Plans you're not supposed to talk about

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You’re in love. The two of you want to share the rest of your lives. So, being good game theorists, you have a romantic dinner and plan how to align your interests for mutually beneficial optimal strategic behavior. Your goals are (1) to Odysseus yourself so that even if you’re momentarily tempted to break up you can’t, and (2) to remove the power of breaking up as a negotiation tactic so that you both invest fully in the relationship. So you come up with a plan: You’ll make costly commitments by purchasing jewelry, and you’ll sign a contract with the government that intermingles assets and is difficult to unwind. Maybe you’ll even join a religion that says that breaking up is punished in the afterlife. That’s helpful, but you go further. You decide to throw a giant expensive party where you both invite everyone you know and make loud public vows to each other. You consider telling everyone “OK, here are some promises that we’ve designed to maximize how embarrassing it would be for us

dynomight · Dec 2021 · philosophy 1. You’re in love. The two of you want to share the rest of your lives. So, being good game theorists, you have a romantic dinner and plan how to align your interests for mutually beneficial optimal strategic behavior. Your goals are (1) to Odysseus yourself so that even if you’re momentarily tempted to break up you can’t, and (2) to remove the power of breaking up as a negotiation tactic so that you both invest fully in the relationship. So you come up with a plan: You’ll make costly commitments by purchasing jewelry, and you’ll sign a contract with the gover

Plans you're not supposed to talk about

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