Week 9: An Interesting Game

Hi Guys! We are almost at the end of the Senior Research Project, and it's been quite the journey. This week, Mr. Nair and I went on a very slight tangent into the idea of beliefs. Although they are not directly related to my research, beliefs are inherently different from knowledge as they are not always true, whereas knowledge is true information. Beliefs can be argued for or against, whereas knowledge can't. For example, I can unreliably guess the age of any individual, and I can even believe my guess, however, that is mere belief, it is not knowledge unless I ask for that person's age and they respond honestly.

During this week, Mr. Nair explained a very interesting game to me regarding beliefs. Let's say you have a piece of paper in front of you with 100 true or false statements, you write true if you believe that the statement is true, or false if you believe it is false. Let's add another aspect to the game, if you get it right, you gain a point, and if you get it wrong, you lose a point, but if you leave it blank nothing happens. Obviously, the goal of this is to maximize the number of points you can get. Now, assume that all these statements are related to a topic that you are relatively familiar with, something like Calculus or US History. Because there is a penalty for getting it wrong, you will mostly think through each of the questions individually and do your best to get as many right as possible. But if the penalty was increased substantially, let's say you lose 100 points if you get it wrong, then unless you were absolutely sure of yourself, you would leave the question blank.

Now, let's transition the idea behind this type of game to a real-life example. Let's say you believe there is a fire in a theater. If you yell "FIRE" to warn everyone, there will most likely be people who will be trampled because of the fear and panic that arises from the danger of a fire. Therefore, the penalty for believing there is a fire, yelling fire, and then being wrong is pretty high. However, if you are right, then there still might be trampling, but the major danger was avoided. Just like with the game, you will not yell fire unless you are absolutely sure, due to the possible penalty of being wrong.

I find this game extremely interesting because of its wide applications to real life. In taking into account a belief, you have to address both the benefits and costs of believing it. If you were to traverse a bridge that seems to be dilapidated, you would want to be sure that it could support your weight before actually going across. The applications this game has are extremely wide. Anyways, that's all for this week! There are a lot of subtleties when it comes to this idea so feel free to ask about some unique examples or ideas that you guys have regarding the topic.