Religions And The Prisoner's Dilemma

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Religions And The Prisoner's Dilemma

Drealm
The following info from wikipedia describes the "prisoner's dilemma".

The prisoner's dilemma (or prisoners' dilemma) is a canonical example of a game analyzed in game theory that shows why two individuals might not cooperate
Two members of a criminal gang are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of speaking to or exchanging messages with the other. The police admit they don't have enough evidence to convict the pair on the principal charge. They plan to sentence both to a year in prison on a lesser charge. Simultaneously, the police offer each prisoner a Faustian bargain. Each prisoner is given the opportunity either to betray the other, by testifying that the other committed the crime, or to cooperate with the other by remaining silent. Here's how it goes:

#1 If A and B both betray the other, each of them serves 2 years in prison

#2 If A betrays B but B remains silent, A will be set free and B will serve 3 years in prison (and vice versa)

#3 If A and B both remain silent, both of them will only serve 1 year in prison (on the lesser charge)
This dilemma is based around individuals, but I'd like to apply this to religions.

Let's suppose Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Secular Liberals replaced the roles of the individual gang members. So it instead reads:

#1 If Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Secular Liberals betray the other, each of them serves 2 years in prison

#2 If any group backstabs the other groups and the others remains silent, the backstabbing group will be set free and the other groups will serve 3 years in prison (and vice versa)

#3 If Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Secular Liberals all remain silent, all of them will only serve 1 year in prison (on the lesser charge)

I think these are the strategies of every group:


> Judaism attempts to do #2.

> Christianity attempts to do #3.

> Islam does #1

> Secular Liberals do #3


Here's why I classify each group as such:


> Why does Judaism do #2? Because it encourages others to trust them while screwing them.

> Why does Christianity do #3? Because they're gullible enough to believe they can recruit everyone to their side.

> Why does Islam do #1? They don't want to trust others, nor do they want to be trusted.

> Why do liberals do #3? Because they're brainwashed enough to think everyone will evolve into a liberal.


Both Othodox Judaism and Islam are stronger than Christianity for this reason. However Judaism attempts to gain trust, where as Islam makes it clear they want you dead.

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Re: Religions And The Prisoner's Dilemma

fschmidt
Administrator
My only criticism here is that Christianity is a meaningless label.  There is Modern Christianity and Traditional Christianity, and they are almost completely unrelated.  Modern Christianity is simply Liberalism.  And Traditional Christianity is basically like Islam.  Both Islam and Traditional Christianity were willing to accept minority religions but not trust them, which meant that minority religions could usually live with them as long as the minority religion behaved.