The Evolution of Cooperation is a 1984 book written by political scientist Robert Axelrod that expands upon a paper of the same name written by Axelrod and evolutionary biologist W.D. Hamilton. The article's summary addresses the issue in terms of "cooperation in organisms, whether bacteria or primates".
The prisoner's dilemma is a game theory thought experiment that involves two rational agents, each of whom can cooperate for mutual benefit or betray their partner ("defect") for individual reward. This dilemma was originally framed by Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher in 1950 while they worked at the RAND Corporation. Albert W. Tucker later formalized the game by structuring the rewards in terms of prison sentences and named it the "prisoner's dilemma".
William Donald Hamilton was a British evolutionary biologist, recognised as one of the most significant evolutionary theorists of the 20th century. Hamilton became known for his theoretical work expounding a rigorous genetic basis for the existence of altruism, an insight that was a key part of the development of the gene-centered view of evolution. He is considered one of the forerunners of sociobiology. Hamilton published important work on sex ratios and the evolution of sex. From 1984 to his death in 2000, he was a Royal Society Research Professor at Oxford University.
Tit for tat is an English saying meaning "equivalent retaliation". It developed from "tip for tap", first recorded in 1558.
Franciscus Bernardus Maria "Frans" de Waal is a Dutch primatologist and ethologist. He is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Primate Behavior in the Department of Psychology at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, director of the Living Links Center at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory, and author of numerous books including Chimpanzee Politics (1982) and Our Inner Ape (2005). His research centers on primate social behavior, including conflict resolution, cooperation, inequity aversion, and food-sharing. He is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Selfishness is being concerned excessively or exclusively for oneself or one's own advantage, pleasure, or welfare, regardless of others.
Evolutionary game theory (EGT) is the application of game theory to evolving populations in biology. It defines a framework of contests, strategies, and analytics into which Darwinian competition can be modelled. It originated in 1973 with John Maynard Smith and George R. Price's formalisation of contests, analysed as strategies, and the mathematical criteria that can be used to predict the results of competing strategies.
Computational sociology is a branch of sociology that uses computationally intensive methods to analyze and model social phenomena. Using computer simulations, artificial intelligence, complex statistical methods, and analytic approaches like social network analysis, computational sociology develops and tests theories of complex social processes through bottom-up modeling of social interactions.
Robert Jervis was an American political scientist who was the Adlai E. Stevenson Professor of International Politics in the Department of Political Science at Columbia University. Jervis was co-editor of the Cornell Studies in Security Affairs, a series published by Cornell University Press.
Kenneth George "Ken" Binmore, is an English mathematician, economist, and game theorist, a Professor Emeritus of Economics at University College London (UCL) and a Visiting Emeritus Professor of Economics at the University of Bristol. As a founder of modern economic theory of bargaining, he made important contributions to the foundations of game theory, experimental economics, evolutionary game theory and analytical philosophy. He took up economics after holding the Chair of Mathematics at the London School of Economics. The switch has put him at the forefront of developments in game theory. His other interests include political and moral philosophy, decision theory, and statistics. He has written over 100 scholarly papers and 14 books.
Elinor Claire "Lin" Ostrom was an American political scientist and political economist whose work was associated with New Institutional Economics and the resurgence of political economy. In 2009, she was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for her "analysis of economic governance, especially the commons", which she shared with Oliver E. Williamson. She was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Economics.
Michael Cohen was the William D. Hamilton Collegiate Professor of Complex Systems, Information and Public Policy at the University of Michigan.
Scott Atran is an American-French cultural anthropologist who is Emeritus Director of Research in Anthropology at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique in Paris, Research Professor at the University of Michigan, and cofounder of ARTIS International and of the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict at Oxford University. He has studied and written about terrorism, violence, religion, indigenous environmental management and the cross-cultural foundations of biological classification; and he has done fieldwork with terrorists and Islamic fundamentalists, as well as political leaders and Native American peoples.
Harvey Whitehouse is chair of social anthropology and professorial fellow of Magdalen College at the University of Oxford.
Raghavendra Gadagkar is an honorary professor at the Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, India, who studies evolution of social behaviour using eusocial insects using Ropalidia marginata, a locally common wasp as a model. He was, from 2014 to 2016, the president of the Indian National Science Academy.
The William and Katherine Estes Award, previously known as the NAS Award for Behavioral Research Relevant to the Prevention of Nuclear War is awarded by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences "to recognize basic research in any field of cognitive or behavioral science that has employed rigorous formal or empirical methods, optimally a combination of these, to advance our understanding of problems or issues relating to the risk of nuclear war". It was first awarded in 1990.
James D. Morrow is the A.F.K. Organski Collegiate Professor of World Politics at the University of Michigan and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, best known for his pioneering work in noncooperative game theory and selectorate theory.
ARTIS International is a scientific research organization that focuses on behavioral dynamics affecting conflict. Its work is field orientated, and the fellows come from a wide variety of disciplines.
Rational choice is a prominent framework in international relations scholarship. Rational choice is not a substantive theory of international politics, but rather a methodological approach that focuses on certain types of social explanation for phenomena. In that sense, it is similar to constructivism, and differs from liberalism and realism, which are substantive theories of world politics. Rationalist analyses have been used to substantiate realist theories, as well as liberal theories of international relations.
