WEBVTT - Finite and Infinite Games 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:14.640 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:17.520 My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick. You know, Joe. 0:00:17.560 --> 0:00:19.759 I bring up the books of Ian M. Banks a 0:00:19.800 --> 0:00:23.680 lot on the podcast um and and and generally, because 0:00:23.720 --> 0:00:26.079 you know, these are really good books that that tie 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:30.840 on a number of different uh uh, sci fi, psychological, 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:34.120 you name it topics. They're they're they're rich with stuff 0:00:34.120 --> 0:00:36.920 to blow your mind content. Can I confess that I've 0:00:37.040 --> 0:00:40.199 considered reading them but have actually been hesitant because I 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:42.720 want you to be able to keep explaining m banks 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:46.240 books to me with me actually not knowing them in advance. Okay, well, 0:00:46.479 --> 0:00:49.279 then hopefully that's what's gonna happen right now. Because as 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:52.840 we were researching the topic for today, I was reminded 0:00:53.000 --> 0:00:57.760 of his nine book, The Player of Games. Okay, so 0:00:58.040 --> 0:00:59.960 this is a book that concerns the culture, which is 0:01:00.000 --> 0:01:04.120 of course an instellar, interstellar post scarcity civilization in which 0:01:04.240 --> 0:01:07.840 AI minds do all or most of the heavy lifting 0:01:07.880 --> 0:01:10.760 and humans live in a kind of uh uh, you know, 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:14.080 utopian anarchy. Okay, so this is not the book that 0:01:14.160 --> 0:01:17.560 Tron was based on No No, but but it is 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:20.759 a wonderful treatment of games. Now, the people in the culture, 0:01:20.760 --> 0:01:23.360 they don't really have to do much beyond just enjoy life, 0:01:24.040 --> 0:01:28.160 and our protagonist in this particular book, Gurga does this 0:01:28.240 --> 0:01:31.520 by playing in and excelling at a multitude of card 0:01:31.640 --> 0:01:34.680 and board games and other related games. Yeah. So this 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:38.040 is often the positive vision of the sort of post 0:01:38.080 --> 0:01:40.640 singularity future, right most A lot of the visions that 0:01:40.680 --> 0:01:43.039 you get in science fiction are very negative, I guess 0:01:43.080 --> 0:01:46.120 because negative plots are more interesting to play with. But 0:01:46.280 --> 0:01:49.400 so this says, basically, you know, once humans aren't really 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:53.000 needed to create the wealth that sustained society anymore, you 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:55.640 can actually just do what you want. You can be creative, 0:01:55.680 --> 0:01:58.200 you can have fun, and that's what life is. Yeah, 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:00.400 and uh or am I off base? Is that not 0:02:00.560 --> 0:02:03.920 how it is? Um in the culture? It is, but 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:07.960 with lots of dark caveats Okay. Now, some members of 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:12.000 the culture choose to involve themselves in matters of greater importance, 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:15.680 such as service in Special Circumstances, which deals with pending 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:20.440 and emergent threats to the culture uh and general interplanetary stability, 0:02:21.000 --> 0:02:24.080 and they recruit Gurga and send him to the Empire 0:02:24.200 --> 0:02:28.040 of Azad uh to to master and play the game 0:02:28.120 --> 0:02:30.800 of Azad, which is a complex game that consists of 0:02:30.880 --> 0:02:34.120 various sub games that serves as the basic system of 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:38.600 all political and social order in the Empire of Azad. Okay, 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:41.080 So what is is it? What like a big board 0:02:41.120 --> 0:02:44.720 game or something. It's it's like a board game built 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:46.919 out of board games. It's a kind of like imagine 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:50.280 a board game that is just the center of all culture. Like, 0:02:50.760 --> 0:02:52.880 I guess it's kind of hard to to to pick 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:58.080 out something like imagine if the Bible in say medieval Europe, 0:02:58.080 --> 0:03:00.240 if the Bible were a board game instead, if it 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:03.280 was like Settlers of Ghatan instead of the Bible at 0:03:03.320 --> 0:03:06.080 the center of this, uh, this sort of Catholic world. 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:09.840 And on top of that, it was not just settlers 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:12.440 of Gatton, but are ridiculously complex settlers. Do you have 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:15.679 to devote your entire life to playing it? So a 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:20.560 labyrinthine game that contains pronouncements of authority that is intermingled 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:24.200 with government. Yes, And so they want they apparently need 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:26.440 to send him there because they want to disrupt as 0:03:26.520 --> 0:03:29.480 odd and topple its current systems and bring about something 0:03:29.520 --> 0:03:33.800 more in line with culture values. Uh and and also 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:36.720 because the the the the empire of his they also 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:40.360 are a very brutal people given to spectacles of fatal violence. 0:03:40.840 --> 0:03:43.000 So it's a great book and one I always recommend 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:46.000 as a starting point for the culture and banks in general. 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:49.320 But isn't it interesting how we see the mixture of 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:53.160 different games here. So we see the contained and restricted 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:56.120 board and card games within Gurga's life, so those are 0:03:56.160 --> 0:04:00.160 like normal games. We see the open ended game of 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.240 Gurga's life, in which he essentially tries to fill a 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:07.320 lengthy trans human lifetime with pleasure and meaning. We have 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:10.960 the complex but ultimately contained game of add we have 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:15.480 the intricate game of special circumstances, various plots and operations. 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:18.599 We have the greater game that's played by these minds 0:04:18.920 --> 0:04:21.920 that are operating, you know, on scales beyond anything human 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:25.120 intelligence can can really comprehend. And then we have the 0:04:25.200 --> 0:04:30.080 looming possibility of the game of interplanetary war. Yeah, it's 0:04:30.120 --> 0:04:35.200 interesting the way games so readily serve as metaphors for 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:38.680 almost any kind of human endeavor or for life itself. Right, 0:04:39.200 --> 0:04:42.080 A game, in its more narrow definition tends to be 0:04:42.120 --> 0:04:45.400 a thing with rules that is done for recreation or 0:04:45.400 --> 0:04:48.760 for fun. And yet you can clearly see how that 0:04:48.880 --> 0:04:53.359 concept of a game gets mapped onto essentially anything humans do. 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:56.080 Whatever you're doing right now, in one way or another, 0:04:56.160 --> 0:04:58.720 can be thought of as a game. I'm just gonna 0:04:58.720 --> 0:05:01.560 read one quick quote from from the player of games, 0:05:01.800 --> 0:05:04.240 just to give everyone a taste. This is the story 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:06.600 of a man who went far away for a long 0:05:06.680 --> 0:05:09.279 time just to play a game. The man is a 0:05:09.320 --> 0:05:12.640 game player called Gurga. The story starts with a battle 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:15.039 that is not a battle and ends with a game 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:19.680 that is not a game. And you have to read 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:22.839 the book to get the rest. But but I, like 0:05:22.880 --> 0:05:24.479 I said, I couldn't help but think of this book 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:28.440 in uh in comparison to the topic we're discussing today. Right, 0:05:28.520 --> 0:05:31.640 So today we're gonna be talking about an interesting little 0:05:31.720 --> 0:05:34.680 philosophy book that I read within the past couple of 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:38.799 weeks by an American scholar named James P. Cars, who 0:05:38.920 --> 0:05:41.560 for more than thirty years was a professor of the 0:05:41.640 --> 0:05:44.960 history and literature of religion at New York University. Now, 0:05:45.000 --> 0:05:48.479 this book isn't directly about religion, though it addresses religion, 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:51.159 and some of its parts it's it's a short, little 0:05:51.160 --> 0:05:55.359 philosophy book, and it's called Finite and Infinite Games, a 0:05:55.480 --> 0:05:58.640 vision of Life as Play and Possibility, and it was 0:05:58.680 --> 0:06:02.440 published in nineteen eighty six from Free Press. Now, over 0:06:02.480 --> 0:06:05.200 the years, I've read several writers and thinkers who I 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:07.960 admire in one way or another mentioned this book as 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:11.520 influential on their thinking, and I recently decided to check 0:06:11.560 --> 0:06:14.040 it out. And ever since I started reading it, I 0:06:14.320 --> 0:06:17.520 have been captivated by the idea at the core of 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:19.880 this book. And really, the idea is just a very 0:06:19.920 --> 0:06:23.640 interesting metaphor. It's not a scientific book. It's not a 0:06:23.680 --> 0:06:27.600 book really I think that is necessary for explaining anything 0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:31.400 important about how things are. But it's a very interesting 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:35.039 metaphorical framework for how to look at the behavior of 0:06:35.160 --> 0:06:39.000 beings like you and me using this metaphor of play, right, 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:40.680 And I also want to drive home that it's it's 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:42.360 not it's it's rather different from a lot of the 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.480 books we've discussed on the show because it's not filled 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:49.640 with a bunch of, you know, descriptions of various histories 0:06:49.680 --> 0:06:53.360 or mythologies or other philosophical topics. It's a very it's 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:57.600 a very easily consumed book. Um, I don't want to criticism. 0:06:57.560 --> 0:07:00.000 I don't. I don't want to relegate it to the bathroom. 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:02.000 But this is a book that you could keep in 0:07:02.040 --> 0:07:05.240 the bathrooms. It's very much a casual read. Yeah, and 0:07:05.279 --> 0:07:07.320 you you can pick up any part of it, any 0:07:07.320 --> 0:07:09.600 page of it. Usually there will be a short section 0:07:09.680 --> 0:07:12.520 that you could read that that will, you know, make 0:07:12.560 --> 0:07:15.640 you think about things. That's kind of interesting and provocative. 0:07:16.080 --> 0:07:18.080 If it were kept by a toilet, I would call 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:21.120 it a butt number. You know the button numbers, button 0:07:21.160 --> 0:07:24.560 number books. No, I've never heard this terminol. They're the 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:26.600 ones that if you keep them by the toilet, they're 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:28.320 going to keep people on the toilet a little bit 0:07:28.320 --> 0:07:31.640 too long because you'd get interested interesting. I've I've never 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:33.920 heard them described as such. I might have made that up. 0:07:33.960 --> 0:07:35.760 I'm not sure. I can't remember if I got that 0:07:35.920 --> 0:07:38.800 from the culture or from my own brain. Well, now 0:07:38.800 --> 0:07:41.520 it's out there so everyone can use it. Okay, So 0:07:41.560 --> 0:07:45.360 what is this this core idea that James P. Cars 0:07:45.360 --> 0:07:48.520 talks about in his book. The main idea is that 0:07:48.600 --> 0:07:51.640 when we do things, we're playing, and the things we 0:07:51.720 --> 0:07:54.960 do are games. And Cars's main move in this book 0:07:55.040 --> 0:07:58.440 is to separate the games we play into two major types, 0:07:59.080 --> 0:08:02.080 finite and infinite. It's there in the title Finite and 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:05.440 infinite Games. And to quote from the opening of the book, quote, 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:08.880 there are at least two kinds of games. One could 0:08:08.880 --> 0:08:12.600 be called finite, the other infinite. A finite game is 0:08:12.640 --> 0:08:15.720 played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for 0:08:15.760 --> 0:08:20.320 the purpose of continuing the play. Okay, In fact, I 0:08:20.360 --> 0:08:23.280 could say that you could skip reading the rest of 0:08:23.320 --> 0:08:26.280 the book and just contemplate that sentence and get a 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:28.960 lot of the same value. For instance, one example that 0:08:29.000 --> 0:08:30.640 probably comes to a lot of people's minds is that 0:08:30.680 --> 0:08:34.440 it's perhaps the difference between playing tennis and keeping score 0:08:34.559 --> 0:08:37.160 and just batting the ball around, right. I mean, that 0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:39.800 could potentially be a good example where one is played 0:08:39.800 --> 0:08:42.440 with a finite definite outcome in mind, where the other 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:45.200 is played to see how long play can go on. Well, 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:47.200 let's get into a little bit. Let's flesh out the 0:08:47.240 --> 0:08:49.800 core concept here. Let's look at a few of the 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:52.760 characteristics that Car slays out that that he thinks go 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:55.560 along with the difference between a finite game and an 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:58.400 infinite game. So, what are the characteristics of finite and 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:01.480 infinite games in cars? Is mine, alright. So a finite 0:09:01.520 --> 0:09:04.280 game must come to an end when a player or 0:09:04.280 --> 0:09:07.679 a group of players win. Now, what constitutes winning might 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:10.640 be spelled out in some set of external rules or 0:09:10.760 --> 0:09:13.160 or you know, it depends on the judgment of a referee. 0:09:13.200 --> 0:09:16.200 But ultimately the only thing that can decide whether the 0:09:16.240 --> 0:09:19.600 game has been one is the players agreeing that, hey, 0:09:19.760 --> 0:09:21.560 the game is over in this person one or this 0:09:21.640 --> 0:09:24.200 team one. Right. So if the players don't agree the 0:09:24.240 --> 0:09:26.840 game is over in practice, it is in fact not 0:09:27.040 --> 0:09:30.200 over right, It ain't over yet. And if the players 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:33.400 agree the game is over in practice, they can't continue 0:09:33.400 --> 0:09:36.960 playing sort of by definition, maybe they could continue some activity, 0:09:36.960 --> 0:09:39.360 but they're no longer really playing the same game they 0:09:39.400 --> 0:09:41.880 were if they all think it's over, right. And then 0:09:41.920 --> 0:09:45.319 also there are temporal boundaries in place here. Time matters. 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:48.440 Do you know when your game began? Do you care? 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:52.319 If your answers are yes, then your game is finite. 0:09:52.800 --> 0:09:54.520 And then, of course the game again is over is 0:09:54.640 --> 0:09:57.840 if someone wins, right. And by contrast, the purpose of 0:09:57.840 --> 0:10:01.680 an infinite game is not to win, but to prevent 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:04.000 the game from coming to an end. And thus there 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:07.840 really is no decisive way to win except maybe by 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:11.960 indefinitely continuing play. Yes, and he says, quote, there is 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:15.440 no finite game unless the players freely choose to play it. 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:19.240 No one can play who is forced to play. Now. 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:21.280 One of the things he talks about with a finite 0:10:21.320 --> 0:10:25.160 game is that finite games need to have players agree 0:10:25.200 --> 0:10:28.560 on the rules before play starts. Right. If you've not 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.240 agreed on the rules and advance, or players try to 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:34.760 change the rules after play begins, the legitimacy of the 0:10:34.800 --> 0:10:38.520 outcome could be in danger. Players might not accept the outcome, 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:42.520 they might not accept the winner. But by contrast, infinite games, 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:46.800 by necessity, tend to evolve over time. Sometimes you change 0:10:46.840 --> 0:10:50.360 the rules, the teams, the players, the play space so 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:53.600 that play can continue and can get around obstacles that 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:58.920 would impede play. Cars Wrights quote, Finite players play within boundaries. 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:03.480 Infinite players play with boundaries, and finite games encourage players 0:11:03.520 --> 0:11:07.760 to create predictability and discourage surprise. So in an infinite game, 0:11:08.400 --> 0:11:11.560 usually the very purpose is to be surprised. Right, Because 0:11:11.600 --> 0:11:13.520 if you're playing a finite game, you want to win. 0:11:14.120 --> 0:11:16.280 What gets in the way of you winning, you not 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:19.600 expecting what comes next, right, Right, You want to control 0:11:19.800 --> 0:11:22.000 the conditions of the game when you're trying to win. 0:11:22.480 --> 0:11:24.640 When you're playing an infinite game where the purpose is 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:26.640 not to bring it to an end but to let 0:11:26.640 --> 0:11:29.040 it go on forever, you always want there there to 0:11:29.080 --> 0:11:31.959 be the potential for variation, right, Yeah, it's I think 0:11:32.000 --> 0:11:34.400 about role playing games a lot with this, Like playing 0:11:34.440 --> 0:11:37.240 Dungeons and Dragons. It's not a situation where the players 0:11:37.240 --> 0:11:39.920 are necessarily playing against each other, though there are games 0:11:39.920 --> 0:11:42.600 that play out like that. It should not be, in 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:45.160 my opinion, a situation where the dungeon master is playing 0:11:45.200 --> 0:11:50.600 against the players. Uh. Instead, it should be, in my mind, uh, 0:11:50.640 --> 0:11:54.319 a collective storytelling effort by the players and the dungeon master. 0:11:54.440 --> 0:11:57.880 And therefore it's not about which which a choice or 0:11:57.880 --> 0:11:59.920 which which role of the dice is going to her 0:12:00.120 --> 0:12:02.120 the other side the most. It's about what is going 0:12:02.120 --> 0:12:06.720 to create the most engaging situation. I want to come 0:12:06.720 --> 0:12:08.600 back to your D and D example in a bit, 0:12:08.679 --> 0:12:11.400 because that goes along with something I think I've observed 0:12:11.920 --> 0:12:14.560 when when I've been thinking about finite and infinite games. 0:12:15.000 --> 0:12:17.520 One more characteristic I want to mention before I move 0:12:17.559 --> 0:12:20.840 on to an example is that car says finite games 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:24.640 tend to engender an attitude of seriousness, focus, and single 0:12:24.720 --> 0:12:28.959 mindedness within the players. Meanwhile, infinite games tend to encourage 0:12:28.960 --> 0:12:33.439 a spirit of playfulness, exploration, and curiosity. Quote whoever must 0:12:33.480 --> 0:12:36.760 play cannot play well. That, of course, he says, applies 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:39.320 to both types of games. Right. You might not like 0:12:39.400 --> 0:12:41.680 the fact that you say, have to earn money to 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:44.160 make a living, or have to eat in order to survive, 0:12:44.240 --> 0:12:46.600 but you must agree to play that game or you're 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:51.000 not playing. Now, before we consider dungeons and dragons or 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:54.600 dungeons and dragons at gunpoint any further, we should probably 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:58.880 turn to a more you know, classically established a game 0:12:58.920 --> 0:13:01.640 as a model for this for this subject. Sure well. 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:04.800 To understand the simplest version of the difference I think 0:13:04.840 --> 0:13:08.600 between a finite game in an infinite game, consider a 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:12.760 game of chess versus the game of chess. So, in 0:13:13.000 --> 0:13:15.840 a single game of chess, a player's goal is to 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:19.400 defeat her opponent and become the winner. The game of 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:22.320 chess doesn't have a set number of players who play 0:13:22.400 --> 0:13:24.800 against each other and want to win over another. It's 0:13:24.960 --> 0:13:29.240 it's an abstract space that allows individual games to keep 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:32.200 on happening within it. It goes on forever. It could 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:35.400 have infinitely many finite games within it. You can win 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:38.199 a game of chess, but you can't win the game 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:41.640 of chess. It exists, so people can keep playing it now. 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:43.720 I just want to throw in a couple of quick 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:47.760 facts from a two thousand ten Popular Science article by 0:13:47.960 --> 0:13:52.679 Natalie Wolchover, in which she quotes computer scientists Jonathan Schaefer, 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:55.439 who points out that quote, the possible number of chess 0:13:55.480 --> 0:13:58.320 games is so huge that no one will ever invest 0:13:58.400 --> 0:14:01.240 the effort to calculate the exact number. Uh And in 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:03.480 the article, she also points out that while there are 0:14:03.520 --> 0:14:06.840 only so many opening moves a player can make, the 0:14:06.880 --> 0:14:10.600 possibilities just quickly spiral out of control with each subsequent move. 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:14.960 So in a sense, there are almost an infinite I guess, 0:14:14.960 --> 0:14:18.920 maybe not an actually infinite, but but a seemingly infinite 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:22.240 number of chess games that could be played. But even 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:24.520 that doesn't in fact matter, because you could say that 0:14:24.560 --> 0:14:27.280 tic tac toe, which has a much smaller number of 0:14:27.320 --> 0:14:30.880 possible games, is in a sense an infinite game. If 0:14:30.880 --> 0:14:33.160 you're talking about the game of tic tac toes, you 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:35.640 can't win the game. You could win a game that 0:14:35.680 --> 0:14:38.200 you play against somebody. Right. In fact, there's there's no 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:41.920 excuse not to win a game tec if you play first. Now, 0:14:41.920 --> 0:14:44.800 wait a minute, I can't remember what is that solved 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:47.360 in the first player? Can always win at tic tac toe? 0:14:47.720 --> 0:14:49.840 Or can you always force a draw? I don't know. 0:14:49.880 --> 0:14:53.360 Playing against a child really kind of screws things up 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:55.760 for me because I've had to throw games of Tic 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:58.320 Tac toe, uh, to the point where I don't remember 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:02.320 how it really works because I'm trying to win the 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:06.240 infinite game of parenting. But that's a that's a bad strategy. 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:09.400 You need to teach him the pain of losing. Well, yeah, 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:13.960 but I want to do that with games that are fun. Well, 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:15.600 maybe we should take a quick break and then when 0:15:15.640 --> 0:15:17.600 we come back, we can talk a little bit more 0:15:17.640 --> 0:15:20.640 about why we think this idea of finite and infinite 0:15:20.680 --> 0:15:23.240 games is interesting and and some more ways that can 0:15:23.240 --> 0:15:28.000 be applied. Alright, we're back, So let's let's get do 0:15:28.120 --> 0:15:30.560 some some more examples here. What are some examples of 0:15:30.640 --> 0:15:34.640 finite games? Okay, well, we're totally surrounded by finite games 0:15:34.680 --> 0:15:37.720 and we're just you know, they make up the bulk 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:41.760 of everyday endeavor right, competition among co workers for a 0:15:41.800 --> 0:15:45.200 single available promotion or among job candidates for a single 0:15:45.240 --> 0:15:47.920 position at a company. That's a finite game, right, You 0:15:48.080 --> 0:15:50.600 there's an end that you want to win. You want 0:15:50.640 --> 0:15:53.240 to be the person who gets that position, and you're 0:15:53.240 --> 0:15:56.400 competing for it. Another example would be an actual game, 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:58.840 like a game of football. You're you're trying to win 0:15:59.000 --> 0:16:01.480 the game. Yeah, and it has a it has a 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:04.200 time even though times. See I don't know much about football, 0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:06.760 but it does seem like time works differently in football 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:10.920 because the the time on the ticker there does not 0:16:11.080 --> 0:16:15.360 equal the the exact uh length of the game. Well, 0:16:15.400 --> 0:16:18.240 whatever the length is, there are boundaries. I mean, you 0:16:18.280 --> 0:16:20.920 could have a game that doesn't have a necessary time 0:16:20.960 --> 0:16:23.160 limit on it, but it starts at a certain time 0:16:23.440 --> 0:16:27.160 and you know how the ending is decided, right. I'm 0:16:27.200 --> 0:16:29.240 not sure what happens in football if you don't have 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:31.160 a winner, Like if you're just tied and you just 0:16:31.280 --> 0:16:33.400 keep going and you can't win, do they do they 0:16:33.440 --> 0:16:35.040 just call it a draw? Or do they play until 0:16:35.080 --> 0:16:36.800 somebody wins? Oh? Yeah, because you have other games where 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:40.000 you have sudden death over times or a draw is 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:42.320 is permittable? I I am not sure we're showing how 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:45.600 cool we are here knowing all about football. Well, our 0:16:45.640 --> 0:16:49.040 football fan listeners will have to chime in. Okay. So 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:52.440 another clearly finite game would be a chase, an individual 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:55.840 chase between predator and prey. Right there, there is somehow 0:16:55.920 --> 0:16:58.920 going to be a decisive conclusion. Either the predator might 0:16:58.920 --> 0:17:00.880 get a meal and the prey will die, or maybe 0:17:00.880 --> 0:17:03.320 the prey will escape and survive and the predator will 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:05.119 lose and go hungry, and then there can be all 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:08.400 kinds of sort of ranked intermediate outcomes, but there will 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:10.959 be an outcome, right yeah. And that's the one thing 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:13.919 that's important keep in mind with the infinite versus finite 0:17:13.920 --> 0:17:16.160 games is you can kind of nitpick a lot of these. 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:18.840 You can say, well, well, you know what if they 0:17:18.880 --> 0:17:22.120 both the predator and prey both die, that's finite. Yeah, 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:24.320 I mean it's it's still finite. But but yeah, you 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:27.199 have to the mind can help. But I said, I 0:17:27.200 --> 0:17:30.399 think pick at the distinction of finite and infinite, and 0:17:30.440 --> 0:17:32.520 you can kind of go down a rabbit hole with 0:17:32.520 --> 0:17:36.720 any of these examples. In addition to predator and prey competition, 0:17:36.760 --> 0:17:39.000 of course, the other great competition of the natural world 0:17:39.040 --> 0:17:42.320 is mating. Oh sure, this is a finite game though 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:45.439 mating and I would say mating and procreation itself is 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:48.440 an infinite game, right It doesn't have a finite outcome. 0:17:48.800 --> 0:17:52.679 Reproduction is something that seems to be designed to go 0:17:52.800 --> 0:17:55.359 on as long as it can and just keep the 0:17:55.400 --> 0:17:59.080 game going. But say in a more finite contest between 0:17:59.119 --> 0:18:01.399 two stags fighting for the right to mate with a 0:18:01.440 --> 0:18:04.000 female in the area, there is a winner and a loser. 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:05.920 The winner gets to mate. There's no way to win 0:18:06.000 --> 0:18:08.600 the game of reproduction. On the other hand, it's played 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:12.720 so that play may continue indefinitely down the generations. Yeah, 0:18:12.760 --> 0:18:16.200 but but but in terms of the actual encounter, Uh, 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:19.200 it's gonna end. Attenborough is going to tell you when 0:18:19.240 --> 0:18:20.840 it's over, and then you're gonna go to the next 0:18:21.359 --> 0:18:25.200 segment on the Nature documentary. Now, you actually pointed out 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:28.200 something interesting about how it can get weird when you 0:18:28.200 --> 0:18:30.800 you think a game is one type, but then you 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:33.359 can nitpick about ways that it could be the other type. 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:37.720 One thing is that wars very often get presented as 0:18:37.760 --> 0:18:41.040 a finite game. Right there, there is a goal to achieve, 0:18:41.240 --> 0:18:44.000 we will win over the enemy. But it's interesting to 0:18:44.080 --> 0:18:46.360 consider the idea of war as an infinite game, as 0:18:46.400 --> 0:18:49.359 imagined by George Orwell in ninety four. You know, in 0:18:49.640 --> 0:18:53.600 Orwell's Dystopia, in that novel, war is not fought for 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:56.880 the purpose of ultimately winning over the enemy and achieving 0:18:56.920 --> 0:18:59.840 some finite goal. The purpose of war, you know, it's 0:18:59.880 --> 0:19:02.760 not like to control territory for the long haul. In 0:19:02.800 --> 0:19:06.000 the end, it is to be continuously at war, to 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:10.000 fight continuously for political purposes. And in this circumstance, the 0:19:10.000 --> 0:19:11.960 purpose of war is not to win, but to be 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:14.880 at war. And in the sense this makes war an 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:18.240 infinite game. Of course, you know, many critics have argued 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:20.480 that there are elements of this in the rationale for 0:19:20.560 --> 0:19:23.560 some real wars taking place in the real world. Now. 0:19:23.640 --> 0:19:27.680 I've seen this example brought up before, specifically by motivational 0:19:27.720 --> 0:19:31.919 speaker A Simon Cynic, who used the Vietnam War as 0:19:31.960 --> 0:19:36.760 an example of of an infinite war. But but I 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:39.040 kind of want to go with a different, broader example, 0:19:39.200 --> 0:19:41.679 just to to lay it out. So in any story 0:19:41.760 --> 0:19:45.280 that pits besiegers against the besieged, and you know, in 0:19:45.359 --> 0:19:49.040 terms of like an army that is besieging a fortress, Uh, 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:51.879 there are two games at play, So you can argue 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:54.520 that the besiegers and attackers are playing a finite game. 0:19:54.560 --> 0:19:57.880 They are playing to take the castle. Their game ends 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:02.000 when they actually conquer Troy or gond Or or gall 0:20:02.040 --> 0:20:05.720 got Rath. But the besiegers that offenders, their game is 0:20:05.720 --> 0:20:08.560 more infinite. Their game is survival, so they don't have 0:20:08.600 --> 0:20:11.760 to conquer their enemy, they just have to avoid being conquered. 0:20:11.760 --> 0:20:14.879 They have to survive. Well, yeah, that's interesting, because Cars 0:20:14.960 --> 0:20:17.480 ultimately says, though I think this sort of undercut some 0:20:17.520 --> 0:20:20.720 of the interesting parts of his metaphor. He says in 0:20:20.720 --> 0:20:23.199 the very last chapter of his book, there is but 0:20:23.359 --> 0:20:27.920 one infinite game. So therefore he's implying that life itself 0:20:28.000 --> 0:20:31.679 really is the infinite game, and the things within it 0:20:31.720 --> 0:20:33.800 are the finite games. But I think it's useful to 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:36.600 imagine the other types of infinite games there can be 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:39.240 within life. But of course, the way you point out there, 0:20:39.400 --> 0:20:41.840 there's sort of like levels that a finite game can 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:45.399 be close or distant from the infinite game. The the 0:20:45.440 --> 0:20:48.600 attackers on a city are playing a finite game to 0:20:48.880 --> 0:20:52.560 achieve a finite goal, and for the people within the city, 0:20:52.600 --> 0:20:55.199 what's at risk in the finite game of defending the 0:20:55.240 --> 0:20:58.199 city is ultimately the viability of the infinite game of 0:20:58.240 --> 0:21:01.280 getting to continue living. Yeah, if you, if you really 0:21:01.400 --> 0:21:03.600 sort of pick it apart enough, you can you can 0:21:03.600 --> 0:21:05.760 bring a lot of these games back to the infinite 0:21:05.760 --> 0:21:08.399 game of survival. So we discussed the game of war. 0:21:08.520 --> 0:21:10.480