UAAR April 2012 – Reasons in games

UAAR presents

“Reason in games”, decisions and strategies 
Tuesday April 17 – ore 17,30, Venice. 
“Reason in games”, by Dario De Toffoli: introduction about the meaning of games, decisions in competitive situations, strategies, examples in literature, movies, and more.

When Dario has been asked to prepare this conference for “Uaar”, he was a bit worried and asked:”What connects games with atheism?”.

Well, with atheism directly there might not be any connection, but with rational and logic thinking there is. If there are players, we think that they might have the goal of winning and so they might prefer to take actions that favour their goal rather than stupid actions that make them lose. So they use their rational way of thinking. A game has a fake setting, but uses rational specific rules, so it creates a good alternative way to think. Life in general can be compared to a game that we happen to have to play because of chances and needs: rules are different depending on each culture, environment, religion…
So, no absolute rules but rules that can be shared in life, rules that can be changed if they don’t have a general interest. We know that all cubs learn to survive and face the world, to know their bodies, relate with space, time and other life beings, by playing games. And adults, when they play they find the ludic aspects of their life. Games could also be the antidote for commodification of social relationships: I play if I have fun, if it challenges me, if I feel good, if it makes me grow, if it makes me interact with others… otherwise “I’ll change game”. Now, I know Dario will blame me because I didn’t say anything about all the things he will talk about, like mental mechanisms, roles, chances, emotions, maths… These are all topics that you will hear from him. The entrance is free.