On Mon, Jan 20, 2014 at 10:09:02PM +1300, LizR wrote: > On 20 January 2014 19:43, Russell Standish <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Sun, Jan 19, 2014 at 10:13:22PM -0800, meekerdb wrote: > > > On 1/19/2014 7:09 PM, Russell Standish wrote: > > > >That's not the definition. A rational agent is someone who always > > > >chooses the optimal course of action, not that there might be a reason > > > >for it. > > > > > > Isn't "being optimal" a reason? > > > > Yes - a specific reason, not any old reason. > > > > Obviously I wasn't meaning just "any old reason" ! > > (I said the reason was to optimise the utility function... I realise there > are caveats like not knowing how to, not having time, etc) >
The point about acting randomly is that clearly you are not optimising your utility. You a choosing something other than the optimum action, so are behaving irrationally by definition. Yet, it could be a beneficial strategy to do so, for all the reasons raised (fooling your opponents, making a timely decision, and so on). -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
