Focal Points in Framed Games: Breaking the Symmetry

by Andre Casajus

Overview

Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to built the city. (Genesis 11.7-8) 1.1 Static Focal Points 1.1.1 Coordination In real life, people quite often face situations in which they prefer to act in the same way, but they are not particular about the concrete way of acting. Some examples are given below: Credit cards: Buyers want to possess the credit cards potential sellers do accept. Also, sellers wish to have contracted the credit card company the credit cards of which potential customers usually carry along. For both, basically, it is all the same which credit card this is. What matters is that both choices coincide. Communication, information transmission: The transmission of information requires that the signals used have the same meaning to both the sender and the receiver. But it is inessential which signal has a certain mean­ ing. In verbal communication, this basically means that the people involved use the same (natural) language, though even then some ambiguities remain. Things are a bit more difficult for non-verbal communication, for example data transmission between computers-both sides have to use the same or compatible prools. Again, what matters is the prools to be the same for both sides.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783540414063
Publisher:	Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Publication date:	02/23/2001
Series:	Lecture Notes in Economics and Mathematical Systems , #499
Edition description:	2001
Pages:	131
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.20(d)

Table of Contents

1. Introduction.- 1.1 Static Focal Points.- 1.2 Dynamic Focal Points.- 1.3 Outline.- 2. Static Focal Points in Framed Strategic Games.- 2.1 Introduction.- 2.2 Examples.- 2.3 Harsanyi and Selten’s Symmetry Invariance Requirement.- 2.4 Rationalizing Static Focal Points.- 2.5 Framed Strategic Games (FSGs).- 2.6 Focal Points in FSG Representations of VUMGs.- 3. Weak Isomorphisms of Extensive Games.- 3.1 Introduction.- 3.2 Finite Extensive Games with Perfect Recall.- 3.3 Invariance with Respect to Weak Isomorphisms.- 3.4 Strong Isomorphisms of Extensive Games.- 3.5 Traditional Extensive Representations of Strategic Games.- 3.6 Conclusion.- 4. Dynamic Focal Points in Framed Extensive Games.- 4.1 Introduction.- 4.2 Examples.- 4.3 Modelling Dynamic Focal Points.- 4.4 Framed Extensive Games (FEGs).- 4.5 Modelling Dynamic Focal Points by FEGs.- 5. Conclusion.- 5.1 Static Focal Points in Framed Strategic Games.- 5.2 Weak Isomorphisms of Extensive Games.- 5.3 Dynamic Focal Points in Framed Extensive Games.- 5.4 Perspective.- List of Symbols and Abbreviations.- List of Figures.