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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 6 September 2020 and 6 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Dyy122dyy.
Outcome D: If A and B both betray the other, they will share the sentence and serve 5 years
I am failing to see where outcome D comes from? Is it implied in the text?
Premise:
William Poundstone described the game in his 1993 book Prisoner's Dilemma:
Two members of a criminal gang, A and B, are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of communication with their partner. The principal charge would lead to a sentence of ten years in prison; however, the police do not have the evidence for a conviction. They plan to sentence both to two years in prison on a lesser charge but offer each prisoner a Faustian bargain: If one of them confesses to the crime of the principal charge, betraying the other, they will be pardoned and free to leave while the other must serve the entirety of the sentence instead of just two years for the lesser charge.
I noticed the same when I read it a few days ago but didn't have the time or energy to investigate it or even mention it on the talk page. But I agree completely: There is a non-stated premise that if both are convicted they will share the 10 year sentence in the given hypothetical justice system, and it is confusing that this premise only shows up in Outcome D, out of the blue.
So now I looked further into it, and it turns out that the quote has been messed with. It is not a proper quote from the stated book. The book (William Poundstone: Prisoner's Dilemma, February 1993, ISBN 0-385-41580-X) says this at page 118:
"A typical contemporary version of the story goes like this: Two members of a criminal gang are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of speaking to or exchanging messages with the other. The police admit they don't have enough evidence to convict the pair on the principal charge. They plan to sentence both to a year in prison on a lesser charge. Simultaneously, the police offer each prisoner a Faustian bargain. If he testifies against his partner, he will go free while the partner will get three years in prison on the main charge. Oh, yes, there is a catch ... If both prisoners testify against each other, both will be sentenced to two years in jail."
So I guess we should either (1) correct the quote and then also correct the text after the quote to match it, or (2) state our completely own version of the dilemma, without referring to any book, but then I think we could border on something like Misplaced Pages:No original research. I guess option (1) seems to be the most straightforward to ensure we align with reliable sources.
We should also make clear that the quote is just a "typical contemporary version" mentioned in that book, because right now, without reading the article lead, the text can give the impression that this book is the original source of the prisoner's dilemma (even though the book of course makes no such claim; on the contrary, it clearly states the origin as Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher in 1950, with the name coming from Albert W. Tucker). --Jhertel (talk) 11:43, 18 June 2023 (UTC)
I have adjusted the article now with the correct quote and correction of the actual numbers mentioned in that specific version of the story. Jhertel (talk) 13:33, 18 June 2023 (UTC)
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 6 September 2020 and 6 December 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Dyy122dyy.