For those of you who are familiar with this show, the linked clip is probably my new favourite. If you aren't familiar, you can still enjoy it, though having the context of previous examples definitely improves this:

http://www.wimp.com/usinglogic/

P.S. Watch the after-show comments.

I heard Liv Boeree say that you're not allowed to speak to the other person after the show for this exact reason. Although there will always be ways around this with social media these days.

I enjoyed that, but I have no clue what the guy was trying to achieve with his plan and I'm frankly shocked with the result

he was guaranteeing a split. i thought the other dude was gonna level him and steal

But if he had of just gone steal as he kept saying, then wouldn't he have kept all the money? Also he runs the risk that player B might go steal just to spite him and his dastardly plan. My head asplodes as to why he went split.

from what I can, there is zero reason to ever go split on that show. The best plan is always to steal, but somehow convince the other to split

Hes trying to prevent the other person from stealing by saying there is absolutely no upside for him to steal. Hes protecting himself against the other guy choosing to screw him.

If were playing the game properly he should always steal but irl theres other things to consider.

and he did it perfectly, mission accomplished- yet he failed to capitalise on his efforts by STEALING!!!! THE GUY IS PART GENIUS PART RETARD.

There is absolutely no reason for him to put all that work in, just to split. he should have done exactly what he said he was going to do all along

ITT $upermad4it misses the point. The guy managed to guarantee his fair share of the money without having to trust the guy across from him. And it worked perfectly.


Of course it's always going to yield you personally a better result if you steal. That's the entire point!

Anyone more interested in this should look up The Prisoners' Dilemma or watch this clip from A Beautiful Mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CemLiSI5ox8

Lol please spell it out for me it's making my head asplode. I don't know much about the tv show but I'm assuming that his goal would be to leave with the most money possible and not caring anything about the other guy. So please explain why he should deviate from what he claimed he was going to do, and split and why this makes more sense than stealing. Seems to me that he came in with an unexploitable strategy but failed to pull the trigger

The key word you use here is "fair share". If he was going for his fair share then he accomplished it quite nicely via his method. It is possible he valued a nearly guaranteed 6k over a risky 13k.

From what I know of this game (not much) this was the last turn. On the last turn, assuming this is a one-shot game in the Prisoner's Dilemma scheme, you always go in best interest = steal.

look the fact is whenever ur in prisoners dilemma everyone should split. and there is somthing to be said at being a person who always splits when placed in that kind of scenario. or for that matter being a person who always cooperates in life because society at large gains more even tho they might gain more by competing. in this case the guy was trying to remain a "splitter" or "cooperater" while making sure he didnt get screwed in the process.

First, I disagree that his strategy was "unexploitable."

Second, the clip doesn't show the 20 minutes that preceded this moment where these two guys worked together to beat several other teams to reach this point in the show. This clip doesn't show how the two of them worked together to build that prize money to 13,600 pounds. Together.

I realize that you didn't see any of that, but when you ask "Why didn't the guy in the clip screw that guy over and keep the whole 13,600 quid for himself?", I really don't know what to say.

I guess all I can think of is that I hope my ancestors didn't climb out of a tree, harness fire, learn to speak, domesticate animals, write laws, debate philosophy, create art, build empires, harness electricity, and finally create this massive world wide web where we are currently having this conversation, so some selfish bastard could **** a guy out of 13,600 pounds for no good reason.

If we can't do any better than that, then I say we just bag this whole civilization experiment, climb back into ****ing trees and start throwing feces at each other again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyFpOp8Ft0Q

I came across a blog post on this show. I had watched about 5 of them before I saw the one in the op. The whole time I thought it was strange that no one ever thought to say they were going to steal. They always try to convince the other player that they should both split. They go on and on about how honest and trustworthy they are and all this bull****, and it appears to have absolutely no effect on anyone's decision. In the post-show interview, people often say they had made the decision to steal no matter what before the show even began. And I think the vast majority of the people who split also had no intention of ever stealing, their goal is to convince the other player to split.

Of course there's no way to know for sure, but this guy may have been the first one to actually influence the other player's decision.