#0036 - Do you trust easily?
As I’m looking for a new place, I’m already hearing warnings about one of the the real estate brokers that is showing me around & potentially has access to the place I like the most. As I was figuring how much to trust this fellow, I was wondering if there are easy ways to approach this.
In a world where we don’t know a majority of people we interact with daily, do we approach every new person warily, spending a lot of time analyzing all their motives & actions, or should we just trust easily & hope for the best outcomes?
If we simulated a game using the different types of interactions with the various kinds of people we come across regularly, wouldn’t it help us understand this better?
It totally does!
This extraordinarily brilliant game by Nicky Case teaches you how to model trust in a world where different people could behave in their own unique ways. I strongly urge you to check out the game at leisure, as it barely takes 20 minutes to teach you something truly important. It has a surprisingly simple, yet powerful insight.
Nicky’s game is multiple iterations of the Prisoner’s Dilemma, a popular problem that is used to explain how 2 individuals acting in the best of their interests might not bring about the best overall outcome.
The basic version of the problem goes like … Two criminals are arrested, but police can't convict either on the primary charge, so they plan to sentence them to a year in jail on a lesser charge. Each of the prisoners, who can't communicate with each other, are given the option of testifying against their partner. If they testify, and their partner remains silent, the partner gets 3 years and they go free. If they both testify, both get two. If both remain silent, they each get one.
As we can see, it is always best for one person to testify, if they do not know the motivations of their partner, and that doesn’t bode well for the group. Most often, they both end up testifying.
Considering similar situations arise in our daily lives, the cost that we pay is very real. It is the amount of time we’re spending evaluating motives, and we need to figure out the implications of trust, and how to react if it is reciprocated or betrayed. While you’ll play the game & figure it out, let me tease you with the outcome:
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you
But that’s only when you’ve multiple iterations with the same person / set of people. I still haven’t figured out how to optimize for one-off interactions apart from using trusted sources. Would be happy to learn tricks that you’ve learned.
Cheers,
Kalaikovan