经济与社会科学2015nature.com
等级制度对人类合作有害
Hierarchy Is Detrimental for Human Cooperation
进阶 · 约 35 分钟读完前置知识：博弈论基础、纳什均衡、实验经济学方法
导读
这篇论文通过实验博弈任务考察等级结构如何影响人类合作，标题给出的结论是等级对合作有损害。实验涉及不同等级差异的伙伴互动和重复博弈；评论指出，高等级者在等级差距较大时反而比纳什预测更慷慨，因此论文的实验设计和普适结论在 HN 上受到质疑。
HN 关注点：等级制度究竟是否阻碍合作，以及一个实验博弈能否支撑关于社会组织的一般结论；讨论集中在实验设计、结构性与权力等级的区别，以及等级是否其实是合作的必要条件。
HN 评论精选
这几条评论里：质疑 2 补充 2
质疑批评实验设计有先入为主的叙事，并指出高等级者其实比纳什预测更慷慨，标题结论被夸大。
这篇论文有点奇怪，读起来像一位人类学家写的二流实验博弈论论文。任务被设计成产生符合他们想讲的故事的纳什均衡，而他们似乎还对“两个伙伴的行为只是定性上相似于”博弈本应诱发的行为感到惊讶。我认为最有意思的发现埋在文章中间：“另一个有趣的观察是，等级差异越大（k 越低），高等级个体越倾向于分享比纳什预测更大的数额。”这意味着处于支配地位的玩家表现得比他们必须做到的更公平。鉴于这个发现，更好的标题应该是：“等级对人类合作的危害没有你想象的那么大”。
tdaltonc查看英文原文
This is an odd paper. It reads like a so-so experimental game theory paper written by an anthropologist. The task was designed to produce Nash equilibria that would fit story they wanted to tell. And they as though they are surprised to see "the behavior of the two partners is only qualitatively similar to" the behavior the game was designed to elicit. I think that the most interesting finding is buried halfway down. "Another interesting observation is that for greater rank differences (lower k), the higher ranked individuals are prone to share an amount larger than the Nash prediction." This means that the player in the dominate position behaved more fairly then they needed to. Given that finding I think this would be a better titile: "Hierarchy is Not as Detrimental for Human Cooperation as You Might Expect"
补充主张区分结构性等级与权力等级，反对把“反等级”当作一刀切立场。
我对这类叙事的不满在于，它们把结构性等级与社会/权力等级混为一谈。人们花了很多时间反对前者，却以为自己在反对后者。在人类组织中两者经常相关，但并不等价。结构性等级似乎也是个棘手难题；更聪明的做法是构建更具包容性的等级，而不是一概反对等级这个概念。
evv555查看英文原文
The issue I have with these kinds of narratives is they conflate structural and social/power hierarchies. People have spent alot of time rallying against the former thinking it's the latter. The two often correlate in the case of human organizations but are not equivalent. Structural hierarchy also seems to be an intractable problem. It's smarter to construct hierarchies that are more inclusive then to be categorically against the idea.
质疑从历史、国际关系和创业经验论证等级是合作与决策的前提，而非损害。
我认为等级对合作根本不构成损害，反而是合作的前提。人类历史绝大部分时间都生活在没有明确部落间等级的松散部落群体中，因此数千年来一接触就互相残杀。你可能以为在美国/西方等地大家都是“平等者”，但实际上之所以平等，是因为我们接受了政府这一更高权威，尤其是其通过强制和暴力执行法律的能力。于是我们不再担心对方是否会砸碎自己的头骨，而能相对和平地共存。国际关系则缺乏明确等级，是半结构化的“强权即公理”无政府状态，因此我们在气候变化等许多“公地悲剧”问题上无法合作。20 世纪 chronic warfare 的一个定义性特征正是这种等级缺失。微观层面，试着经营一家没有等级的公司，你会发现冲突滋生，工程师无休止争论，却没有高效决策并推进的机制。等级其实是自发涌现的，人类因其优点而容忍它；当它不出现时，人群就会消散、使命失败。
dkural查看英文原文
I believe hierarchy is not detrimental at all (indeed, it is a pre-requisite) for cooperation. Humanity spent the vast majority of its history in loose bands of tribes with no clear inter-tribal hierarchy. Thus we spent thousands of years murdering each other on contact. You may think you are "peers" in the US / West etc, but in fact you are peers in that you've accepted an overarching higher authority in the form of the government - in particular, it's ability to enforce laws by coercion and violence. Thus instead of wondering if the other guy is about to bash your skull, we coexist in relative peace. International relations, however, lack clear hierarchy - it is a semi-structured anarchy of might-makes-right. Thus we fail to cooperate on many "tragedy of the commons" type problems, such as climate change. Chronic warfare is a defining feature of the 20th century due to this lack of hierarchy. At the micro level, try running a startup with no hierarchy. You'll find that this will fester conflict, as engineers endlessly argue with no mechanism to bring decisions efficiently and move forward. Indeed, hierarchy is emergent, and tolerated for its virtues by humans because when it does not emerge, the "company" of people dissipate and fail their mission.
补充强调实验的重复互动条件与社会长期互动不可类比，研究不能推广到社会组织。
论文写道：“给定更长的重复互动序列，等级组织中的成员或许能部分克服对高等级个体的不信任——只要后者建立了慷慨的声誉，这些人也许能从低等级伙伴那里获得更多贡献。”需要明确这项研究的含义：社会就等于更长的重复互动序列。这项研究与社会组织方式无关，它自己也承认，对于等级对人类社会的善恶毫无相关性。
rubidium查看英文原文
"Given a longer sequence of repeated interactions, it might be possible that members of a hierarchically organized group would partially overcome mistrust of higher ranked individuals in those that establish generous reputations and these individuals might be able to elicit more contributions from their lower ranked partners. " To be clear about the implications of this study: Society = longer sequence of repeated interactions. This study is not relevant to thinking about organizing society. It acknowledges it has zero relevance to whether hierarchy is good or bad for human society.
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从这篇论文所有 HN 讨论帖的全部评论里整理出来的链接。
历次讨论
- 2015Hacker News 讨论帖208 分 · 117 评
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