The Prisoner’s Dilemma Must Be Solved for Peace to Exist. The prisoner’s dilemma is a concept from game theory that explains why, even when the best thing for two parties to do is to cooperate, the logical thing for each to do is to kill the other first. That is because survival is of paramount importance, and while you don’t know for certain if your opponent will attack you, you do know that it is in their interest to defeat you before you defeat them. It’s for this reason that deadly wars are best avoided by both sides establishing mutually assured protections against existential harms.
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