Episode 160: David McAdams
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Game Theory and the Art of Transforming Strategic Situations
When it comes to game theory, the stories we tell can be incredibly powerful, because it's not enough to just analyze a situation and come up with what you think is the right thing to do. You have to convince people to make change.
David McAdams is Professor of Business Administration at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, as well as a Professor of Economics in the Economics Department.
McAdams has broad research interests in microeconomic theory and game theory, with particular focus on the epidemiology of information, with applications to infectious disease and misinformation, and auction theory, with applications to market design. David is also the author of "Game-Changer: Game Theory and the Art of Transforming Strategic Situations."
Greg and David discuss all things game theory in this episode: why every transaction you've ever done is a prisoner's dilemma, how familiarity with game theory can make you a better person, and war games.
Episode Quotes:
Game theory and change
“You need game theory to imagine the big change. So you will never get there if you're just measuring around yourself and making little incremental things. To make big change, to dramatically make the world a better place, you need to have the vision that comes from game theory. And then going back to that storytelling, you can probably convince people, yeah, this is going to work.”
Why game theory?
“That's what jazzes me up the most about game theory. It just encourages you to think big and think creatively.”
Game theory and storytelling
“The most powerful thing you get from being a game theorist is storytelling. You become a storytelling master. And this is powerful, but it can also be powerful in some really negative ways too.”
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