A Note on the Compatibility of Different Robust Program Equilibria of the Prisoner's Dilemma

TL;DR

This paper investigates the compatibility of various cooperative equilibrium strategies in a program game version of the Prisoner's Dilemma, showing that different types of Fair Bots can coexist as equilibria.

Contribution

It demonstrates that multiple previously proposed cooperative programs, including epsilon-grounded and proof-based Fair Bots, are compatible as equilibria in the program game setting.

Findings

Different cooperative programs can coexist as equilibria.

Compatibility extends across various types of Fair Bots.

The results support the robustness of cooperative strategies in program games.

Abstract

We study a program game version of the Prisoner's Dilemma, i.e., a two-player game in which each player submits a computer program, the programs are given read access to each other's source code and then choose whether to cooperate or defect. Prior work has introduced various programs that form cooperative equilibria against themselves in this game. For example, the $\epsilon$-grounded Fair Bot cooperates with probability $\epsilon$ and with the remaining probability runs its opponent's program and copies its action. If both players submit this program, then this is a Nash equilibrium in which both players cooperate. Others have proposed cooperative equilibria based on proof-based Fair Bots, which cooperate if they can prove that the opponent cooperates (and defect otherwise). We here show that these different programs are compatible with each other. For example, if one player submits $\epsilon$-grounded Fair Bot and the other submits a proof-based Fair Bot, then this is also a cooperative equilibrium of the program game version of the Prisoner's Dilemma.