The beginning of fall marks an annual celebration of learning: Back to School Time again. I did buy a new cool metal lunchbox this summer, though I’m reticent to take it to work (a grown up place that does not seem to lean toward whimsy in any fashion). Instead I am engaging in the season by (again) dedicating myself to learning One New Thing. Last year it was “How To Play The Banjo”. I initially could not find online instruction that matched both my keen enthusiasm and complete lack of talent for the instrument. I finally found a great teacher who is kind, patient, and detail oriented - and I am now actually getting better. It is soothing to play the one tune I know. I am practicing holiday songs for December. This year’s One New Thing had to be different. And no more expensive subscriptions. Masterclass™ has become overwhelming, where talented people who are just naturally good at something try to tell us how to became good at that thing - it is often like having a tall person explain how to reach objects on high shelves. BBC Maestro™ hosts a much less esoteric collection of instructors (lacking Masterclass’s contingent of Kardashians), but holds the meta-flex of offering Agatha Christie (in resurrected digital form) as one of their teachers. Instead I turned to the Open Courses online series, a grand experiment in instruction. 20 years ago, a few top universities began to videotape entire semesters of certain classes and offer the recordings, FOR FREE, on the internet. No official college credit, but all the information was there for the learning. From the wide array of offerings available, one in particular caught my eye, as I had recently become very curious about its subject matter. It’s ECON 159 - Game Theory. We use game terms all the time: things are “stacked against us” because it’s not a “level playing field”, we have to “roll the dice” even if we are “dealt a bad hand” because we don’t want to just “throw in the towel” when it’s “time to play hardball”. The first thing I ever learned about games was how to lose. Not particularly with grace, but with unwavering consistency, as my mom won bouts of Chinese Checkers, and red and black checkers, again and again. With each loss we reviewed the game and analyzed what went wrong - what choices I could have made. until one night, YEARS later, I actually won. She had always said that it would feel better if I won fair and square, and she was absolutely correct…it was life changing. I enjoyed those face to face games. Two people sitting across from one another with a game board in between them, taking turns making choices that wouldn’t matter once they left that space, yet felt crucially important while they were there - a challenge of mind and spirit. Along came video games, where two people sat not facing, but side by side, looking at a television set. Choices and moves on the screen were a bit impersonal because players never looked at each other. The challenges and responses were pre-programmed and merely activated through controllers. Still, I had fun with my wife, who would augment her on-screen movements with elbow nudges and hip checks from the couch… it was like one of those 4D movie theaters. Then gaming systems required that each player have their own unit and internet access, so they couldn’t even be in the same house. Game choices and moves became nearly anonymous because even if others were in the game, you were playing alone, which I thought was weird. When games of adventure with endless choices and no single narrative path began to appear, I felt excited but a bit disappointed: I mean, that’s what life was already (minus all the Pokemon). And eventually these evolved into long form examples of imminent threat - survival games of war or monsters or zombies… which was (thankfully) WORSE than life was already, and I really couldn't get into. And now on my phone I am offered the chance to shoot constantly at a never ending horde of enemies until I am at last overwhelmed - a game that I will definitely lose - it’s only a question of when. And they want me to pay for it. It’s like therapy backwards - you’re having a pretty good day until you run out of ammo in the bleak hopelessness of your palm-held perdition. That’s a GAME? Isn’t a game a chosen risk where the odds are pretty even? Why would you play a game if you’re guaranteed to lose? How did games progress from challenge, to adventure, to survival, to despair? Thus, ECON 159. So far I have learned about The Prisoner’s Dilemma, which goes like this: A pair of criminals is captured by the police, and each given the same deal - if they inform on their partner and their partner does not inform on them, they will be set free and their partner will get a five year sentence. if they inform on their partner, and their partner DOES also inform on them, they will each get a 3 year sentence. if they both stay silent, they each get 1 year. I won’t go into all the head-spinning calculations, but it’s statically better to inform than not because the most you’ll get is three years and maybe none at all - but the question is ultimately moral, because it’s less about the odds than if you trust your partner. The “game” reflects not what the criminals did, but who they are. We’re all tested everyday; we make it out of bed, face the outside world, and triumphantly recognize traffic lights, crosswalks, and bicycles in those online security tests to prove we’re human. Sure, that’s a pretty low bar, but these are tough times. We live in a reality where our tools are becoming so fast and efficient that we feel like we’re becoming their tools. And the ridiculous fact about that all those tools and technologies are made by human beings… ironically rushing to prove just how clever they are. But life isn’t just a race against impossible odds. If that were true then all that would matter was speed and efficiency and volume and output, and we’d all be that little character with the ammo on the bridge, endlessly shooting until they’re overwhelmed. Ok, I can see how that metaphorically appeals to folks because the situation does speak to bravery in desperate circumstances - but how did that little guy get on that bridge in the first place? The premise seems to speak of previous poor choices on his part. We, unlike that fellow, can choose which games to play, which adventures we want to set out on, which prizes are worth our risk. In this blinding cacophony of NOW NOW NOW it’s important to remember that games are supposed to be relaxing. Fun. Parker Brothers and Uno and Frisbees and hide and seek and chess were not invented to be stark metaphors as to the state of human existence, but amusing ways to spend face time with friends, where how one wins speaks much less to one’s character than how one plays. Get full access to :lowerblackpain at lowerblackpain.substack.com/subscribe
