I'm going to take a stab at explaining/translating some of the examples from that article. The first is about "mana screw". In Magic: the Gathering, each player has a deck of 60 cards, of which about 2/5 are "land" or "mana", and the rest of which are "spells". Each turn, players draw one new card, put down one land card if they have it, and play spells whose total cost is less than or equal to the number of lands they have. Costs are typically distributed in a bell curve centered at about 3.5. If a player has too few lands relative to the cost of his spells, he can't play them; this is called "mana screw". If he has too many lands, he won't have spells to play with them; this is called "mana flood". Lands and spells also have color; to play a spell, some number of the lands used must be the correct color or colors.
At the start of the game, each player draws 7 cards, looks at them, and decides to either keep them or mulligan, which means he puts them back, reshuffles, and draws a new hand with only 6 cards. (If the 6 card hand is also bad, he can do it again, getting one less card each time.) If the initial 7 cards are wor...
Note: playing your own deck, as opposed to netdecking, is called "going rogue" and an original, unexpected deck is a "rogue" deck.
The advantage to going rogue is that your opponent will not be prepared to play against your strategy. As a result, he will be more likely to make mistakes when playing against you, and his deck will not be optimized for beating yours. (Plus, as designing an effective deck that hasn't been discovered already is extremely difficult, winning with a rogue deck is very impressive.) The downside is that rogue decks tend to be weaker than netdecks, because, well, you and your friends aren't smarter than the entire rest of the Magic playing world.
That's funny. I haven't played Magic seriously since pre-Google, and not building one's own deck from scratch was commonly known as 'cheating'.
ETA: this is because deck construction was considered most of the game, so playing someone else's deck is like having a more experienced player play the game for you
I don't know how "Bruce-like" I am in issues of personal goals and so on -- probably about average. But I have a freakishly bad case of the Bruce when it comes to competitive games.
I don't win games. Ever. I played Catan every week for a whole summer -- never won. I haven't won a poker game since I was seven. You don't want to know what happens if I try Mario Kart. I used to go bowling a lot -- I never, ever won. I run slower in a race than when I time myself on my own. Come to think of it, I don't believe I've ever won an argument.
The variety of games I suck at is too broad for it to be a simple matter of lacking a skill: I lose at competitions of strategy, probability, hand-eye coordination, and fitness. No. I have some kind of hang-up against winning. I've won "competitions" that involve taking a test or mailing in an application, but I just can't win if I can see my opponent face-to-face. On some level, I really don't want to.
It's got to be psychological. I suppose the cure would be to find a "game" of something that I actually am skilled at, and defeat someone face to face. The weird thing is, that sounds terrifying. Unlike MOR:Harry, I know how to lose; I don't know how to win.
I'm curious to know what you and PJEby got out of it. I didn't get anything, except "don't sabotage yourself" and "think your decisions through" - not really anything groundbreaking.
There's one example of the Bruce Effect that immediately jumps at me because it
a)Has been incredibly active in my life
b)Squares so well with the adaptionist explanation of the Bruce Effect
My chief form of self sabotage has always been with the opposite sex. Someone will hit on me, or my own advances will begin to go somewhere, and I'll do something to bring things to a halt. On present reflection it feels very much like I'm afraid of the challenges that would follow - that flirting with someone I find really attractive feels like embarking on some terrifying balancing act, and the failure is a return to the natural order of things - reassuring and predictable. The kind of thinking that might lead someone to avoid seeking higher status within a peer group which he didn't feel capable of maintaining.
Damn, it appears I haven't read the off-topic thread where Magic players were sought after.
So let me state here that Magic was my number one passion between ages 14-20 or so. I sold my collection (including the Power Nine and other goodies) in order to donate to SIAI, though.
(Haven't regretted it, even though Magic is such a hugely fun game.)
I hated Magic, because it took over the roleplaying community and replaced a lot of good games; and I was excluded from it because I couldn't afford it.
Interesting connection here with "Breakdown of Will" (which I finally received and read yesterday): Ainslie hypothesizes (rather convincingly) that pain and negative emotion are also associated with a burst of "reward" -- i.e. attention and interest. This might be where "Bruce" comes from... not to mention other forms of drama addiction.
(I'm tempted to link to this article from my blog as well, but the jargon really does make it a tough read. Maybe I'll wait until it can supplement a more substantive Bruce-related post of my own.)
I... honestly feel like I have no clue at all what this emotion feels like. I wonder if my brain would actually show that burst of reward.
I read the article and thought, "Hm, I have an inner name-of-loser-relative", which was a very frightening thought; but I didn't parse that in terms of enjoyment, that seemed to me like needless psychoanalysis. It was just a loser side with bad habits, probably formed mostly by hyperbolic discounting or poor impulse control. And it occurred to me that I should give this side a name and separate it out from my real me.
Now I'm wondering if the part about "enjoyment" wasn't mere psychoanalysis but something I either unusually lack, or which is unusually obscured from my sight. I know there are men who get sexual pleasure out of being kicked in the balls but I don't really know what goes on in their minds. I'm trying not to sound boastful here, but losing, generally speaking, hurts like a bastard. I can imagine other minds in which a little flash of malicious enjoyment or self-flagellation or something is tacked on, but I have no idea if that imagination is the right one.
Now I'm wondering if the part about "enjoyment" wasn't mere psychoanalysis but something I either unusually lack, or which is unusually obscured from my sight.
Enjoyment isn't the right word, I don't think. My wife and I both described the "Bruce effect" sensation as being more like a sense of recognition or rightness -- like confirmation of something that you expected, something that's just the way the world works. That, upon successfully losing, it's like, "yep, this is where I'm supposed to be". Not enjoyment... more like satisfaction... though that's still too strong. Closure, maybe? Relief? It's a brief and subtle reward, not a conscious pleasure.
It was just a loser side with bad habits, probably formed mostly by hyperbolic discounting or poor impulse control.
Anosognosia. Don't speculate, investigate -- observe the automatic thoughts in action, rather than adding voluntary thoughts on top of them.
And it occurred to me that I should give this side a name and separate it out from my real me.
Be careful of how you do that... dispassionate separation is okay, rejection is not. When people actively reject parts of themselves ("...
Enjoyment isn't the right word, I don't think. My wife and I both described the "Bruce effect" sensation as being more like a sense of recognition or rightness -- like confirmation of something that you expected, something that's just the way the world works.
Okay... I understand that, but only because of my struggles with my diet.
It's possible that naming the part of us that makes us lose is oversimplifying the problem. We can consciously come up with rationalizations for why achieving one result counts as a "win" and another result as a "loss". But clean win/lose states don't exist in real life, which is much more messy. Instead winning and losing is achieving different results.
Is it possible that Bruce is just playing a different game, rather than solely attempting to make "me" lose my game? Bruce may actually be the person who wants things that we c...
You made me think: Is there some possible evolutionary advantage of having a Bruce? Or more precisely, is there an instinct that would do something useful 100000 years ago, which makes us self-sabotage today?
Perhaps there is an instinct "not to appear much more successful than the rest of your tribe". Because there is a competition inside your tribe. Success is good, but it also brings enemies, any you may not be ready to face them. So unless you are ready to fight them all and become a leader of your tribe, it is better to sabotage yourself sometimes.
This instinct was fine-tuned to an ancient environment, and is not so necessary today (unless there is a Khmer Rouge revolution around the corner). But if you are smarter that the average, sometimes the instinct may kick in after an unconscious decision that you are already "dangerously successful".
More precisely, the instinct is somehow valid today too (success still brings you enemies), but it sometimes mistakenly assigns too much danger to relatively small success. Maybe it is related to the size and degree of specialization in our "tribe" -- in ancient world, when you were in top 1% at something, you were probably the best in your tribe; nowadays just studying something or doing some sport or game easily puts in top 1% of population with regard to that specific thing.
I have a Magic deck, but I don't often play. That's because Magic is not only an interesting game, its been carefully designed to continually suck more money out of your pocket.
Ever since it was first introduced (I happen to own a first generation deck) the game has been slowly increasing the power levels of the cards so that older cards are less and less valuable and one needs to buy ever more newer cards just to stay competitive.
Add to this the fact they regularly bring out new types of cards that radically shift the power balances in the game and one f...
I removed the "Recommended Reading" part from the title; I feel this can be implied and I'd hate to see lots of "Recommended Reading" every time something was linked. Hope that's okay, if not you can always edit back.
Arguably, card games in general can be a good tool for learning rationality. I knew that there was no point to dwelling on inaccessible options before I learned cassino, but when I learned cassino, I got to see the good ten sitting on the table and a distinct lack of tens in my hand and really understand that there would be no ten of diamonds for me this time and I should focus on the spades or something.
@CronoDAS - I used to play a very long time ago, but attempting to keep up with the expansions became too expensive, so I let the hobby lapse. This decision was made when Ice Age came out, so... there's your timeline. However, I did manage to acquire the old 2004 "Shandalar" PC version, which has been delightful both tactically and strategically (the overland game - defeating NPCs and ganking their cards - may be even more enjoyable to me than the card game itself). While I haven't tried the more recent multiplayer video game version, I'd definitely be amenable. So let me know. I can be reached at DarianSentient@gmail.com if you prefer, or if anyone else reading this would like to reach out, as well.
I play magic. Well, at least I used to. Never competitively though, at least not in meatspace (or magic online, apprentice ftw). And I agree - there's a great connection to rationality. One problem with the game though: to truly enjoy it's dynamic nature, which is one of the great things that sets it apart from other games, it takes a significant continuous financial investment in new sets. It's the reason I never played competitively.
I'd wager that there's at least one other mtg player here. How many people are named Zvi?
There's a set of 3 (I think)...
This sounds like a case of "wrong" perspective. (Whoa, what?! Yes, keep reading pls^^)
Like someone believing (to believe) in Nihilism. To Nihilism, I haven't thought of a good and correct counter-statement, except:
"You are simply wrong on all accounts, but by such a small amount that it's hard to point to, because it will sound like »You don't have a right to your own perspective«", (Of course, I also would not agree with disallowing personal opinions (as long as we ARE talking about opinions, not facts).)
Granted, I haven't tried to have that kind of discu...
Finally i go to other site and read this long text. But i'm not sure about what it says. That you need to look not at step that divide you from win, but at steps that move and move you to lose? Or about when you know that it is wrong variant, but find who was cause of your lose, think how unhappen you are, and don't stop you wrong actions. When you want to win, but make and make obstacles in your path by your own hands.
The link is broken, but I found the article elsewhere on starcitygames.com: https://articles.starcitygames.com/premium/stuck-in-the-middle-with-bruce/
I think you're overstating how rational Magic is. Maybe it was 10 years ago before Internet came along and changed everything, but these days everybody netdecks, brute force optimization of decks by playing a lot (online or not) beats any creativity, and number of viable deck types in a typical format got extremely limited (before JTMS/SFM ban, there was exactly 1 viable deck type in Standard, with everybody playing some variant thereof or losing).
The good old days of rogue decks stealing tournament wins are long gone. Feedback got way too fast for that.
Mu...
The next time you lose a match you feel you should have won, or just lose any match, ask yourself if perhaps instead of thinking the entire combat math through you just said"screw it" and ran all your dudes in.
I am reminded of Robert E. Lee's uncharacteristic frontal assault at Gettysburg. I keep thinking that the pressure got to him, and he just convinced himself, "Screw it. My men can do anything!"
It would seem that Vince Lombardi is the Anti-Bruce.
I wonder if the underlying mechanism is something evolved for the regulation o...
Winning matches isn't necessarily the reason people take up card games like Magic: The Gathering.
It's not that difficult to imagine someone holding a purpose for playing that's at cross-purposes to building a more 'effective' deck. As a sort of trivial example, consider a person who has the resources available to exploit an infinite-power-loop that was unintentionally created when cards from the latest edition are combined with old cards from several editions back... and refuses to use that combination on the grounds that it makes the game less fun to play.
Slightly off topic, but I doubt Magic is especially good for teaching rationality compared to other board games. There are a lot of games besides Magic and Poker that are about decision-making under uncertainty, although most aren't nearly as popular. One way to measure ones progress in rationality might be to play a wide variety of these games and keep track of one's win/loss record.
If three different commenters ask me to do it, I'll go to the trouble of translating it into English. Anyone interested?
I remember liking the Bruce article when I first saw it linked here. I wish I remember why.
You sabotage yourself because you know that you shouldn't be allowed to succeed. You've heard"no!" since birth and had it confirmed throughout your entire life.
That's the author's thesis. Your persistent problems, he says, are due to a facet of your mind that wants to lose and suffer persistently; not to suffer for exhilaration, like a man who enjoys the occasional nipple clamp, but to suffer as penance to the cosmos for being a wretched, worthless pers...
Hmm, didn't really get anything out of this. Maybe you need to be able to be competent at stuff in the first place to sabotage yourself?
I agree card games can be a decent training mechanism, but I think the efficacy increases with the games complexity. I played MTG in my youth and a number of other card games like L5R. In actuality I think MTG is one of the least complex card games in the market, lending to its wide popularity. Certainly it could be argued to be more complex in some ways then poker, but less then other games. At some point complexity makes a game overly convoluted or turns off more casual players if it reduces the ability for an average person to understand its basic facet...
I was somewhat disappointed to find a lack of Magic: the Gathering players on LessWrong when I asked about it in the off-topic thread. You see, competitive Magic is one of the best, most demanding rationality battlefields that I know about. Furthermore, Magic is discussed extensively on the Internet, and many articles in which people try to explain how to become a better Magic player are, essentially, describing how to become more rational: how to better learn from experience, make judgments from noisy data, and (yes) overcome biases that interfere with one's ability to make better decisions.
Because people here don't play Magic, I can't simply link to those articles and say, "Here. Go read." I have to put everything into context, because Magic jargon has become its own language, distinct from English. Think I'm kidding? I was able to follow match coverage written in French using nothing but my knowledge of Magic-ese and what I remembered from my high school Spanish classes. Instead of simply linking, in order to give you the full effect, I'd have to undertake a project equivalent to translating a work in a foreign language.
So it is with great trepidation that I give you, untranslated, one of the "classics" of Magic literature.
Stuck In The Middle With Bruce by John F. Rizzo.
Now, John "Friggin'" Rizzo isn't one of the great Magic players. Far from it. He is, however, one of the great Magic writers, to the extent that the adjective "great" can be applied to someone who writes about Magic. His bizarre stream-of-consciousness writing style, personal stories, and strongly held opinions have made him a legend in the Magic community. "Stuck in the Middle with Bruce" is his most famous work, as incomprehensible as it may be to those who don't speak our language (and even to those that do).
So, why am I choosing to direct you to this particular piece of writing? Well, although Rizzo doesn't know much about winning, he knows an awful lot about what causes people to lose, and that's the topic of this particular piece - people's need to lose.
Does Bruce whisper into your ear, too?