Prisoners’ Dilemmas even come up in nature. In baboon tribes, when a female is in “heat”, males often compete for the chance to woo her. The most successful males are those who can get a friend to help fight off the other monkeys, and who then helps that friend find his own monkey loving. But these monkeys are tempted to take their friend’s female as well. Two males who cooperate each seduce one female. If one cooperates and the other defects, he has a good chance at both females. But if the two can’t cooperate at all, then they will be beaten off by other monkey alliances and won’t get to have sex with anyone. Still a Prisoner’s Dilemma!
If anything this is closer to Parfit’s Hitchiker. While both are game theory problems and a good decision theory will result in cooperation on both of them (assuming adequate prediction capabilities) the non-sequential nature of the game matters and some decision making strategies will handle them differently.
If anything this is closer to Parfit’s Hitchiker. While both are game theory problems and a good decision theory will result in cooperation on both of them (assuming adequate prediction capabilities) the non-sequential nature of the game matters and some decision making strategies will handle them differently.