Empathy: an unintentional exercise in Game Theory?

A few weeks ago, during the Welcome Programme at Sciences Po, there was a day of rain. It was remarkable to me because, having lived in Southern California for the past 15 years, I haven't seen such a storm in quite a long time. On my way to school that morning, I had stopped at Monoprix and bought an umbrella for the first time in my life. For quite some time, any rain in San Diego has become a cause for celebration so I felt a bit of a thrill as I splashed through puddles on the sidewalk and shook my umbrella out in the foyer of 13 rue de l'Université.

I went about my classes for the day and then headed back to the Métro for the ride to my dry apartment where I planned to make myself a dinner of salmon, broccoli, and a demi-baguette with whatever wine happened to be the cheapest at Carrefour. I was hungry, so the novelty of the rain was waning and I was just thinking about getting home to my comfortable life. As I approached the entrance to the Mabillon station, I quickened my pace so that I could get out of the rain as quickly as possible.

My head down, I moved my foot towards the first step into the underground when suddenly my eye was drawn to something in its periphery. I noticed a well-dressed young man inside the Diesel clothing store looking out of the display window, his brow furrowed. Following his gaze, I saw a man laying on the ground underneath what little protection their canopy provided from the rain. He was unkempt and dressed in raggedy layers, so I inferred that he was laying on the ground in the rain because – unlike me – he didn't have a studio apartment stocked with food, dry clothes, and comfortable bedding.

I faltered for a fraction of a second and, as I did so, another young man came out of the store and timidly tried to shoo the man away from the window. In that moment, I saw the homeless man's face and – though I couldn't hear the words exchanged over the noise of the rain and the Métro – his body language was clear: “What am I supposed to do?!” I had to make a choice: would I stop, step back from the stairs, and try to intervene on the man's behalf? Perhaps take him to get some food and sit with him for an hour? Offer to buy him an expensive rain jacket from Diesel à la Pretty Woman? (“Big mistake. Big. Huge.”) Or would I continue on my way home, turn on a podcast and watch a movie on Netflix while I waited for my dinner to be ready?

As with all decisions, this was to be a transaction. If I intervened, I would feel better about myself. My smug White liberal male elitism would be indulged. I might also have the opportunity to practice my French with a captive audience if I took him to eat. I would have a story to tell my friends to show how much of a nice guy I am. If I didn't intervene, I could go home and continue with the rest of my day as I had planned it. I wouldn't have to tell anyone about it. Or perhaps weeks later I could tell my philosophy class about how much of a gut-wrenching decision it was and how I wrestled with the choice so that they would see how thoughtful I am and pat me on the back.

In the end, my timidity and my seemingly urgent need for protein and carbohydrates won out. I justified the decision to myself by saying that I would have been limited by my poor French speaking skills and that intervening would have infantilized the man lying on the street. And that it was cold out. And that maybe I just didn't want to bother. I slept well that night, my belly full and my blankets warm. The young men working at Diesel probably did as well. I doubt that the man huddling in front of the display window had a similar experience.

This is a very long preface to a lesson that I took from an article by Saul Frampton, published in The Guardian on 22 January 2011, and based on a parable from de Montaigne's Essais. Mr. Frampton recounts a story – which I couldn't find in de Montaigne's writings to properly cite – of a neighbor who arrived at de Montaigne's home breathless and allegedly pursued by soldiers from a warring faction. Naturally, he is granted entry and comfort. Soon after, several of the neighbor's men arrive along with their battle arms, also claiming to be pursued by what must have been quite a substantial force. Being an unquestioningly giving person, de Montaigne invites everyone into his castle. With a metaphorical Trojan horse in his home, de Montaigne looks his neighbor in the eye and resigns himself and his very desirable castle to the impending treachery. The neighbor then unexpectedly turns and leaves along with his confused men.

It is a tried and true aphorism that nice guys finish last, so why did this snake in the grass neighbor sacrifice what would have been an uncomplicated annexation of a handsome piece of property? Being a philosopher, de Montaigne wondered the same thing and so he did what philosophers do: he asked his neighbor. The man told him that, after looking the generous de Montaigne in the eye, he found himself unable to follow through on his plan. That proximity caused him to lose the will to take the property or life of his neighbor.

Conventionally, we seem to think of empathy as a force for good that is the exclusive domain of altruists: Mother Teresa; Lyndon Baines Johnson as he pushed the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act through Congress; the volunteers and staff of Medicins sans Frontières; Saint Dan and his overwhelming-yet-unacted-upon concern for the closest homeless guy. What we don't seem to expect – and here I'm finally getting to the second half of the title – is that empathy can be more than the spoils of a decision in the form of the warm fuzzy feeling that one gets from doing the right thing. It can cause a dramatic cost for the defending party if one's empathy is exploited by a person with fewer scruples than de Montaigne's neighbor and, conversely, it can lead to a cost for the escalating party if they suddenly find previously-unknown feelings that prevent them from snatching the spoils that are well within their grasp.

There are other combinations of conditions in this hypothetical game that haven't yet been covered in this blog. Here's one:

I won't pretend that boxing and philosophy are more similar than they are here: I'll leave that for the romantics. What we do see here, though, is the interplay between empathy and imperfect information. In Game Theory, an actor has imperfect information if they do not fully understand all of the choices and information known to all other actors. In this case, the aggressor has imperfect information because he doesn't know that the young man he is attempting to rob could almost certainly beat the snot out of him. The odds of a net gain for the bully are, unbeknownst to him, quite low. The boxer and the little boy with him have more information than the bully, but still incomplete information: does he have a knife? Does he have allies hiding in the shadows?

The young boxing champ analyzes the information available to him: the cost of capitulation will be at least the money that he has in his pocket. The cost of escalation seems likely to be less for him, but there's a complication: the boxer's sense of empathy drives him to analyze the underlying factors that have brought the boy to this empty lot looking for an easy target. He infers more complete information and decides that capitulation is the better option. In doing so, the boxer shows us that this is not a zero-sum game. By submitting to this boy's aggression, he teaches the young boy standing behind him – who idolizes the boxer – that sometimes it's appropriate to turn the other cheek. The hungry bully gets to buy some food for him and his family and he doesn't get his ribs broken. The boxer feels good about the resolution and hopefully sees the money as well-spent. And we all get to hear the beautiful Xhosa language.

I'll close with one final wallop right to the feels. Here's another story of a good person turning the other cheek in a way that reduced the costs to him and may have increased the spoils for his would-be robber:  get yourself a box of tissues before clicking here.