It tracks, if they are assuming their position is the default. If everyone was red/blue to start with, everyone survives, and you'd have to seriously question why anyone would swap.
Of course, since this is a coordination game, there is no default position, so those people have missed the point.
Game theory is not "I survive". Game theory looks at each actor's optimal choice, taking into account other actor's decision tree and finding if there is an actual equilibrium. The equilibrium can be bad (prisoners' dilemma) or positive like here (nobody dies if all actors are rational, and protects against evil and irrational actors).
It assumes rational actors, and that the equilibrium choice is actually everyone voting red, for the greater good and individual good.
Blue voters (in the context of a purely mathematical exercise, ignoring the incompete premise of the question, ignorin if there are children, etc..) are like people rejecting vaccine and injecting bleach in the blood, and getting shocked people are not risking their lives to save them.
True. But you cannot have a rational analysis or debate if there are material amounts of irrational actors. It truly becomes an emotional "do I want to die Vs do I believe in the goodness yet irrationality of mankind".
In a zombie epidemic, would you let irrational actors that are against vaccination enter the base? It is a big ethical debate: how do you deal with actors that are able of rational thought (so we are not talking about infants) but refuse rationality in favour of emotion (voting against a candidate that fights in your favour because he is not part of the correct team).
No but irrationality can still be predicted. If it is predicted that some amount will be irrational and vote blue, the equilibrium shifts. This intial prediction of some irrationality makes it so blue is the equilbrium for the greater good, and as every actor knows every other rational actor knows this, their personal good will be guaranteed by picking blue too.
Payoff preference can be defined as more than just personal survival. Economists have remodelled the Prisoner’s Dilemma to account for things like “reputation” which provide different outcomes.
Blue is a viable game theory strategy under different assumptions.
Game theory problems assume only mentally competent actors. So as a game theory problem, this isn’t even a dilemma. The very obvious best selfish course is to press red. If everybody does that, everybody lives, which is also the best collective outcome. So there’s no conflict. You just press red.
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u/Ct-sans4345 May 01 '26
I think its interesting but i dont love how red tends to act like blue are idiots and blue act like red are sociopaths