Ordinary Players Research Articles

Game-Theoretic Specificity of a Competitive Allocation of the Frequency Spectrum

We consider the problem of developing and optimizing the rules of the spectrum auction. One-sided sealed-bid spectrum auctions are studied. Two types of pricing are compared theoretically: the first-price and the second-price. А game model of the auction with free riders is constructed. A free rider uses frequencies purchased by another such participant for free. All Nash equilibria of the obtained games are found and represented in an analytical form. The significant difference between games with all free riders and games with at least one ordinary player is shown. It is proved that when players eliminate their dominated strategies, the resulting auction price of the lot is determined by its value for ordinary players. In the case when all players are free riders, the price is equal to the minimal bid price. The influence of the information the participants have about their partners’ values of a lot on the outcome of the game is discussed. The theoretically obtained properties are in agreement with the results of the experiments presented for spectrum auctions in the scientific literature.

Small bots, big impact: solving the conundrum of cooperation in optional Prisoner's Dilemma game through simple strategies.

Cooperation plays a crucial role in both nature and human society, and the conundrum of cooperation attracts the attention from interdisciplinary research. In this study, we investigated the evolution of cooperation in optional Prisoner's Dilemma games by introducing simple bots. We focused on one-shot and anonymous games, where the bots could be programmed to always cooperate, always defect, never participate or choose each action with equal probability. Our results show that cooperative bots facilitate the emergence of cooperation among ordinary players in both well-mixed populations and a regular lattice under weak imitation scenarios. Introducing loner bots has no impact on the emergence of cooperation in well-mixed populations, but it facilitates the dominance of cooperation in regular lattices under strong imitation scenarios. However, too many loner bots on a regular lattice inhibit the spread of cooperation and can eventually result in a breakdown of cooperation. Our findings emphasize the significance of bot design in promoting cooperation and offer useful insights for encouraging cooperation in real-world scenarios.

A hybrid improved BRO algorithm and its application in inverse kinematics of 7R 6DOF robot

To advance the calculation performance of the battle royale optimization algorithm (BRO), a hybrid improved BRO algorithm (HBC) is proposed in this paper. The level mechanism of the chicken swarm optimization algorithm (CSO) is integrated into the BRO algorithm to divide all into elite players and ordinary players, and the level relationship of different players is established. Then, an elite player update method of random exploring and directional update in a small range is proposed to improve the development ability. The update method of ordinary players improved, the update mechanism of elite random guidance is introduced to make full use of the excellent location information in the population. The performance verification experiment of the HBC algorithm is carried out on 20 benchmark functions and a practical project. Comparing with several other algorithms, the computational performance of the HBC algorithm is the best. Furthermore, the HBC algorithm is applied to solve the inverse kinematics of the 7R 6DOF robot. The experimental results show that the HBC algorithm effectively improves the average convergence accuracy and reduces the running time, compared with the BRO algorithm. This fully shows that the HBC algorithm is more competitive in stability, calculation accuracy, and speed.

Moderate irrational sentiment-driven fitness can promote cooperation in the prisoner’s dilemma game

In this work, we investigate the impact of irrational sentiment on spatiotemporal dynamics of cooperation in prisoner’s dilemma (PD) game. Generally, players update strategies by comparing the payoffs with that of their neighbors, however, in real life, people often produce some irrational sentiment due to the payoffs and misjudgment of their situation. For example, some players tend to perform so confident that they overestimate their capabilities. In contrast, others are self-esteem and underestimate themselves. So we integrate a player’s irrational sentiment into his fitness calculation via a parameter θ. Then we separate the players into two types: type A (ordinary players) and type B (irrational players: individuals making decision are affected by irrational sentiment). Numerous simulations show that players moderately overestimating and underestimating reality can enhance cooperation. In addition, the more the players with moderate irrational sentiment, the more evident of promoting cooperation. Besides, overestimation (θ>0) can enhance cooperation in a larger range of θ value. And underestimation (θ<0) can enhance cooperation to a higher degree rapidly. Our analytical results provide a novel perspective to explore the influence of people’s sentiment on evolutionary cooperation.

The flip side of power

In random voting, the committee chair, whose vote decides in the case of a draw, is more often decisive than ordinary voters. Therefore, in the power indices literature, the committee chair is said to be more powerful. Players with a veto right are even more powerful still. Similarly, the production of threshold public goods may involve “tie-breaking players” (with more effective contributions) and “veto players” (specialists or larger players) whose contributions are necessary. We pose the question of whether power is beneficial for an individual. Except in the equilibrium where no player contributes, veto players are disadvantaged while tie-breaking players can be advantaged. In experiments with otherwise symmetric players, about 80% of the veto players contribute, but tie-breaking players also contribute almost as frequently as veto players, and significantly more frequently than ordinary players. Even with three times the costs of ordinary players, veto players stick to their behavior, while tie-breaking players reduce their contributions below those of ordinary players. Overall, powerful players always are worse off than ordinary players; thus, power seems not to pay off herein.

Labelling, (re)qualifying and disqualifying marginal spaces. The case of saffron in Taliouine (Anti-Atlas, Morocco)

This article examines how agricultural products from marginalised mountain regions in Morocco manage to get labels. The country’s public authorities present labelling as a new way of requalifying areas that have previously been left behind. They do this by recognising the areas’ uniqueness and the quality of their certified products. However, this labelling can also exacerbate differences between spaces, revalue some, disqualify others, exclude certain actors and stir up conflicts. A critical reading of these labelling processes is offered here. Are these processes really capable of shrinking not only a particular space’s marginality but also social inequality? The discussion focuses on the labelling of saffron from Taliouine, a region in southern Morocco that has long been neglected by the public authorities to such a degree that it is a land of emigration. The article considers how different representations of the territory and agricultural knowledge are negotiated through the labelling process. It analyses the perspectives of ordinary players: small farmers who view themselves as being excluded from the process. Beyond the tensions that are revealed and amplified by the labelling, this work shows the arrangements and ways of resisting that are found in order to “make do with” labelling and fight against marginalisation – sometimes without having a label.

Ethan B. Katz. The Burdens of Brotherhood: Jews and Muslims from North Africa to France.

Ethan B. Katz’s excellent, meticulously researched monograph The Burdens of Brotherhood: Jews and Muslims from North Africa to France traces the political, social, and cultural relationships between Jews and Muslims in France—as a trans-Mediterranean space—from World War I through the early decades of the twenty-first century. It is an intricate analysis of the way the ebb and flow of these relationships shaped the contradictions and lost and attained potential of ethnic harmony and national allegiance. Katz eschews the binary analyses of Muslim versus Jew, racist versus nonracist, colonial versus anticolonial, dear to some scholars, to demonstrate that at any given moment in the chronological trajectory, equating the political, cultural, and social complexity of Jewish-Muslim relations to such binaries is not just reductionist, it is analytically unsophisticated. The book is divided into seven chapters, arranged more or less chronologically, each dealing with a defining moment in the Muslim-Jewish relationship. Katz’s innovation is to examine the lived interactions of ordinary Jews and Muslims, which, he argues, have been lost in the currents of contemporary events. The overarching disruptions that have shaped the lives of these ordinary players and reset their relationships were largely the result of four wars: the two world wars, the Algerian War of Independence, and the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. As Katz points out, French history has inscribed Jews into the republic and Muslims into the empire, but by examining the intricate associations of Jews with (and in) the colonies, Katz suggests that imperial projects were as important in shaping the identities of French Jews as was the republic (8). By examining separate urban spaces, namely Paris, Marseille, and Strasbourg, he shows that the local politics and demographic and geographic differences have created disparities in the Jewish-Muslim relations of each city.

Surrounding information consideration promotes cooperation in Prisoner’s dilemma game

Evolutionary game theory provides a useful, integrative framework for studying the evolution of cooperation. A new strategy updating method is proposed in our model. Due to people with diversified thinking, players are divided into two categories based on their different strategy updating method: ordinary players and advanced players. The former players only consider their neighbor’s payoff and updating strategy by classical Fermi rule, while the latter players take both the neighbors’ surrounding information and payoff into account. The results show that the neighbors surrounding information consideration contributes to the evolution of cooperation and finds the fraction of cooperation grows evidently with the increase of advanced players numbers. Our model may provide a pragmatic approach to the research of cooperation in social network.

Jersey Design and Pattern Making for Disable Players of Ice Sledge Hockey

As the quality of life has improved with development of science and technology, desire for better quality of life of disable people has also increased. Currently, prejudiced views of disabled people in South Korea are changing, but sports for all disabled people is not revitalized and social support is also inadequate. In developed countries, administration and systems for sports among people with disabilities are provided at the consumer level, and many companies willingly provide support to disabled athletes. However, in South Korea, low awareness of sports for disabled people is companied by minimal support companies. In order for South Korea to advance, support for the disable sports players is needed, especially sports-wear that fits their body conditions and differences game playing from ordinary sports players. This study specifically focused on the ice sledge hockey players, taking into account the complaints on their jersey and their special conditions through motion analysis while sleds. For the easy use of the hockey, armhole depth and sleeve breadth was reduced and sleeve hem was designed for flexibility of sleeve such that it does not slide down. Also, because only the front of the Jersey is tucked in the pants, the side vent was designed to be deep such that the back hem is prevented from being pulled. Sportswear pattern making for the players with disabilities required to account for distinct body characteristics, as compared to the ordinary players. Thus, studies that develops sports-wear design for those with disabilities contributes to the qualitative development of sports for people with disabilities.

The ordinary player: teenagers talk about digital games

The present discourse analysis is based on eight focus-group interviews with 32 teenagers where use of and preferences for digital games were discussed. The focus is on how teenagers take stances on digital games and present themselves as players. The main findings are that teenagers position themselves as ‘ordinary’ teenage players who have extensive experience and knowledge of playing various types of games, who play for fun, and who are in control of their playing. The construction of the ordinary teenage player is made in contrast to the hardcore player. The analysis also shows that teenagers display cultural knowledge of what is considered acceptable, as well as problematic stances on digital games and playing.

Quantum Game Theory and Coordination in Intellectual Property

Abstract The inventive and creative works protected by intellectual property laws are typically characterized as public goods. As in the case of ordinary public goods, it is often difficult for inventors and creators to erect non-legal barriers to prevent the use of their works (non-excludability), and any such use generally does not deplete their works (non-rivalry). Thus, scholars have long used classical game theoretic models of public goods to describe the strategies of players in intellectual property (IP) games. These models contain two seemingly common-sense assumptions: one, that if there are a finite number of decisions a player can make for any single move, the player must make exactly one decision; and two, that if a player engages only in a single game, the player will break a pre-game commitment with another player to follow a mutually beneficial strategy if it is in that player’s self-interest. Abstract Recent extensions to classical game theory using the theory of quantum mechanics -- known as quantum game theory (QGT) -- have dispensed with these two assumptions, yielding radical new results for many types of games. For instance, in the classical version of the prisoner’s dilemma, two prisoners will fail to cooperate even though it is in their mutual interest to do so. However, in the quantum version, the prisoners’ decisions are often “entangled” in a mutually beneficial way that overcomes the ostensible barriers of classical self-interest, leading the players to cooperate. In this regard, quantum game theorists have suggested that if some exogenous quantum mechanical mechanism -- like a quantum computer -- could be used to entangle players in a public-goods game, doing so would diminish or eliminate sub-optimal free riding.Abstract This paper contends that there are endogenous effects analogous to those in quantum games -- specifically, quantum game-like results that emerge in the absence of external quantum computers -- in certain types of IP games that may act to reduce classically predicted free riding, duplicated development costs, and deadweight losses. In particular, instead of modeling underlying IP rights as classical entities, this paper follows the suggestions of several earlier scholars that legal rights are probabilistic and, at least metaphorically, quantum in nature. In so doing, it shows that rights, including IP rights, exhibit an inherent quantum structure that allows players to avoid making a single classical choice for each move. By allowing the government -- as a mechanism designer -- to engage in quantum strategies, ordinary players can exhibit forms of seemingly altruistic behavior and cooperation that are absent in classical models. The paper concludes by commenting briefly on how QGT might be applied more broadly to other areas of the law.

Picturing Tragedy: Mrs. Siddons as The Tragic Muse Revisited

Picturing Tragedy: Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse Revisited* Heather McPherson (bio) She was regarded less with admiration than with wonder, as if a being of a superior order had dropped from another sphere to awe the world with the majesty of her appearance. She raised Tragedy to the skies, or brought it down from thence. It was something above nature. We can conceive of nothing grander . . . Power was seated on her brow, passion emanated from her breast as from a shrine. She was Tragedy personified. William Hazlitt, “Mrs. Siddons” (Examiner, 16 June 1816) Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Joshua Reynolds, Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse, 1784. Huntington Library and Art Collections, San Marino. This essay reconsiders Sir Joshua Reynolds’s majestic depiction of Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse (1784; fig. 1), the most celebrated representation of the awe-inspiring actress Hazlitt hailed as the personification of tragedy. 1 In particular, it seeks to recontextualize Reynolds’s painting within the intersecting spheres of late-eighteenth-century visual and theatrical culture in order to enhance our understanding of the complex reciprocal relationship between portraiture and the stage in Georgian England and the ways in which aesthetics, ideology, and commerce overlapped. Reynolds’s exceptional artistic and theatrical icon is situated at the crossroads of historical portraiture and theatrical performance, which faced many of the same challenges in the representation of historical character and the delineation of the human passions. Moreover, just as Mrs. Siddons towered above ordinary players, contemporaries regarded the Tragic Muse as more than an ordinary portrait. For example, the Public Advertiser praised Reynolds’s portrait of Mrs. Siddons as a history painting [End Page 401] “most gloriously splendid in composition, outline, and effect.” 2 It was appropriate that the sublime Siddons, who personified Tragedy for her contemporaries, should be immortalized as the Tragic Muse in a picture widely saluted as the ne plus ultra of Reynolds’s artistic endeavors. 3 Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 2. Composite x-ray of Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse. Huntington Library and Art Collections, San Marino. A reconsideration of Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse is timely because new technical evidence has recently come to light, which demonstrates that Reynolds reworked the picture substantially and modified the iconographic scheme during the painting process. 4 The compositional changes can be seen in the composite x-ray (fig. 2). The principal modifications include the elimination of a putto presenting a scroll, visible at the lower left, and alterations in both the pose and expression of the attendant at the upper right, who was initially depicted in the traditional pose of melancholy, his tilted, helmeted head resting on his left arm, recalling Michelangelo’s brooding depiction of Lorenzo de Medici. Mrs. Siddons’s pose and attitude, however, were not modified. I shall return to the conflation of tragedy and melancholy and the aesthetic and iconographic significance of Reynolds’s compositional changes in the concluding section of the essay. Reynolds’s reworking of the canvas is corroborated by contemporary eyewitnesses such as Gilbert Stuart, who admired the Tragic Muse in progress in Reynolds’s studio, but was disappointed when he returned at Sir Joshua’s invitation to view the finished picture. When Reynolds inquired if he had not improved it, Stuart, supposedly blurted out, “It could not have been improved—why did you not take another canvas?” 5 Although Stuart’s self-aggrandizing account is somewhat suspect, the fact remains that Reynolds did modify his depiction of Mrs. Siddons. The anonymous critic for the St. James’s Chronicle, who also viewed the picture in progress, concurred that Reynolds had altered his original conception and not for the better. In his review of the 1784 Royal Academy exhibition, he faulted Reynolds for spoiling his canvas through attempted corrections and contended that the finished picture lacked sublimity. This picture last year, for we then had the pleasure of seeing it, gave some intimation and hopes of sublimity. Sir Joshua, it seems, was not satisfied with his first thoughts; and by endeavouring to correct them we think he has lost considerably of their spirit and energy. It is not a...

Optimal Stopping-Related Inequalities for Iid Random Variables when the Future Is Discounted

Comparisons are made between the maximal expected gain of a prophet and the maximal expected reward of an ordinary player observing a sequence of uniformly bounded i.i.d. random variables when the future is discounted. The player uses pure threshold stopping times which are asymptotically optimal. Both finite and infinite sequences of random variables are treated. Also, comparisons between optimal stopping values and expected rewards obtained by using asymptotically optimal pure threshold stopping time are given.

Statistics for the chess computer and the factor of mobility

Shannon (1950a) has argued that the problem of providing a programme for a chess-playing computer is of theoretical interest, and its use might lead to a wide range of practical developments. The problem is also interesting psychologically. If the human and the mechanical players are to play the same game, they will each have to be directed by concepts which have a certain equivalence. But the concepts used by the skilled human chess-player are both subtle and complex, and for the purpose of programming a computer they will have to be reduced to their simplest form. Chess-masters are, as a class, men of considerable general intellectual ability, and come from the ranks of professional men, mathematicians, scientists, lawyers, etc. They have in addition a special ability. Very few chess-masters, who began the game early, did not show unusual excellence at it at a very early age. The specific chess ability begins to show itself, given the opportunity, at about the age of eleven. Furthermore, there are few, if any, chess-masters who cannot play blindfold, and play many games at once, achievements which are entirely beyond the powers of the ordinary player. The order of intellectual activity which we are required to reduce to simple terms is therefore of a superior kind.

Human Factor in Piano Tone Production

A special form of portable Westinghouse oscillograph, using a Western Electric double-carbon-button 387-W microphone, and one stage of radio amplification, was used to obtain a large number of sound-wave photographs representing the sounds produced at the piano by various eminent artists, particularly Rudolf Ganz, John Powell, Ernest Schelling, and Olga Samaroff. The object was to discover how variations in attack upon the piano keys, transmitted to the strings through the hammers, affect (a) the intensity, (b) the quality of the sounds produced. The following conclusions were arrived at as a result of many experiments. (1) The number of possible variations in key speed and in the control thereof is indefinitely great, much greater than is commonly appreciated by ordinary hearers, or by ordinary players, of the piano. (2) An indefinitely great number of variations in the velocity of the hammer during its travel to the string is likewise possible. (3) Every velocity value of the hammer, in a manner dependent among other things upon the physical make-up of hammer and string, produces a corresponding intensity value, and a parallel color value, in the sound. (4) Faint sounds on the piano tend to converge in color value until at the minimum of intensity all sounds from bass to treble have the same sine wave form, that is, are perfectly simple sounds. Contrariwise, as intensity increases, the number of audible harmonics increases accordingly. (5) It may therefore be concluded that every change in loudness involves a change in color, and every change in color requires a change in loudness; that is to say, tone color control on the piano is dependent upon control of intensity, that is, upon control of hammer velocity, and that again, on control of the speed and acceleration of the key. The paper is illustrated with numerous sound-wave photographs, the evidence of which confirms the conclusions arrived at. The interpretation of these photographs is guided by the general rule that amplitude measures loudness, and shape of vibration-pattern measures quantity.