It would seem, then, that we need to look beyond the merely 'technical' level if we wish to solve the Prisoner's Dilemma. However, this is not to say that rationality is no use to us but that, rather, our conventional understanding of what it means to be 'rational' is simply too narrow and needs broadening a little. Thus, we come back to the quote at the start of this article. Irrationality, says Douglas Hofstadter, is the 'square root' - ie, the cause - of all evil. Fair enough - but how can we distinguish, once and for all, what is rational from what is irrational? A possible answer lies in Hofstadter's concept of superrationality - that is, looking outside one's own decision and taking into account the decisions of others too, and consequently making the decision that one would hope they would also make. In other words, the 'superrationalist' thinks 'globally' - in the wider interest - rather than 'locally', simply with his/her own interest in mind.

The simple question to ask, when confronted with a Prisoner's Dilemma-type situation, is 'Which world would I prefer to live in - which is more in my interests?' A world in which all rational people recognised that to co-operate is more rational than to defect, or a world in which people get stuck at the point that says defecting is more rational in the short-term? The truth is that the latter world would soon become (as this world is progressively becoming) uninhabitable. No one would be able to have any trust in anyone or anything at all - therefore, to choose to defect, even in a one-off Prisoner's Dilemma-type situation, is ultimately an irrational choice because one is undermining the very foundations of reason on which one depends and hopes to live with. So the rational thing to do is to make the leap to that second, higher level of thought, and assume that one is dealing with other people who are also rational enough to make this leap.

As an illustration of this, consider the following example. Imagine you are on holiday hiking through a lovely part of the world, some unspoilt green area that the masses haven't yet got their hands on. You stop for a picnic, in the process of which, naturally, you generate a certain amount of litter. "Why bother to clear it up?" is the thought that might flash through the average mind. "I'll never be coming back here, and it'll probably all be ruined by next summer anyway. Besides, it's only a few bits and pieces." But, of course, you do take your litter home with you because you know that, if you leave the place in a mess, it will also discourage others from respecting the natural beauty of the area. You also know that, if you had come across such a mess yourself, it would have made your holiday a little less enjoyable. This, then, is the 'superrational' approach - only by living the value of superrationality can we expect our fellow hitch-hikers to live it also. The more superrational we become, the more superrational we can expect our fellow travellers to be.

Other examples spring to mind. The decision to turn your heating down a notch, putting on an extra pullover instead, is a superrational decision. Hearing a rumour that there is going to be a shortage of some commodity, coffee for example, and therefore buying a little bit less than normal, rather than stocking up and actually helping to bring about the rumoured shortage, is a superrational decision - because, by taking account of the collective good, your superrational choice will eventually be reflected back to work for your own good. You hope. The fear, of course, is that those people who are addicted to their caffeine in a serious way will panic and hoard up on supplies, clearing the shelves so that next time around you will go short. And it is that fear which exerts such a strong grip over our mind, making us want to buy in bulk too, in order to guarantee our own supply. Just like the Prisoner's Dilemma game, the overriding thought is that you can only be worse off as a result of co-operating. As we saw previously, the rational case for defection seems to be overwhelming. But, far from being rational, defecting is thoroughly irrational. We can only promote sanity with our own sane behaviour.

Only by promoting 'superrationality' - ie, by making the choice ourselves - will we be able to make the choice with any confidence, because one thus makes it more likely that other people will co-operate. After all, as Hofstadter points out, in a game played between truly (super) rational thinkers, choosing to defect "undermines your reasons for doing so" - that is to say, if you suspect that all of the others will behave as you behave, then logically you are saying that they are likely to co-operate with you, and therefore reason says that between truly rational (ie, superrational) people the only rational thing to do is to co-operate3.

Conclusion

No solution is perfect. After all, you can not necessarily be sure that the people you are dealing with are sufficiently rational to understand the principles involved. But, as Hofstadter says, once the principle of superrationality has been established in a person's mind, there is no reason to suppose that a rational thinker will deviate from it, just as there is no reason to suppose that a person who has been taught basic mathematics will ever conclude that 2+2=5. It is a simple principle that, in theory, everyone can learn - and the more people who learn it, the better it is for all of us.

The attempts of Axelrod, Hofstadter, et al, to solve the Prisoner's Dilemma logically, may seem a little simplistic to some and possibly rather too optimistic in their apparent faith that logic can indeed solve all problems eventually. At any rate, though, they stand as commendable enough attempts to try to think through the problems of living together in a complex world, without retreating into the superstition of a pre-scientific age.

References

Robert Axelrod The Evolution of Co-operation (1990, Penguin. First published 1984)

Richard Dawkins The Selfish Gene 2nd edition (1989, Oxford University Press. First published 1976)

Douglas R. Hofstadter Ch.29 and Ch.30 from Metamagical Themas : questing for the essence of mind and pattern (1986, Penguin, First published 1985)

Matt Ridley The Origins of Virtue (1997, Penguin. First published 1996)

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