- For some reason, I thought this would be fun, or something that would be intuitive and easy to do in my head. Instead, it turns out that game theory is much more of a grind it out mathematical thing. It’s my fault; my expectations were off. Also, if I never hear about the Prisoners’ Dilemma again, it will be too soon. Enough with the Prisoner’s Dilemma! At this point, I want to choose “confess” just to get out of the conversation.
This month I read The Compleat Strategyst, described here as "a classic tome on the subject" and "too hard a read." The tone was light and amusing, with clever illustrated examples, but it was basically a textbook with problems at the end of each chapter, leaving no doubt that game theory is largely "a grind it out mathematical thing."
Given that an automated tool can solve game theory problems, learning how to analyze them is like playing with a slide rule: good for understanding the theory, but not a very practical skill.
Sample problem.
Scattered lessons in video format.
#learnnewthings schedule:
January 2016 – Water and growth in California
February – Wine
March – Game theory
April – Cryptography
May – Art history
June – The history of railroads in the U.S.
July – Oceanography
August – Football (strategy and theory)
September – Chaos theory
November – Linguistics
What a great idea for Aaron Carroll, a guy with double vowels and two double consonants in his name. Has anyone on hubski set about a random learning/study plan for themselves unrelated to a work-goal? Seems like an interesting idea. We are all learning all the time, but it is so extensive, random, and unfocussed. It's nice to know something about something and then a little about a lot, just enough to open the door to more. For example Time: "At the micro-level time is reversing, always." I'm on a mailing list involving some smart people. This week all the talk was about this: And that's just the beginning. Er, the continuation, since there are no beginnings at the micro-level. The thinker is Paul Borrill. I'd like to be able to actually understand this:Time is "stroboscopic", meaning synchronization is an illusion, there are just instantaneous events that occur in no time at all, but on some discontinuous scale.