Guest essay by Eric Worrall
What would you think of a Psychology lecturer who every year plays a real life version Prisoner’s Dilemma with undergraduates, awarding course credits based on the outcome of a climate cooperation game?
What a Simple Psychological Test Reveals About Climate Change
If everyone’s success depended on it, would you share—or be selfish?
By Dylan Selterman
I teach undergraduate psychology courses at the University of Maryland, and my classes draw students with diverse interests. But every one of them perks up when I pose this question: Do you want two extra-credit points on your term paper, or six points?
I tell my students that the extra-credit offer is part of an exercise illustrating the interconnectedness of choices individuals make in communities. I explain that the exercise was inspired by an ecologist named Garrett Hardin and an address that he delivered 50 years ago this summer, describing what he called “the tragedy of the commons.” Hardin said that when many individuals act in their own self-interest without regard for society, the effects can be catastrophic. Hardin used the 19th-century convention of “the commons”—a cattle-grazing pasture that villagers shared—to warn against the overexploitation of communal resources.
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A possible solution seems simple: If everyone just moderated their consumption, we’d have sustainability. As many of my students say, “If everyone chooses two points, we’ll all get the points.” And yet, for the first eight years I used this exercise, only one class—of the dozens I taught—stayed under the 10 percent threshold. All the other classes failed.
This exercise was developed more than 25 years ago. Professor Steve Drigotas of Johns Hopkins University had been using it for some time when he administered it to me and my classmates in 2005. My class failed too—and I, who had chosen two points, was incredibly frustrated with my peers who had chosen six.
In 2015 one of my students tweeted about the exercise—“WHAT KIND OF PROFESSOR DOES THIS”—and his lament went viral. People around the globe weighed in: Does so many people choosing six points mean it’s human nature to be greedy and selfish?
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In 2016 I decided to change things up. In hopes of finding a way to increase cooperation, I drew from the scientific literature on social groups and introduced a third option: Students could choose two points, six points—or zero points. That’s right. Zero. Why would anyone do that? Well, for each student who chose zero points, one of the six-point choosers (selected randomly) would lose everything, reducing the total number of six-point choosers by one.
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Prisoner’s dilemma is an interesting intellectual concept – unless you are one of the prisoners, or in this case students. In which case being one of the prisoners in a game of Prisoner’s Dilemma might be a nasty and humiliating experience, especially for a student who is struggling, a student who really needs those precious additional course credit points.
To be fair, in 2016 Lecturer Dylan Selterman improved the odds of at least some students winning additional class credits, by offering self sacrifice option, allowing students to deliberately choose zero class credits for themselves in return for pulling down one of their more ambitious fellows.
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Lecturer Dylan Selterman, University of Maryland Department of Psychology
Read that, and stopped.
“A possible solution seems simple: If everyone just moderated their consumption, we’d have sustainability.”
This kind of instruction is why people believe in the fallacy that mitigating co2 emissions and doing “green” practices in their everyday lives makes a difference.
Lets try a different experiment. Instead of potentially handing out free, unearned “credit points” on the term paper to everyone, let’s have everyone work really hard on their paper and then everyone gets the average number of credit points earned in the class. Clearly, the harder the class as a whole works, the more points everyone gets. My guess, though, is that most students would work less on this paper since any effort put into it would only increase their individual points by a tiny fraction.
Very interesting.
It also makes me think of the option to buy a paper from someone else who is competent. I understand that this is actually a fairly large problem in universities.
The modern “tragedy of the commons” is the accumulation of public debt financed by fiat currency. While a sound currency is of benefit to all of society, overproduction of currency, like overgrazing of the commons, benefits the few with access to the new money, but risks destroying the value of the currency itself. The accumulation of capital, and the acquisition of debt, are essential features of free-market “capitalism”, but to allow governments to acquire debt and retain power is risky, and to allow them to finance debt with “new” fiat currency is a suicide pact.
It looks like we have enough cows and the grass is good, but we’re all starving and the big government wolves carrry off more of them every year.
And there’s more government wolves every year!
Democracy is ultimately mob rule. One of the old Greeks, Plato or Socrates? , chose benevolent dictatorship as the best system of government. A well crafted constitution seems to have worked quite well in the past, not so much now since it is being ignored here in the US. Apparently benevolence is in the eye of the beholder and constitutional protections can be jiggered to mean whatever those in power want. A sound moral code based upon theological principles of Christianity was the original concept of the US constitution but, obviously, people can jigger anything.
15 Commandments
https://youtu.be/Ah-WdAwVg9c
This is an undergraduate class. I would hate to see a graduate psychology class.
Bottom line on all of this is Vanity. The problem is that most people think they are smarter than most other people, or than all other people, or than God Himself, in whom, of course, this last group therefore does not believe. Hard to set up any system of government or any system for any purpose when dealing with such creatures. Vanity/pride, the first sin.
The Mosaic Code (10 Commandments) was the simplest set of laws/rules ever created.
I believe it was Heinlein, writing for Lazarus Long, who said that the more complicated laws become, the less civilized we are… or words to that effect. (Lost my copy of “The Diaries of Lazarus Long”. Have to get another.)
So if we broke it down to just those 10 rules or commandments or whatever you want to call them, would we be more civilized? Well, first thing we’d have to do is get rid of politicians and lawyers.
You had me at lawyers.
Where there is law there are lawyers. Where there is city (aka “polis” in greek) there are politicians.
There is no getting rid of them.
The commons is expandable either by using technology or moving out into the countryside. There’s no need for anyone to impose their preferred lifestyle on anyone else. People who insist you must do it my way are either trying to get someone elses stuff or are coddling an inner tyrant.
It’s obviously tyrannical because the supply is a fixed amount. He then goes on to compare his experiment to sustainability, which also assumes a fixed finite amount.
He does not give any option to create new supply, nor assume that the future needs will be met by digging deeper or inventing different stuff.
“…the tragedy of the commons.” Oh, so close! It is actually, “the tragedy of the communism”.
I would point at one of the two guards and ask THE OTHER GUARD “if I ask him which is the safe door, which door would he say?”……and then go out THE OTHER DOOR.
Oh, wait. Wrong thread.
Subject students to arbitrary rules they have no control over. Good lesson about the world they will be entering.
Thomas Sowell, in his Basic Economics, discusses the “‘Fallacy of Composition’–the mistaken assumption that what applies to a part applies automatically to the whole.”
The fallacy is not limited to economics. E.g., “in a sports stadium, any given individual can see the game better by standing up but, if everybody stands up, everybody will not see better. In a burning building, any individual can get out faster by running [rather] than walking. But, if everybody runs, the stampede is likely to create bottlenecks at doors, preventing escapes by people struggling against one another to get out, causing some of those people to lose their lives needlessly in the fire.”
“What is at the heart of the fallacy of composition is that it ignores interactions among individuals, which can prevent what is true for one of them from being true for them all.”
Higher education with mafia rules.
Wish I was in his class, just so I could spout off.
I’ve got nothing to lose, and a bit of life experience.
Something tells me guys like you never benefit from the curve grading in this dullard’s class.
But I bet they are capable of putting in the effort and passing by their own merit.
How ludicrously farcical.
Several times, I’ve encountered teachers who asked us students to “self rate” and “self score” our papers and exams.
* Not one of them gave a higher score or a higher rating. You got what your scored/rated.
* Not one of them reduced the vast majority of ambitiously high scores or high ratings.
– a) a few of the teachers did apply their own teacher’s score and rating where people boosted their ratings/score to deity level.
– b) All too often the teachers simply gave students their inflated scores/ratings.
It only takes one or two of these teaching experiences before everyone applies A+ scores and ‘Terrific!’ ratings to their own work.
One teacher, denying an entire class of a few bonus marks, because of an entire class’s collective excessive self promotion, certainly will not offset the lazy teachers who reward self promotion.
I did have one excellent advanced accounting teacher who asked students to “self rate” tests.
He did it for amusement, and to identify less trustworthy students; e.g. students who botch answers then rate themselves as A+.
The only times that teacher opened our school books was to make sure he knew which topic we were learning. He then closed the book and gave us real world examples and assignments directly related to our subject.
Why he taught accounting, I can not explain. He once explained that he needed extra cash, but I had to take a “make up” exam because work required that I travel on exam day. The accounting business he owned, was very busy, as I sat in their waiting area, before my exam.
Why complicate the issue – the point was to demonstrate human nature – in any group there is a very high likelihood that a percentage will self promote rather than work in the common interest – even when (on the course I did) great emphasis was put on getting the best result for all. Its a good lesson to learn and helps you realise that there are stop at nothing people who freely mix and socialise with you – their predisposition to win overrides their need to fit in
With all the complaints about the current education system, why aren’t there searchable or even live feeds of the course content being taught in schools ??
With todays tech it would seem to be cheap and easy.
Anonymity of the students, would have to be ensured, of course.
Do parents care enough to look? I see complete apathy in most of the population. They gave their kids to the government beast and never looked back.
Ihope that is the future. Online lectures by the very best at very low cost. Students self-organized into co-operative study and support groups. Long lines of third-rate profs at unemployment offices. Cheaper, better education without the indoctrination and without the self-aggrandizement of so many of these intelligent but emotionally stunted figureheads.
Typical socialist/group think game.
Rule One: Fix the game to push simplistic group think. There are piles and piles of real problems that need to be addressed, climate change is not one of them.
Rule Two: Force people to play stupid game
On the contrary I think it demonstrates why socialism is doomed to failure. These ‘6’ people do energise the system – some succeed and are very driven and productive. Others crash and burn. The majority tag along making the best of whats left and work within the system dominated by ‘6’ people – hardly socialism – hardly conformity. This offereing the ‘6’ is an opportunity for the risk taker…….who are the risk takers in true socialism. The opportunity given by offering a ‘6’ is surely why capatilism works as it drives the bigger system forward. Sometimes wasteful but nearly always better and more productive than socialism
Eric, Anthony and Moderator
I hope you see my comment. This is NOT an isolated incident. Researchers in the Psychology Dept at my university asked me if they could run a ‘what-if’ global warming scenario game on my first year Earth Science students to monitor their psychological reactions. There is some national organizing behind this use of the global warming meme by academic Psychology Depts. I don’t know if that fraud John Cook is behind this. It needs to be investigated.
Jane we would need a sample of something sinister to shed light on it. Think Climategate, we all suspected things were happening but it wasn’t until someone leaked inside emails that we could prove what they were doing.
You could try asking for where they got the idea, background information on the experiences of other classes when these exercises were run. The background might just be someone reading an article from National Geographic, like the article I quoted.
Don’t do anything to risk your job, and don’t rule out the possibility that such an exercise might actually help the lecturers and students get over their obsession, might not produce the outcome the lecturers expect.
For example one solution to reducing CO2 is nuclear power. Unless the exercise is rigged to exclude the nuclear option, at least some students might advocate this option. If their proposals are treated fairly, a nuclear solution might be an eye opener for the entire class.
Eric
If you do a google search on psychology research and global climate change, articles like this will come up. I suspect some national funding agency is pushing a significant amount of grant money for it
https://www.apa.org/science/about/publications/climate-change.pdf
Hi Jane, I don’t think there is any issue with interest groups pushing their own point of view, thats part of the push and shove of democracy.
Where it might cross the line is when such advocacy harms students in some way, say if climate skeptic students are marked down because they are concerned about the veracity of alarmist climate claims.
I’ve never been a school administrator or manager so I’m not sure what to advise. I’m certainly very concerned as a parent, this is why I wrote several times about Peter Ridd’s nightmare with James Cook University.
Maybe let them have their climate exercise, but monitor the terms of the exercise, if that is within your brief?
Its sad that lecturers are caught up by climate groupthink, but I wasn’t upset that students were playing a climate whatif game, I was upset that the teacher in my opinion was handing out class credits in a way which reinforced compliance with his personal biases.
If a climate skeptic started awarding class credits for embracing climate skeptic views, I would be just as upset as I am about Dylan Selterman’s class exercise.
I think what most of us are trying to achieve is liberty from shoving a particular viewpoint or life choices down people’s throats, particularly people in a vulnerable situation, like students who need the approval of the lecturer to some extent to pass their course.
Look out for signs the exercise might have crossed the line. For example, if a student complains that they were marked down because they expressed climate skeptic views, investigate whether that was what actually happened, and if necessary reprimand the lecturer who is awarding marks based on their personal biases.
I’ve never been much of a conspiracy theorist because I can’t believe people can keep their mouths shut about things they know but I have come to believe that AGW represents a conspiracy of self interest. The media is well to the left of mainstream society as is academia. The AGW disciples are mostly fellow travellers.
So I thank Jane for raising this concern and urge all those who care about these issues to be alert for evidence to corroborate her suspicions. It has become obvious that CAGW is a public issue like no other, with “communication stategies”and “psychological studies”which aim to “improve” those communication strategies. In what other area of science does psychology pretend to have a role ?
It speaks of organized coercion and that can only be necessary to aid a great lie!
I’m trying to get my mind around how someone could be such an a-hole he’d take a zero just for the satisfaction of screwing another guy.
“Why would anyone do that? Well, for each student who chose zero points, one of the six-point choosers (selected randomly) would lose everything, reducing the total number of six-point choosers by one.”
Stick it to your classmate rule. How nice and altruist. Shaft someone by choosing zero. So much for the love, singing campfire songs and all. It’s stab the errant one in the back ASAP. This professor is just a creep. I think I’d use the time honored Captian Kirk method and find a way to cheat. That’s what the professor is doing—cheating the kids out of their hard work via a game of points that looks like shooting craps. If he finds cheating okay, then I see no reason to abstain from it in his class. It’s his rule.
Stay away from this college.
Regarding Hardin’s book “The Tragedy of the Commons”, which I remember being discussed in the 70s: in historical fact, the Commons in Great Britain were not destroyed by the selfishness of the peasants who used them. Those people mostly adhered to their old traditions and customs. But eventually the gentry, the rich and powerful landlords who were less bound by tradition, used their power to enclose the common land. All of course in the name of more efficient and productive land use (as it may have been); but basically for their own selfish benefit.
That process went on for centuries: the first part of Sir (St) Thomas More’s Utopia raged against a corrupt society in which sheep “ate” the people rather than the reverse. England’s woolen trade was a big driver there. And it continued up into the 18th century.
I own a small common here in the UK. There are farmers who exercise their right to graze their horses and cattle on it and for some legal reason I have never understood my own stock have to be last in the queue. It never gets over-grazed. In fact we have to top it every year. So tragedy averted.
With the enactment of the federal reserve system the US has slowly changed in a progressive marxist country. The same way you boil a frog.
(1) Boiling frogs smell AWFUL!!
(2) Boiling live frogs will get you in trouble with PETA.
(3) Why would you boil a frog, anyway? Surely not to eat it.
(4) Frogs will jump out of warm water well before they start to cook.
Eco- Socialists frogs will adjust the temperature reading! So much more empowering than being pushed around by reality.
Indeed. frogs must be fried, not boiled. Actually, dismembered before frying, since you only eat legs.
Pretty sure the boiled frog meme isn’t true. While frogs aren’t homeotherm, they do care about temperature and wouldn’t survive without the ability to feel when it gets to hot for them. Actually, not being homeotherm makes it all the more useful for the survival of the specie to feel when temperature gets too hot, whether brutally or smoothly over the time.
Here’s another nice prisoner centred paradox.
A prisoner is on death row on a Monday morning and he is told that he will be executed before the end of the week but that on the day that he will be executed he will have no idea that his execution will be later that day.
Now this prisoner is a clever guy and he looks forward to Friday, If I get to Friday then I know I’ll be executed that day so it can’t be Friday as I’d know. If I get to Thursay I know it can’t be Friday so it must be Thursday but I’d know so it can’t be Thursday. Same logic applies to Wednesday, Tuesday and Monday so he rejoices that he is safe.
Unfortunately he gets a knock on his door on Wednesday and led to the gallows. He had no idea.
not so clever. He cannot apply the “if I get to Friday” condition in the “if I get to Thursday” situation, but he does.
So let me guess
* thinks he is smart
* makes assumption that are not true
* reaches a wrong conclusion accordingly
* get surprised and doesn’t believe it when proved wrong
Looks like he is a “climate scientist” ™ .
The tragedy of the commons: we all need to stop breathing air now, in order to preserve it for future generations