheat does have positive value, people don’t seem to calculate it that way. Presumably there would be some amount of money that punishment is “worth”, $1, $10, $50, etc.
However, people seem to calculate the acceptance/rejection point mostly on the ratio of your take to their take. Larger total sums do increase people’s willingness to put up with unfair offers, but not as much as you’d expect if punishment had value in of itself.

By: Snarly Old Fart

Snarly Old Fart — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 20:11:33 +0000

Personally I would turn down anything that wasn’t an even split. I’m for punishing cheats. If my friend cheats me, he loses my friendship, and it won’t be worth it to me for him to try winning it back.

By: Sam C

Sam C — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 18:17:41 +0000

It is completely rational to turn down