The Problem With Game Theory - The Philosophy of Billions 

Axe: "How certain are you?" Dollar Bill: "I am not uncertain" One of my favorite lines

Wags is my favorite character.... he is loyal, intelligent, quick witted, and self-indulgent and a pinch of crazy.

I really hope people realize how educational this series is... It's phenomenal

Showtime really got their moneys worth with this sponsored video. I immediately started binge-watching Billions because of this take on the show, and I was not disappointed.

I just want to say that Paul Giamatti is an underrated actor.

Im so glad someone finally appreciated Billions!

For the raise negotiation -during lunch -outside their office -ask for 10% more -set a number first -on a Friday around the end of the fiscal year

The channel was wise to approach you to talk about their show. I am interested in watching it now, seems compelling.

I've been watching "Billions" since it first aired. It's been a fascinating show to watch. This video analysis takes it to a whole new level for me. Thank you, Showtime, for commissioning this analysis!

So this video is about two things, game theory and ethics, but it seems like it misunderstands game theory. It's true that game theory is all about winning, or at least doing the best you can possibly do in a specific game. That means achieving your best payoffs. However, if you are making rational choices then payoffs include everything you care about. If payoffs don't include everything you care about, you open yourself up to taking losses you failed to consider. If a person has ethical values, and those morals become relevant in a game, they must be included in some way in the payoffs. For example, let's say two people are playing a game for fifty bucks. Each player has 25 bucks to start with, and the only way to get 50 is to steal from the other player. If both players refuse to steal they'll each keep 25 dollars, or whoever steals first wins the 50. However, you the player know that stealing is wrong; you may or may not know how your opponent feels about theft, but that's irrelevant in this case. Maybe you have Kantian deontological ethics and believe that stealing is always wrong, or you're a virtue ethicist and believe it is usually wrong and not worth 25 or 50 bucks. Your commitment to your moral values is factored into your payoffs. So you "win" by not stealing regardless of what your opponent does, because that's how you achieve your best possible payoff when you total your different values into one payoff. Maybe your opponent steals your money and thinks they win and you loose. If they care less about theft than they do about money it's true they won, but you didn't lose, you also achieved your best possible payoff. You both won in the sense that you both achieved your best possible payoffs, though you couldn't win in the sense of getting your optimal outcome. For you, the optimal outcome would consist of not stealing or being stole from, but it wasn't possible to avoid being stolen from in this game if that's what your opponent decided to do. Maybe your opponent is somewhat bothered by committing theft and doesn't feel like their victory is a perfect victory since they made themselves uncomfortable. Game theory is really just math, so in that sense it doesn't have a moral dimension on its own, but when you start applying it in real life ethics should considered if you value them. The problem isn't that game theory is intrinsically amoral, the problem is that Bobby and Chuck are amoral. They don't factor ethics (and often don't even factor treating their loved ones decently) as heavily into their payoffs as a good person would. And it's often not enough for them to win, they want their opponent to lose. Of course, that desire to crush their enemies is factored into their payoffs, the problem is that their actions often become unethical when they factor this competitiveness so heavily into the payoffs. I suppose when you're using game theory, you may be tempted to downplay or abandon your morals in favor of achieving a purely monetary victory. This can lead to people like Taylor losing their morals over time. If that's the case, the problem only exists if you give into that temptation, and if you did you probably don't value ethics as much as a good person should. Someone subscribing to Kant's views would say their is no excuse for going down this slippery slope, right action should never be sacrificed in the first place and can't be excused, so you either play games "correctly" always doing the right thing, or you play them wrongly and do wrong. A virtue ethicist would say that if you go down this slippery slope, it's because you aren't virtuous enough. The only way to avoid going down the slippery slope is to always ask yourself what would some virtuous role model of yours want you to do in that situation, and keep practicing being a good person along the way. If you fail do that it may be difficult to learn to be a good person again. A utilitarian would probably not find game theory incompatible with their philosophy as long you consistently remembered to employ utilitarian moral logic, otherwise like a Kantian they'll say you are flatly doing the wrong thing and need to correct your course, which you can do at anytime as long your remember to employ utilitarian moral logic.

Pretty good advert. Full disclosure appreciated.

The Philosophy of Person of Interest, entirely underrated in my opinion. Everyone should watch.

Damian Lewis is fantastic in every show I've seen him in. He needs more Emmys.

Oh, I thought "The Problem with Game Theory" was about that RU-vid channel hosted by MatPat.

Wags = one of my favorite media characters ever. Maybe its his conviction for what he does

Billions is a fantastic series, incredibly well written with some great acting on display. I'm shocked you hadn't seen it or covered it already. Glad you have now.

I think it's worth pointing out that Black Jack's zen koan, seemingly throwaway, line has a lot more weight to it than it seems. I recently watched all of the show, and it's become increasingly apparent the primary philosophical debate is between cold calculus, game theory plays and contrasting it with something that's completely out of left field: classical Japanese warrior and monk codes. They reference the latter a *lot.* Not even close to as much as game theory, but it's definitely the second leading ideal that is fighting with it. That's probably why the show works the way it does despite the seemingly tired premise of cop vs. robber. This is played with a lot with the American Wild West metaphors, as it and classic Japanese philosophy have quite a lot in common as well (e.g. Seven Samurai --> The Magnificent Seven).

Philosophy of Lou Bloom from Nightcrawler please. It's highly requested.

"Bordering on sociopathy". no, chuck is straight up a sociopath. because of the way the story is told, he is an engaging antihero, but indubitably a sociopath and i love em'.

S/O to Showtime for getting this video done, never thought it would happen

Thank you for this. I told everyone that this was basically a posting co test between two powerful people, but this is a much better explanation. Love this show and now this channel!

billions is one of the most brilliant white collar shows I've ever seen. the only downside is i hate the fact that all of the characters, especially taylor mason love to quote too many pop culture points as to tell us (audience) that they don't just do law n wall street stuff, they still watch movies n listen to music on the side lol. nonetheless, other than that, everything about the show is very well thought out

Billions: Best show in our era

Finally! I’ve been waiting for you guys to go over this epic series! 👏🏾

Billions is without doubt the best quality show around today and maybe of a generation and maybe even ever. I would never have believed that such subject material could be so compelling and pretty much the whole cast are superb. I put special shout-outs to Costabile and Dillon. Screenwriting and production are nothing short of genius, in my opinion. I love this show.

6:44 - The line does not "devolve into a state of anarchy". It may or may not exist in a state of anarchy. It devolves into chaos. Precise language matters. ESPECIALLY in philosophy.

I never thought I'd be getting this kind of insight from Ed Sheerans' brother

I literally just listened to a podcast with one of the show runners on the “The Right Time” with Bomani Jones and was gonna ask you guys to do a philosophy of Billions. Apparently Wisecrack reads minds now. 😂😂😂

Oh my god, finally you guys cover this show. This is one of my favorite shows to watch. From the themes of order vs chaos, ends justify the means, and my favorite Axe is always right.

Please do Philosophy Of LOU BLOOM from Nightcrawler.

Interesting. Thanks for the heads up, this was a good collaboration, Jared. I'm'a have to check this out...

Philosophy of Doctor Horrible's Sing-along Blog would be much appreciated

"Behind every great fortune, there is a crime" ~The Godfather

What I really love about this series is it shows how morals and sense of justice are all fluid everyone has there own reasons and perspectives and justification for doing what they do, wether it’s “good or bad” btw good and bad are just social constructs created by humans. Get rid of humans and there would be no such thing. Everyone has there own morals and perspective on the world. Ex. More technical people have more of a black and white factual view, while feelers have more of what feels right to them. You also have someone like Wendy who sees all perspectives without judgement and finds a middle ground and helps people individually become a better them. This is why when chuck implies that Wendy is a criminal through his questioning she kicks him out. He started to forcefully project his morals onto her, making her in his mind look like a criminal and blaming axe leading to his own (marital) destruction and why he thinks when axe is arrested it would all be solved.

Finally!!! i Love the show. And a philosphy about their facets and protagonist is something i was expecting. Thaaanks!

I love this show so much! Glad to see it getting the recognition it deserves!

I love how the lawyer called out the other guy for saying he came up with the Game Theory name. 😂🤣😂🤣 I got to watch this show.

Great TV show. The characters are loveable and repulsive at the same time.

There's a little caveat in Game Theory argument here. The best strategy in a repeated Prisoner's Dilemma is "forgiving tit for tat" or "delayed tit for tat". You either wait until two betrayals or enter the chance of cooperation after you're being betrayed. In a 'regular' environments it's the best strategy in a long-term Prisoner's Dilemma. And then you go and explore all of the complications for this theorem when you have short number of game rounds, mistakes and errors, different "meta" of strategies...

This is the video that led me to watching the series 'Billions'. So as I wait for the next episode to be released I just wanna say, thanks :)

16:43 this story touched me deep inside my soul "you break that F*&!ing stick"

Love Billions. Just started my 7-day trial to watch Season 4 🙌🏼

Thank you for doing one on Billions. A great and underrated show.

I loved this show so much, I’ve rewatched it more times than I care to admit The edge in Chuck’s voice, Axe playing everything out. This show is amazing

Playing Go changed the way I approached life. It showed me that connections, relationships can be stronger than what any one person can do and that sometimes it is more valuable to leave a competitive situation unresolved. 😎

At first, I thought that this video was going to be a twenty-minute rant against MatPat. Then I watched the video. I gotta stop being so quick to impressions...

Awesome video as always guys probably one of my favorites, as a psychoanalyst i use the series as an example of a dynamic of power, castration and father figures competition but the game theory perspective is genius.

You need to an episode of the philosophy of Reggie "My body is ready".

Great brilliant insight. Not just some popcorn stuff but thought put into making the content of the video. Love it. ps : I've never watched billions so I'm trusting that the show is at least a reflection of it

Hello Internet! Welcome to Ga- Oh wait, it's the other type...

OMG you finally did Billions. I asked for this in an email like 2 years ago. You guys rock

There's another great thing about Billions: the references to Nassim Taleb. Looking forward to the next season!

Another solution to the stick question might be answering, " that is not a stick". This solution kind of more fits better with the idea, but either way its essentially the same thing... you are rejecting something fundamental about the question.

Your description of Game Theory and the social dilemma was pretty accurate. Well done educating your viewers on strategic behavior and its' limits! Thanks

Showtime was smart in asking you guys to do a review. Because I never heard of it but now I'm dying to see Billions

I saw something about game theory on the internet and it got my attention, than i saw the beginning of this video on the they it was published and became aware of the existing of a tv series about the game theory, making me wonder how good this show could be, so i waited till i have watched all the seasons so i could watch this video, it took me 3 months (because i had college, work and stuff) and i can say it was worthy. Only the firsts 2 minutes of video already made me want to see the show, so congratulations to everyone involved here.

But this is only a theory.... A GAME THEORY!

Damn, Major Winter seems even younger nowadays, good for him!

Please do more on game theory! It's a bit confusing for me but really exciting to learn about! Great video!

Amazing analysis! I had no idea the writers had a plan based on game theory the whole time!

I was a Philosophy major. I think it is critical to have peace within yourself first, and continually work at this daily. Our intuition is very important in making sound decisions. In my opinion it is probably more important than all the information you can find anywhere in the entire world.

Definitely thought this was a diss on Matpat.

That video was amazing. I recently told a friend that Billions - my fav TV show of all time - is Game Theory as a TV show. you explained it perfectly.

Great video! How do you think the show affects how we look at specific asset classes and commodities?

Philosophy of “Vikings” would be a great video

*Do you recommend to watch it?*

Excellent video, best bit? Finding out season 4 starts in 2 days lol.

That "Ice Juice" scheme reminds me a lot of the Chipotle debacle

"... sometimes explicitly." What, like naming a character Axelrod? Yeah, that's quite explicit.

Could you do the philosophy of code geass?

Outstanding analysis. Both technical and accessible. Kudos!!

This channel has grown so well over time.

Philosophy of Lou Bloom from night crawler would be a big W

Love this show. Watching for years. Still don't understand what hedge fund is. 🤦🏽‍♀️

I have watched this series from season one and it is even better than presented here. It has great insight into how human nature is what really runs the stock market and law. Also, kudos to Showtime and I hope they sponsor more insights into their programs.

Billions is a masterpiece.

Do the Philosophy of Courage Cowardly Dog

Jared your beard is misaligned! what's up with that!

BY FAAAAR one of the best breakdowns Great job guys

I have watched these show twice now.. it is that good. Awaiting new season.

Wow ! I haven’t gotten past ep 4 but I’ll be back after a week of binging

But hey, that's just a theory, a GAME theory !

i adore this episode guys ! great job !

I watched the first season, but after this I am caught up and interested in watching the next now that I understand the game.

Anarchy is not synonmous with chaos

The title is going to push down the other results you'd find for "The Problem with Game Theory"

The script and dialogue in Billions is outstanding! ⭐👏👏

What a lovely conclusion that thinking about situations utilizing game theory has starkly diminishing returns. Well done.

Philosophy of Joss Whedon or Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, please.

Welcome everyone who’s new to this show, you won’t be disappointed 😊

I thought you said "BASS" at the end of the video instead of "Peace" and I was pretty excited for the Adam Neely reference.

Been WAITING for this!!!

this video deserves a disclaimer that it is not about the youtube channel "game theory"

JARED! Do LOU BLOOM the perfect SOCIOPATH and GAME THEORIST from NIGHTCRAWLER this would make a PERFECT follow up! ❤️

Nice job! Really enjoyed it👌🏻

I’ve been a big Billions fan from s1 ep1, thanks for the analysis. Looking forward to s4.

But that was just a theory, a GAME THEORY

That hand sign at the End =Wasn't= 'Peace' ( ! ) ?

11:54 One key insight of game theory you didn't mention is that both players defecting is a "Nash equilibrium" of the Prisoner's dilemma. If Chuck cooperates, then Axe gets 50 by cooperating and 100 by defecting and if Chuck defects then Axe gets -500 by cooperating and -100 by defecting...so Axe is better off defecting in either case and the same is true for Chuck. Neither player really has any incentive to cooperate in a prisoner's dilemma. (In an iterated prisoner's dilemma" it gets more complicated, but there is always a strong incentive to defect if any one round of the game is taken isolation, or if you know that the game will end in a set number of rounds.)

Ok I can't be the only one that clicked thinking it had something to do with MATPAT 😂😂😂. Love ya Jared!!!