There's a mail that has been circulated a lot in student groups as well as among people in software companies (as I came to witness during my software job).
This is about two friends who had a very good preparation for Chemistry (whatever) final for the semester. However, they had a party on weekend to attend and they decided to go for it. The party went really well and they missed to reach for the final on time. So, they concocted a story about their car tire being punctured and presented it to the professor as the reason why they were unable to reach on time. They asked for a makeup final and the professor agreed. When the final came, they were made to sit in different rooms and had two questions in the paper. First one was quite easy, 10 marks scored and they thought it was going to be cool when they turned the paper and found the second question, "Which tire ?".
Now this incident is claimed to be real and that it took place in IIT-Bombay. However, I doubt that this is true since I have been reading Game Theory (you must have heard this name if you have watched the movie, A Beautiful Mind) from a very nice book (Games of Strategy - Avinash Dixit, Susan Skeath) and there I found this to be a Duke University incident. Anyways, that's not the interesting stuff. What makes this thing interesting is that it presents an example of what are called focal point strategies.
In fact, there is one more strategic lesson from this story. That is, to recognize that professor is an intelligent (rational, in game theory jargon) player in this game. The students failed to take into account that professor may suspect their story to be fake, and that he may come up with such a question (whether in the final or maybe before it).
Now, coming back to the focal point strategies. The probability that both the friends picked up the same tire is easy to calculate and it is 1/4 or 25% (4 times 1/4 times 1/4). So they need to come up with some reasoning besides pure luck. Say, you are one of the students and you have some reasons to believe that the front right tire is most likely for puncture (pointed objects are more likely to be on side of the road, the trip had right turns mostly or anything you can come up with). What makes your choice good is not the reasons which you have thought of but, whether your friend has also made the same choice. So you need to consider whether your friend would think the same way (and pick the same choice as yours) and, that he thinks that you will also think the same way that he thinks that you think ... and so on. A chain of reasoning, and it needs to converge for the outcome to be in your favour (and your friend's). Hence, the name focal point. So to quote from the book, "what is needed is a convergence of expectations about what should be chosen in such circumstances. Such a commonly expected strategy on which players can successfully coordinate is called a focal point."
There is obviously more than this to focal points but, for starters it is quite a good example. I will be putting some more as I keep learning from the book.
This is about two friends who had a very good preparation for Chemistry (whatever) final for the semester. However, they had a party on weekend to attend and they decided to go for it. The party went really well and they missed to reach for the final on time. So, they concocted a story about their car tire being punctured and presented it to the professor as the reason why they were unable to reach on time. They asked for a makeup final and the professor agreed. When the final came, they were made to sit in different rooms and had two questions in the paper. First one was quite easy, 10 marks scored and they thought it was going to be cool when they turned the paper and found the second question, "Which tire ?".
Now this incident is claimed to be real and that it took place in IIT-Bombay. However, I doubt that this is true since I have been reading Game Theory (you must have heard this name if you have watched the movie, A Beautiful Mind) from a very nice book (Games of Strategy - Avinash Dixit, Susan Skeath) and there I found this to be a Duke University incident. Anyways, that's not the interesting stuff. What makes this thing interesting is that it presents an example of what are called focal point strategies.
In fact, there is one more strategic lesson from this story. That is, to recognize that professor is an intelligent (rational, in game theory jargon) player in this game. The students failed to take into account that professor may suspect their story to be fake, and that he may come up with such a question (whether in the final or maybe before it).
Now, coming back to the focal point strategies. The probability that both the friends picked up the same tire is easy to calculate and it is 1/4 or 25% (4 times 1/4 times 1/4). So they need to come up with some reasoning besides pure luck. Say, you are one of the students and you have some reasons to believe that the front right tire is most likely for puncture (pointed objects are more likely to be on side of the road, the trip had right turns mostly or anything you can come up with). What makes your choice good is not the reasons which you have thought of but, whether your friend has also made the same choice. So you need to consider whether your friend would think the same way (and pick the same choice as yours) and, that he thinks that you will also think the same way that he thinks that you think ... and so on. A chain of reasoning, and it needs to converge for the outcome to be in your favour (and your friend's). Hence, the name focal point. So to quote from the book, "what is needed is a convergence of expectations about what should be chosen in such circumstances. Such a commonly expected strategy on which players can successfully coordinate is called a focal point."
There is obviously more than this to focal points but, for starters it is quite a good example. I will be putting some more as I keep learning from the book.
1 comment:
Hmmm...this one is interesting...I am surprised I didn't get this in an email...may be I deleted it...keep putting such stuff :-)
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