eBook downloads, eBook resources & eBook authors
This revised edition contains new material & shows students how to apply game theory to model human behaviour in ways that reflect the special nature of sociality & individuality. It continues its in-depth look at cooperation in teams, agent-based simulations, experimental economics, & the evolution & diffusion of preferences.
Since its original publication in 2000, Game Theory Evolving has been considered the best textbook on evolutionary game theory. This completely revised and updated second edition of Game Theory Evolving contains new material and shows students how to apply game theory to model human behavior in ways that reflect the special nature of sociality and individuality. The textbook continues its in-depth look at cooperation in teams, agent-based simulations, experimental economics, the evolution and diffusion of preferences, and the connection between biology and economics. Recognizing that students learn by doing, the textbook introduces principles through practice. Herbert Gintis exposes students to the techniques and applications of game theory through a wealth of sophisticated and surprisingly fun-to-solve problems involving human and animal behavior. The second edition includes solutions to the problems presented and information related to agent-based modeling. In addition, the textbook incorporates instruction in using mathematical software to solve complex problems. Game Theory Evolving is perfect for graduate and upper-level undergraduate economics students, and is a terrific introduction for ambitious do-it-yourselfers throughout the behavioral sciences. Revised and updated edition relevant for courses across disciplines Perfect for graduate and upper-level undergraduate economics courses Solutions to problems presented throughout Incorporates instruction in using computational software for complex problem solving Includes in-depth discussions of agent-based modeling
Introduces current evolutionary game theory--where ideas from evolutionary biology and rationalistic economics meet--emphasizing the links between static and dynamic approaches and noncooperative game theory. This text introduces current evolutionary game theory--where ideas from evolutionary biology and rationalistic economics meet--emphasizing the links between static and dynamic approaches and noncooperative game theory. Much of the text is devoted to the key concepts of evolutionary stability and replicator dynamics. The former highlights the role of mutations and the latter the mechanisms of selection. Moreover, set-valued static and dynamic stability concepts, as well as processes of social evolution, are discussed. Separate background chapters are devoted to noncooperative game theory and the theory of ordinary differential equations. There are examples throughout as well as individual chapter summaries. Because evolutionary game theory is a fast-moving field that is itself branching out and rapidly evolving, Jörgen Weibull has judiciously focused on clarifying and explaining core elements of the theory in an up-to-date, comprehensive, and self-contained treatment. The result is a text for second-year graduate students in economic theory, other social sciences, and evolutionary biology. The book goes beyond filling the gap between texts by Maynard-Smith and Hofbauer and Sigmund that are currently being used in the field. Evolutionary Game Theory will also serve as an introduction for those embarking on research in this area as well as a reference for those already familiar with the field. Weibull provides an overview of the developments that have taken place in this branch of game theory, discusses the mathematical tools needed to understand the area, describes both the motivation and intuition for the concepts involved, and explains why and how it is relevant to economics.
The outstanding feature of this book is that it provides a unified account of three types of decision problem. It covers the basic ideas of decision theory, classical game theory, and evolutionary game theory in one volume. No background knowledge of economics or biology is required as examples have been carefully selected for their accessibility. Detailed solutions to the numerous exercises are provided at the back of the book, making it ideal for self-study. This introduction to game theory is intended as a first course for undergraduate students of mathematics, but it will also interest advanced students or researchers in biology and economics.
This book both summarizes the basic theory of evolutionary games and explains their developing applications, giving special attention to the 2-player, 2-strategy game. This game, usually termed a "2×2 game” in the jargon, has been deemed most important because it makes it possible to posit an archetype framework that can be extended to various applications for engineering, the social sciences, and even pure science fields spanning theoretical biology, physics, economics, politics, and information science. The 2×2 game is in fact one of the hottest issues in the field of statistical physics. The book first shows how the fundamental theory of the 2×2 game, based on so-called replicator dynamics, highlights its potential relation with nonlinear dynamical systems. This analytical approach implies that there is a gap between theoretical and reality-based prognoses observed in social systems of humans as well as in those of animal species. The book explains that this perceived gap is the result of an underlying reciprocity mechanism called social viscosity. As a second major point, the book puts a sharp focus on network reciprocity, one of the five fundamental mechanisms for adding social viscosity to a system and one that has been a great concern for study by statistical physicists in the past decade. The book explains how network reciprocity works for emerging cooperation, and readers can clearly understand the existence of substantial mechanics when the term "network reciprocity" is used. In the latter part of the book, readers will find several interesting examples in which evolutionary game theory is applied. One such example is traffic flow analysis. Traffic flow is one of the subjects that fluid dynamics can deal with, although flowing objects do not comprise a pure fluid but, rather, are a set of many particles. Applying the framework of evolutionary games to realistic traffic flows, the book reveals that social dilemma structures lie behind traffic flow.
All of life is a game, and evolution by natural selection is no exception. The evolutionary game theory developed in this 2005 book provides the tools necessary for understanding many of nature's mysteries, including co-evolution, speciation, extinction and the major biological questions regarding fit of form and function, diversity, procession, and the distribution and abundance of life. Mathematics for the evolutionary game are developed based on Darwin's postulates leading to the concept of a fitness generating function (G-function). G-function is a tool that simplifies notation and plays an important role developing Darwinian dynamics that drive natural selection. Natural selection may result in special outcomes such as the evolutionarily stable strategy (ESS). An ESS maximum principle is formulated and its graphical representation as an adaptive landscape illuminates concepts such as adaptation, Fisher's Fundamental Theorem of Natural Selection, and the nature of life's evolutionary game.
These Notes grew from my research in evolutionary biology, specifically on the theory of evolutionarily stable strategies (ESS theory), over the past ten years. Personally, evolutionary game theory has given me the opportunity to transfer my enthusiasm for abstract mathematics to more practical pursuits. I was fortunate to have entered this field in its infancy when many biologists recognized its potential but were not prepared to grant it general acceptance. This is no longer the case. ESS theory is now a rapidly expanding (in both applied and theoretical directions) force that no evolutionary biologist can afford to ignore. Perhaps, to continue the life-cycle metaphor, ESS theory is now in its late adolescence and displays much of the optimism and exuberance of this exciting age. There are dangers in writing a text about a theory at this stage of development. A comprehensive treatment would involve too many loose ends for the reader to appreciate the central message. On the other hand, the current central message may soon become obsolete as the theory matures. Although the restricted topics I have chosen for this text reflect my own research bias, I am confident they will remain the theoretical basis of ESS theory. Indeed, I feel the adult maturity of ESS theory is close at hand and I hope the text will play an important role in this achievement.
Evolution, Games, and God explores how cooperation and altruism, alongside mutation and natural selection, play a critical role in evolution, from microbes to human societies. Inheriting a tendency to cooperate and self-sacrifice on behalf of others may be as beneficial to a population’s survival as the self-preserving instincts of individuals.
The author examines the interplay between evolutionary game theory and the equilibrium selection problem in noncooperative games. Evolutionary game theory is one of the most active and rapidly growing areas of research in economics. Unlike traditional game theory models, which assume that all players are fully rational and have complete knowledge of details of the game, evolutionary models assume that people choose their strategies through a trial-and-error learning process in which they gradually discover that some strategies work better than others. In games that are repeated many times, low-payoff strategies tend to be weeded out, and an equilibrium may emerge. Larry Samuelson has been one of the main contributors to the evolutionary game theory literature. In Evolutionary Games and Equilibrium Selection, he examines the interplay between evolutionary game theory and the equilibrium selection problem in noncooperative games. After providing an overview of the basic issues of game theory and a presentation of the basic models, the book addresses evolutionary stability, the dynamics of sample paths, the ultimatum game, drift, noise, backward and forward induction, and strict Nash equilibria.
