Lecture 11 - Evolutionary Stability: Cooperation, Mutation, and Equilibrium

We discuss evolution and game theory, and introduce the concept of evolutionary stability. We ask what kinds of strategies are evolutionarily stable, and how this idea from biology relates to concepts from economics like domination and Nash equilibrium. The informal argument relating these ideas toward at the end of his lecture contains a notation error [U(Ŝ,S’) should be U(S’,Ŝ)]. A more formal argument is provided in the supplemental notes.

Om Podcasten

About the Course This course is an introduction to game theory and strategic thinking. Ideas such as dominance, backward induction, Nash equilibrium, evolutionary stability, commitment, credibility, asymmetric information, adverse selection, and signaling are discussed and applied to games played in class and to examples drawn from economics, politics, the movies, and elsewhere. Course Structure This Yale College course, taught on campus twice per week for 75 minutes, was recorded for Open Yale Courses in Fall 2007. https://oyc.yale.edu/economics/econ-159