lászló mérő

budapest 11 dicembre 1949

spiega come una tecnica matematico-algoritmica altamente sofisticata riesca a far luce su delicati aspetti della psicologia umana come l'altruismo la competizione la politica rivelando i nessi tra la psiche profonda e il pensiero razionale

formazioneadulti.com

DR. László Mérő - December 11, 1949, Budapest - is a Hungarian research psychologist and popular science author. He is a lecturer at the Experimental Psychology Department of Eötvös Loránd University and at the business school Kürt Academy. He is also a founder and leader of a software company producing computer games. One of his projects is a computer game he is developing with Ernő Rubik, the inventor of the Rubik's Cube. He is also the leader of the Hungarian team at the World Puzzle Championship. Professor of Psychological Economies in 2005. His son is Csaba Mérő, 8 time Hungarian go champion.

CASON ACADEMY

The first presentation of the CASON Academy in 2011 will be held by László Mérő mathematician and psychologist in the auditorium of the Talentis Business Park.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mero_Laszlo

dal concorde al nirvana

Quando la matematica diventa "gioco"
Nell'intrigante libro di Laszlo Méro, "Calcoli morali", il pensiero umano spiegato attraverso le teorie di von Neumann utilizzate in passato per comprendere i meccanismi che riguardano la biologia e le guerre, l'economia e la psicologia

Nel 1971 Martin Shubik pubblicò il resoconto di un gioco da lui inventato. Il gioco consisteva nel mettere all'asta una banconota di un dollaro. Il prezzo iniziale era di un centesimo. Si aggiudicava la banconota chi offriva di più. Vi era solo una regola speciale: il banditore doveva essere pagato anche dal secondo miglior offerente. In base agli esperimenti di Shubik in occasioni di varie feste il biglietto da un dollaro era stato pagato in media 3.40 dollari. Inoltre lui aveva guadagnato di più perché anche il secondo arrivato aveva dovuto pagare. Regola assurda quella che anche il secondo deve pagare visto che non vince nulla? Ed ancora più assurdo il comportamento di chi paga più del triplo per una banconota di un dollaro?

Provate a fare il gioco voi stessi ad una festa. All'inizio ponete la domanda "chi vuole acquistare un dollaro per un cent". Se ci sono due offerte il gioco è innescato. Durante i rilanci, un giocatore penserà che qualcuno ha rilanciato per esempio a 20 cent e quindi che conviene andare avanti e vincere un dollaro per 21 piuttosto che perderne 19 (la sua puntata precedente). Ovviamente lo stesso ragionamento lo fa anche un altro giocatore.

Meglio puntare 23 che perderne 21. E' chiaro che la soglia critica è 50 cent. Il rilancio è a 51, il che vuol dire che il banco che deve ricevere la prima e la seconda puntata riceverà almeno 50

ci sono molte strade per il nirvana ed alcune possono richiedere

una delle molteplici forme di razionalita' pura
concetto conclusivo di 'calcoli morali'

51 cent cioè un cent in più del valore del dollaro

E' chiaro che superata la soglia, il gioco continuerà sino a 99 cent. C'è sempre un guadagno. Si arriva a 100 cent, un dollaro. Quindi chi lo offre va in pareggio. Ma chi ha puntato 99 cent, la puntata precedente, perde tutto e quindi rilancerà a 101; meglio perdere 1 cent e prendersi il dollaro che perdere tutto. E' normale offrire molto più di un dollaro per avere al massimo un dollaro? razionale? Shubik pubblicò i risultati nel 1971 durante la fase più acuta della guerra del Vietnam. Quando vennero analizzati i discorsi del presidente americano Johnson tra il 1964 e il 1968, si osservò che subivano un escalation retorica, una trasformazione simile ai cambiamenti di motivazioni osservati nei soggetti su cui si era sperimentato il gioco del dollaro. Anche nella costruzione dell'aereo supersonico Concorde da parte di Francia e Gran Bretagna (chiamata la "trappola del Concorde") si è innescato un meccanismo tipo asta del dollaro che ha portato a produrre aerei in perdita. Il libro del matematico Laszlo Méro "Calcoli morali", da cui gli esempi sono tratti ha come obiettivo il pensiero razionale "qualche cosa che, forse, non esiste".Scopo del libro è analizzare il pensiero umano alla luce della teoria dei giochi del matematico John von Neumann, i cui primi risultati importanti in teoria dei giochi furono pubblicati nel 1928. Il risultato di von Neumann fu che per un certo numero di giochi è possibile giocare in modo puramente razionale. Il nome giochi non deve trarre in inganno.

La teoria dei giochi è stata applicata con successo in dilemmi decisionali che riguardavano la biologia, la psicologia sociale, le scienze politiche, i conflitti sociali, l'economia. Nel 1944 il premio Nobel in economia verrà assegnato a J.F Nash, J.C. Harsanyi e R. Selten per i lavori in questo settore.
Naturalmente il problema principale nella teoria dei giochi è quella di individuare una strategia che porti al risultato ottimale. Una strategia può essere pura se le azioni del giocatore sono dettate da un unico principio, che in situazioni identiche ha come conseguenza sempre la stessa azione. Per esempio il comandamento "Non uccidere". In una strategia mista, invece, il giocatore assegna una probabilità ad ogni possibile mossa e in seguito decide come procedere in base a queste probabilità. La decisione dipende dal caso ma le probabilità associate alle diverse decisioni non sono necessariamente eguali.

Entrano in gioco ovviamente anche questioni morali, economiche, sociali.
Un dilemma famoso: quello del prigioniero. Nel 1951 Albert W. Tucker scrisse una detective story: la polizia arresta due criminali con l'accusa di aver commesso un grave reato. Non vi sono prove sufficienti per incriminarli; tutto quello che la polizia può effettivamente provare è un'accusa per eccesso di velocità.

Il pubblico ministero fa la seguente proposta ad ognuno dei due prigionieri che sono in celle separate: "Se confesserai il crimine denunciando il tuo complice, ti lascerò libero; e archivieremo la questione dell'eccesso di velocità. Il tuo complice resterà in prigione per dieci anni. L'offerta è valida solo se il tuo complice non confessa. Se anche lui confessa, allora la tua confessione non sarà di alcun valore. In questo caso ognuno di voi resterà in prigione per cinque anni. Se nessuno dei due confessa vi daremo un anno per eccesso di velocità. Stessa proposta sarà fatto al tuo complice. Qual è la soluzione più razionale?
Se considerate la strategia della corsa agli armamenti delle due superpotenze (quando c'era ancora

l'Unione Sovietica), è tipicamente uno schema da dilemma del prigioniero. Il dilemma è se conviene

cooperare o competere. Quali regole anche morali convengono seguire; ad esempio la regola d'oro del vangelo: "Tutto quanto volete che gli uomini facciano a voi, fatelo voi a loro". La razionalità non sempre funziona; sono le strategie miste, razionalità ed irrazionalità che funzionano meglio.
Di tutto questo parla il libro di Méro, che porta razionalmente alla conclusione che i processi inconsci

sono quelli pienamente razionali mentre è il pensiero conscio a non esserlo completamente. Che termina con un inno alla irrazionalità ed alla necessità di raggiungere il Nirvana. "Ci sono molte strade per il nirvana, e alcune possono richiedere una delle molteplici forme della razionalità pura".

pensiero matematico

Has the human race 'grown up digital' - biologically different from the homo sapiens ?

He argued that the importance of the slow genetical evolution has been overtaken by a fast cultural evolution which will eventually lead to a global culture. What will exactly happen is unpredictable due to the "exponentially accelerated development" in technology and human adjustment. While today 10% of the total GDP is produced by information technologies this figure will climb up to 50% in 50 years .

We have all witnessed the enormous technological advancement in the last few decades - the question lends itself whether it is possible for our societies to adjust, or adapt these innovations into our lives. The information overload in our world today has led to "accelerated perception according to Mero. He listed examples of human performance actually exceeding what we had thought to be the upper limit set by the speed of neural impulses in the human body, for instance, when typing. On the other hand , however, the attention span has decreased radically, as reported by media analysts and other professionals.

The "7-second brain" trained by the television is increasingly inclined to develop the latest, most "popular" disease of "attention deficit disor der." In fact, Douglas Rushkoff, New York author and syndicated columnist, sees it as a possible strategy to combat the "attention economy the late-capitalist version of market economy; a scenario of profit-driven companies armed with the media competi ng for a few minutes of the potential consumers' attention, bombarding them with flashy, "image-is-the-content" commercial messages everywhere and all the time. The "good consumer" is brainwashed.

He operates by impulsive responses. He is encouraged to th ink less and behave more predictably. Rushkoff, truly the McLuhan of the 90's, teamed up with Stone, Cosic, and Ermanno 'Gomma' Guarneri put together a superb subversive show, demonstrating fundamental and advanced concepts of a democratic Net. The key is to prioritize the social and cultural, and push the commercial into the background. The ideas soared from public terminals to alternative communication systems, from free local calls worldwide to the future role of the TV. The greatest potential to fight the "Microsoft-like" power, as the participants directly or indirectly indicated, lies in the current computer counterculture movement.

As it was periodically implicated, the hacker is our "greatest friend who has the cap ability to intrude into secret corporate or governmental territory, to reveal the conspiracies against the American public, or to download copyrighted software and freely distribute it among the people. As one participant pointed out that counterculture is fundamentally reactionary, therefore, when the cause becomes less defined the drive gets lost.

Causes are often co-opted by the media; the once countercultural cause is picked up by the media, gets remingled, and sold back to the mainstream. And when co unterculture gets commodified, corporate powers acquire the framework. It is time, as Rushkoff hints, to get the Government back into the picture. In the light of the new power rlations of corporate capitalism he offers a new definition of counterculture as, "any activity not related to buying or selling."

otal.umd.edu

Dollar Auction

how much would you bid for a dollar?

There's a catch - you have to pay your highest bid even if you don't win the dollar.

Generally it goes like this. You bid one cent, because you stand to gain 99c which is clear profit.

Unfortunately someone else bids 2c against you. So you go to 3c. Eventually you get to 99c and the other fellow bids 100. What do you do? Well, if you bid 101c you lose 1c even if you win, but if you don't bid you lose 99c regardless. So you mitigate you loses by bidding the 101c. The other fellow reasons similarly. Experimental subjects have bid as much as 3 or 4 dollars before sanity is restored.

Advertising is a kind of dollar auction. You have to pay for the adverts even if they don't bring in new business. Also R&D; you have to pay your boffins even if they don't invent a new product. Consider also the cold war arms race.

My recollection is that in the experiments mentioned above it was only the second-highest bidder who had to pay even though he didn't get the dollar.

The solution is for the first bidder to bid $0.99. No one else will then bid. If the first bidder bids less than $0.99, it is still suboptimal for anyone else to bid (as the bid race will begin), so in theory, the first bidder should bid $0.01 and then no one else should bid. However, since that leaves room that someone might bid, $0.99 is still the optimal first bid.

The interesting part of this is why even enter?

A STRANGE GAME
THE ONLY WINNING MOVE  IS NOT TO PLAY

Because your psychology professor wants you to. Because you're dim enough to think the other people involved might let the bidding stop before it gets to $1.00. Any other suggestions?

Another suggesstion - (Psychology class requirement(proceeds to charity of course)): If all must bid and pay what they bid even if they lose) The likely winner is the auction(charity), If the bidding goes to minimize individual losses, the first bidder bids $.01, the second $.02, and the nth $ n cents. Then no one else bids, the auction gets n+(n_1)+(n-2)...+$01, and gives the dollar to the winner(loser - if the class has more than 100)or to the winner(winner - if the class has less than 100) (If the class has less than 14 then the auctioneer(charity) and all but the 13th player lose). If it is the psychology professor's dollar he wouldn't initiate the game for a class less than 14. (This would be a good fund raising gimmick for a class larger thatn 13) And what if it's just one round of sealed bids?

The optimal bet would be $0.99 then because it would be worthless to bet >= $1.00, so no one would bother. Thus, the best bet you can make without losing is $0.99. However, since everyone is going to bid that much, why even bother?

The DollarAuction can be converted into an iterated PrisonersDilemma-type of problem by having multiple auctions with the same participants. Each auction has only one round of sealed bids, with results announced before the next auction.

Suppose there are two bidders participating in 10 consecutive auctions ($10.00). If the minimum winning bid is $0.01, then the bidders (collectively) can walk away with up to $9.90. They will only get that amount if they agree to split the auctions. Suppose the bidders were Alice and Bob. If one person (like Bob) is very trusting, they could agree to split the winnings after the experiment is over. (Bob would not bid every round, letting Alice always get $0.99 each round. After the experiment is over, they could split the cash.)

In cases of less trust, Alice and Bob could agree to exchange bids for 1 penny. Alice would first get $0.99, then Bob would get $0.99, etc. Note that it is very much in Alice's favor in this case. Suppose Bob is trusting on the first round, and Alice wins $0.99. Then Alice shows her evil side and bids $0.02 on the next round. Even if Bob always bids $0.99 afterwards, Alice got away with $1.97. (Bob could defect on the first round, but he could only get $0.98 before Alice realizes Bob isn't nice.)

Also, even if Alice is trustworthy for the first 9 rounds, there is no (rational) reason not to defect on the last round (Bob's turn to win). An interesting experiment would be to iterate for a random number of rounds, so that the bidders don't know which is the last round. There is an excellent description and discussion of this in the book MoralCalculations by Laszlo Mero

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?DollarAuction

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?PrisonersDilemma

Developer of Rubik's Games: androsoft.com

amazon.com

programming123.com

https://ruwix.com/the-rubiks-cube/how-to-solve-the-rubiks-cube-beginners-method

Androsoft

was founded by Erno Rubik, the inventor of the Rubik's Cube, Andras Czeller, a businessman and investor, and Laszlo Mero, a mathematician and author of the book " Moral Calculations". Members of the Androsoft team are experienced game programmers and artists, having contributed before to such successful games as Ecco, the Dolphin, Evander Holyfield Boxing, Garfield Caught in the Act, or The Magic School Bus. Androsoft is especially

strong at developing sophisticated puzzle games with lavish 3D graphics and addictive gameplay.

ubiksgames.com

index.hu

Foreword
bright people err smarter then other people are right
Just one example: Esther Dyson the famous internet guru has discovered that the internet would become basically free and be maintained by advertisements. So many smart people would use it intensively that the advertisers would happily fall over on it. This idea has been subject to criticism ever since its birth. It has been calculated that internet development requires as much money as the total advertising budget of the whole world and the television and the newspapers shall still remain advertising media in parallel with the internet. Advertising would not be able to maintain the internet. And so it happened. In April 2000, the colossal collapse of the stock exchange loudly illustrated the downfall of Esther Dyson's conceptions. Yet, the internet has developed so much that it has become an inevitable part of our life. And it slowly maintains itself on its own right. What more, this new media would not have come about without the mistake of Esther Dyson or would not have developed at such a stormy speed. Esther Dyson, a really smart person erred smarter and more constructively than her critics were right. How does someone become smart? I would not say that only the busy solution of puzzles like the ones in this book would facilitate it. First of all, one must be born for such. School education also helps a lot but may sometimes be adverse, too. But if someone is capable of becoming a smart person, his mind must be continuously nourished but not with heavy reading and problems all the time. For thousands of years, puzzles have proven to be capable of keeping the mind awake and providing stimulating nourishment. Like spices added to food: they do not give any nutrients but the process of becoming smarter would be boring less attractive and less amusing without them. It is good to think. More accurately: it is good to think to a reasonable degree like drinking or hill-climbing are also good to a reasonable degree. Lots of us are fond of climbing a hill but only a few would climb the Himalayas - most of us would not survive it. The beauty of good puzzles is that they require as much thinking as is still amusing and the joy of solving the puzzle is well worth the sacrifice and the intellectual efforts. Like sports, if done to a reasonable degree, that make our bodies healthier and also give the joy of performance, our minds are developed through the solving of puzzles. It is good to spend a day in the country even if we know that a professional runner would take the same distance in two hours. We are the measure, the joy of performance is ours and our bodies become healthier. It is same with the puzzles. Nobody should be confused by that professional puzzlers solve some puzzles only in a couple of minutes when we ponder over for half an hour. Those should deal with the Himalayas of puzzles or solve this whole book in half two hours - and we still can take delight in our own performance. Maybe, we will sometimes err smarter than they are right. The puzzles in this book continue the traditions of several thousand years and are really the products of the 21st century. The conventional puzzle-maker, the computer programmer and the graphic artist all had important contributions to their birth. The classis ideas and puzzle concepts were not only given new and modern form but were also improved. New technical possibilities inspired new puzzle concepts. We are new puzzles needed? Is the production of the past couple of thousand years from the sphinx to Ernõ Rubik not enough? Not even a lifetime would be enough for them. But as much as we need new works of literature in spite of that we have not even read the old ones, we also need new puzzles that reflect modern life. This book aims at fulfilling this function: several thousand years old themes appear in the most modern wrapping. All this barely matters when we take this book in our hands and play its puzzles. What matter are, on the one hand, this nice piece of work which is good to hold and to look at and, on the other hand, the deep-brained and good puzzles therein that give the pleasure of solving and the joy of becoming smarter.

kreszbrothers.com

TIT-FOR-TAT

il dilemma del prigioniero non si può "risolvere". O meglio, si può risolvere solo se esiste un sistema di controlli e punizioni reciproche tra giocatori (cioè non meramente delegato a un'autorità esterna) se esiste un sistema di comunicazione efficiente e dunque un coordinamento stabile, se esistono istituzioni socialmente accettate, se si fa leva su elementi diversi dalla semplice razionalità egoistica e, infine, se si adottano strategie imitative di tipo tit-for-tat - occhio per occhio - Cioè in sostanza, se si prende atto dell'impossibilità, come individui, di effettuare scelte collettivamente razionali e, quindi, si cambia gioco. E forse è proprio questo il vero beneficio che si può trarre dalla teoria dei giochi: mettere in evidenza - come scrive Mérö - che certe preferenze e certi valori inevitabilmente conducono al dilemma del prigioniero e "richiamare l'attenzione sulla necessità di modificarli".

swif.uniba.it

Dr. L. Mérő mathematician-psychologist talks about the ideal cooperation about tit-for-tat strategy, the basics of game theory, about how he personally feels in Hungary today and what kind of future solutions he sees in order to improve the situation.

http://gyorgyigalik.com

Moral Calculations - Game Theory Logic and Human Frailty
Los Azares De La Razon - Paidos Contextos
Ways of Thinking - The Limits of Rational Thought and Artificial Intelligence

Rubik's Puzzles

Think A Step Further !

CALCOLI MORALI

Che cos'è il comportamento razionale e perché non sempre si dimostra il più utile ai nostri fini? L'autore ci inizia ai fondamenti della teoria dei giochi, e ci spiega come una tecnica matematico-algoritmica altamente sofisticata riesca a far luce su delicati aspetti della psicologia umana come l'altruismo, la competizione, la politica.

unilibro.it

L'EVOLUZIONE DEL DENARO

Gli esseri viventi sono generati da elementi singoli - i geni - che, opportunamente aggregati, sono in grado di costruire gli organismi più variegati e multiformi. Con questa scoperta, la biologia del XX secolo ha individuato un meccanismo fondamentale che va ben oltre la forma puramente biologica della vita. La cosiddetta vita economica, che sovrintende alla nascita e allo sviluppo delle imprese economiche responsabili degli attuali equilibri, si basa sugli stessi princìpi di funzionamento della vita biologica: cambiano solo i meccanismi di fondo, che qui non sono biochimici, ma psicologici. In uno stile accessibile e piacevole, senza mai allontanarsi dal rigore scientifico, il libro illustra il sistema logico che sta alla base della nascita della vita, i cui meccanismi essenziali possono essere ricondotti al celebre teorema di Gödel sull'indecidibilità. Il parallelo proposto tra i meccanismi di base dell'economia e della biologia può aiutarci, inoltre, a comprendere alcuni fenomeni del mondo moderno, quali per esempio il funzionamento della globalizzazione e della glocalizzazione. In ultima analisi, la logica dell'evoluzione mette in luce le differenze tra il cittadino della società informatica, l'homo informaticus, e il suo predecessore, l'homo sapiens.
libreriarizzoli.corriere.it

L'evoluzione del denaro. Darwin e l'origine dell'economia

ibs

I limiti della razionalità. Intuizione, logica e trance-logica
riflessione sulla natura della nostra mente, sull'indissolubile intreccio tra pensiero logico e pensiero intuitivo alla base della straordinaria capacità umana chiamata intelligenza

libreriauniversitaria.it

Think A Step Further !

Sometimes even ideas that are widely accepted can be worth thinking a step further: neither Aristotle, Newton or Einstein could have known anything about the Internet or about cloning. This said, great minds often err more intelligently than lesser mortals get it right.
smashwords.com

Non-rational still sensible ways of human thought
Artificial Intelligence Seminar - 2007
dr. l. Mérő is a Hungarian mathematician, research psychologist and game-theorist. He is a lecturer at the Experimental Psychology Department of Eötvös Loránd University (University of Budapest); he received his Ph.D. in Psychology in 2000. He is also a founder and leader of a software company producing computer games. One of his projects is a computer game he is developing with Ernő Rubik, the inventor of the Rubik's Cube. He is also the leader of the Hungarian team at the World Puzzle Championship.
He represented Hungary in the Tenth International Mathematical Olympiad held in Moscow in 1968, and was awarded a Bronze Medal. He graduated from Eötvös Loránd University with a degree in Mathematics in 1974. He spent the next ten years at the Computer and Automation Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, working on various pattern recognition and artificial intelligence projects. Recognizing the limitations of artificial intelligence, he began investigating human cognition. Since 1984 he has been at the Experimental Psychology Department of Eötvös Loránd University, studying cognitive psychology and psychophysics.
He has written two books, Ways of thinking and Moral calculations, that aroused the interest of the wider, non-professional public analyzing the quasi-rational mechanisms of people and the nature of rationality in general, undermining some common beliefs about our minds' functioning.
cs.ualberta.ca