"Actual criminals—the very people Gad Saad thinks possess no empathy—betray each other far less often than the regular population. So much for “no honor among thieves.”
Reading the premise of the prisoner's dilemma again I'm also struck by the fact that it's just a made up thought experiment. Real criminals, I suspect, understand quite well that a major reason cops are trying to get you to rat someone else out is because they don't have any real evidence on you. So in real life if no-one speaks there's a good chance that everyone goes free.
Nash equilibrium - at least in the form of the prisoners dilemma - is a great example of an elegant theory that produced a lot of real-world behaviour that all completely forgot that the theory itself is built on assumptions that were put in place not necessarily because they resemble reality but rather because they provide a useful illustration of the subsequent explanation. The entirety of classical economics seems to be like this. "If we assume man is rational and self-interested then X,Y and Z must be true". Yeah, great for you but the central premise isn't true.
For sure, if I assume that Scarlett Johansson is wildly attracted to me then it makes complete sense to try and engineer an opportunity to get her alone. I'm reality, though, what's much more likely to happen there is me getting arrested or beaten up by her security detail. I can theorise literally anything if I make the right kinds of assumptions and don't test those on reality itself.
How dare you criticize classical economics. All it has done is helped to engineer every economic crash since the invention of the stock market; support endless bailouts and tax cuts for the rich; and teach us to treat fresh air, sunshine, and human life like discount commodities.
Also, I’m not sure I buy the distinction between social determinants and “well that’s just the way some people are.” Suppose some has a fundamentally different way of view the world, and that view is somehow hardwired, whether by genes or the uterine environment or whatever. Empathy is only all the more important, if only for practical reasons. Like, you have to be able to inhabit their worldview to predict how they might act, feel what they feel, if only as a tourist.
But, I don't think you are doing justice by John Nash. In fact an important consequence of the Nash Equilibrium is that empathy (of a sort) is good actually. One of the key things Nash found was that in long-term games like the iterated prisoner's dilemma (you and I are career criminals who keep getting caught and keep getting the same offer) then seeking the best thing for us alone in the moment sucks. To you use your terminology our determination to ratfuck each other causes us to just get fucked and the long-term results are bad for everyone. If however we work from that perspective and seek the best combined solution for both of us then over time we all do better both individually and collectively.
Now that isn't exactly an argument for empathy in the general emotional sense so much as it is an argument for enlightened self-interest with a long time horizon. But it is 100% in conflict with the claim that everyone else is a bot and empathy is dumb. Having no concern for others' motivations, feelings or background, let alone their perspective is, per Nash's model, the mindset of a loser, maybe not a loser today but a loser sooner or later.
As to your point about Ayn Rand, Gaad Saad may be a narcissist but has he fallen in love with a serial killer who dismembers 12 year old girls?
Consider what Ayn Rand said: "Other people do not exist for him, and he does not see why they should," she wrote, gushing that Hickman had "no regard whatsoever for all that society holds sacred, and with a consciousness all his own. He has the true, innate psychology of a Superman. He can never realize and feel 'other people.'"
I do hope it didn’t come off too much as though I’m blaming Nash for any of this or that I think he was some sort of sociopath himself. You are right, the negative ripples of his discoveries are far more a consequence of shallow misreading by people who want to justify their own shitty behavior and they don’t fit neatly into what he actually discovered when you take human complexity into account. I liken it a lot to how badly the right/manosphere misread The Matrix and what they’ve turned the Red Pill into. Thank you for this comment, I’m going to be writing more on Nash in my book and I’ll endeavor to be clearer about this.
I somehow did not know that about Ayn Rand and Hickman - that’s messed up, even more messed up than what I already knew about her
No it didn't I just felt that we should be accurate about Nash. And ultimately you are right, much of the damage that gets attributed to him, much like the damage of the "free market" comes from people who misread or read only part of what he really said.
As to Ayn Rand, yeah, that shocked me too when I read it. Unlike John Nash or Adam Smith I don't think there's a hidden layer of complexity that makes her any less than the creep she comes off as. There is a great essay by Whittaker Chambers of all people who called her work shallow and designed to help people of limited intelligence avoid the hard work of thinking about others or words to that effect. It is both correct and ironic at the same time.
"Actual criminals—the very people Gad Saad thinks possess no empathy—betray each other far less often than the regular population. So much for “no honor among thieves.”
Reading the premise of the prisoner's dilemma again I'm also struck by the fact that it's just a made up thought experiment. Real criminals, I suspect, understand quite well that a major reason cops are trying to get you to rat someone else out is because they don't have any real evidence on you. So in real life if no-one speaks there's a good chance that everyone goes free.
Nash equilibrium - at least in the form of the prisoners dilemma - is a great example of an elegant theory that produced a lot of real-world behaviour that all completely forgot that the theory itself is built on assumptions that were put in place not necessarily because they resemble reality but rather because they provide a useful illustration of the subsequent explanation. The entirety of classical economics seems to be like this. "If we assume man is rational and self-interested then X,Y and Z must be true". Yeah, great for you but the central premise isn't true.
For sure, if I assume that Scarlett Johansson is wildly attracted to me then it makes complete sense to try and engineer an opportunity to get her alone. I'm reality, though, what's much more likely to happen there is me getting arrested or beaten up by her security detail. I can theorise literally anything if I make the right kinds of assumptions and don't test those on reality itself.
Your chances with Scarlett Johansson are low because she's into me (I see the way she looks at me through the screen) but for everything else, spot on
She's looking at me, bro. Don't make me fight you.
How dare you criticize classical economics. All it has done is helped to engineer every economic crash since the invention of the stock market; support endless bailouts and tax cuts for the rich; and teach us to treat fresh air, sunshine, and human life like discount commodities.
Have you no respect for elegant amorality?
Also, I’m not sure I buy the distinction between social determinants and “well that’s just the way some people are.” Suppose some has a fundamentally different way of view the world, and that view is somehow hardwired, whether by genes or the uterine environment or whatever. Empathy is only all the more important, if only for practical reasons. Like, you have to be able to inhabit their worldview to predict how they might act, feel what they feel, if only as a tourist.
For saad, though, when it comes to Israel, a foreign country he chooses not to live in, it’s empathy all the way down. Convenient!
Thank you for this overall, I liked this piece.
But, I don't think you are doing justice by John Nash. In fact an important consequence of the Nash Equilibrium is that empathy (of a sort) is good actually. One of the key things Nash found was that in long-term games like the iterated prisoner's dilemma (you and I are career criminals who keep getting caught and keep getting the same offer) then seeking the best thing for us alone in the moment sucks. To you use your terminology our determination to ratfuck each other causes us to just get fucked and the long-term results are bad for everyone. If however we work from that perspective and seek the best combined solution for both of us then over time we all do better both individually and collectively.
Now that isn't exactly an argument for empathy in the general emotional sense so much as it is an argument for enlightened self-interest with a long time horizon. But it is 100% in conflict with the claim that everyone else is a bot and empathy is dumb. Having no concern for others' motivations, feelings or background, let alone their perspective is, per Nash's model, the mindset of a loser, maybe not a loser today but a loser sooner or later.
As to your point about Ayn Rand, Gaad Saad may be a narcissist but has he fallen in love with a serial killer who dismembers 12 year old girls?
Consider what Ayn Rand said: "Other people do not exist for him, and he does not see why they should," she wrote, gushing that Hickman had "no regard whatsoever for all that society holds sacred, and with a consciousness all his own. He has the true, innate psychology of a Superman. He can never realize and feel 'other people.'"
Source: https://www.alternet.org/2015/01/how-ayn-rand-became-big-admirer-serial-killer
"He can never realize and feel 'other people." -- Who might that apply to?
I do hope it didn’t come off too much as though I’m blaming Nash for any of this or that I think he was some sort of sociopath himself. You are right, the negative ripples of his discoveries are far more a consequence of shallow misreading by people who want to justify their own shitty behavior and they don’t fit neatly into what he actually discovered when you take human complexity into account. I liken it a lot to how badly the right/manosphere misread The Matrix and what they’ve turned the Red Pill into. Thank you for this comment, I’m going to be writing more on Nash in my book and I’ll endeavor to be clearer about this.
I somehow did not know that about Ayn Rand and Hickman - that’s messed up, even more messed up than what I already knew about her
No it didn't I just felt that we should be accurate about Nash. And ultimately you are right, much of the damage that gets attributed to him, much like the damage of the "free market" comes from people who misread or read only part of what he really said.
As to Ayn Rand, yeah, that shocked me too when I read it. Unlike John Nash or Adam Smith I don't think there's a hidden layer of complexity that makes her any less than the creep she comes off as. There is a great essay by Whittaker Chambers of all people who called her work shallow and designed to help people of limited intelligence avoid the hard work of thinking about others or words to that effect. It is both correct and ironic at the same time.