Book Excerpt

Samson and Game Theory: The Alpha Male
by E. T. A. Davidson

Samson’s quarrel with the Philistines is a feud, or a Tit-for-Tat series, which Game Theory ¹ teaches us is not the worst strategy against an opponent, but neither is it the best. ² A variety of strategies is best. Samson was playing a zero-sum game (meaning “a situation in which a gain for one side entails a corresponding loss for the other side” [Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary]). So were the Israelites and other warriors in the book. The Holy War is a zero-sum game: the enemy must be completely annihilated. Samson wanted a huge profit, and zero for the enemy. But life is not a zero-sum game,” writes Peter Axelrod”. Generally both sides can do well, or both can do poorly” (110). But this idea did not enter Samson’s head.

The Philistines had told the Judahites that they only wanted the justice of lex talionis: “to do to [Samson] as he did to us” (15.10), whereupon Samson gave an identical explanation for going berserk, “As they did to me, so I have done to them” (15.11). If they had stuck to this plan and let things go once the punishments were equal, things would have turned out differently. However, Samson never had a thought about evenhandedness and proportionality.

Once started, the Tit-for-Tat system is a wrong strategy, as both parties feel they have justification on their side for whatever havoc they wreak. The stakes keep escalating. The Samson story is a perfect example of the continuing classic feud, in which there is no way out except the extermination of one or both of the feuders. To prevent this, one side must “cooperate” (that is, be “forgiving,” and not insist on punishment of the other) at least once, preferably early in the game. This gives the opponent a chance to reduce the penalty as well.

The value of Game Theory has been brought to our attention by two recent Nobel Prize awards. In 1994, John Nash won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his contribution to Game Theory (Nash’s Equilibrium), ³ while in 2005, game theorists Robert J. Aumann and Thomas C. Schelling won the same prize for their addition to this theory–namely, that each side must be a little bit forgiving. You may lose in the short term, but can win in the long term.

The reader might pause here to reflect on a modern day feud, Palestinians vs. Israelis in Israel. At this writing, whenever this feud seems to be drawing to a close, some Samson rises and strikes again. 4 Concerning the Palestinian/Israeli conflict today, Aumann remarked that it had been going on for 80 years, and probably would continue another 80 years but that through an understanding of game theory, both sides could eventually come to their senses. So far, this has not happened. The author of Judges understood the danger of feuding.

The series of retaliations begin with the riddle at Samson's wedding feast. Since the Philistines cheated, Samson could have said, "No fair" and stomped off without paying. Samson, however, kept his word and gave his wedding companions their promised prizes. But his way of obtaining the prizes (killing and robbing 30 Ashkelonite men, and ultimately burning the fields, the vineyards, and the orchards of the Philistines) was intended to infuriate the Philistines in turn, and it did.

What is wrong is that Samson believes his opponent is out to get him, and he assumes that the opponent will always make the move he fears most–i.e., increase the stakes. This leads him never to "cooperate,” but always to “defect.” 5 This brings about unending punishment. 6 For every blow given by the Philistines, Samson increases the stakes with exorbitant “interest.” His vendetta is a kind of negative potlatch, in which everything ultimately is destroyed.

In a computer simulation of game strategies, Axelrod found that “the player that scored the best was the one that was least forgiving–i.e., the one that employs permanent retaliation.” (36). However, “ If everyone else is using a strategy of always defecting , then a single individual can do no better than to use this same strategy (116). Permanent retaliation may seem clever because it provides the maximum incentive to avoid defection [by the opponent]. But it is too harsh for its own good” (122, italics mine).

The going got too rough. In the feud between Samson and the Philistines, neither side cooperated. “Once mutual recrimination sets in, it can be difficult to extract oneself” (34). And Samson did not want to extract himself. Neither side would let bygones be bygones, which would have brought an end to the feud. Both sides were totally unforgiving. In such a situation, neither dares to soften, for the danger of forgiving an opponent is that “you risk appearing to be exploitable” (117).

The hope of those who use the strategy of retaliation is that the opponent will either be completely destroyed or will give up and leave the territory. It might have worked had Samson’s whole tribe been strong enough to engage in it successfully. But for a loner, the strategy is foolish: it can only lead to mutual harm. (It should be remembered that the Israelites believed Yhwh had forbidden them to live alongside of the Philistines, and Samson was ignoring that charge. In the author’s mind, compromise was not approved by Yhwh, and Samson, and presumably his tribe, anyway were absolutists, as we learn from the Danites’ behavior in the next story. What could have prevented the stalemate in Samson's case was negotiation and compromise, but Samson (like, or unlike, Jephthah) did not think of this. He was a man of action, not of words or reflection. His weapons were his hands.

One of the recommendations given by Axelrod to prevent such a series of retaliations is “to enlarge the shadow of the future” (126). This might be a good rationalization for the Judahites’ behavior in handing Samson over to the Philistines–the shadow of the future has loomed over them because of his behavior.

At first, Samson gets what he wants: he is feared by the Philistines, and “the shadow of the future” also looms over them. His brawn brings Samson–the alpha male–status and women. He was taking away Philistine women. This would give the Philistines another reason to loathe him. According to anthropologists, there is intense antagonism between groups when men stay in their native bands while women migrate. “Where . . . a group of closely related men live together as a social unit . . . , feuding and raiding between groups is chronic,” writes Matt Ridley. 7 It might also be argued that when the men of Gibeah in Ch. 19 form a coalition and steal the Concubine, they are behaving just like the bottlenose dolphins and the chimps that Ridley uses as examples: the males form alliances in order to kidnap the desired female (161-162). Seen as an archetypal pattern, the outrage of the Israelites in Chs. 20-21 that follows the rape of the Concubine is understandable, though pathetic.

Presumably, as an alpha male, Samson's selfish genes were at work, 8 but as far as we know, he had no offspring. The book would have told us had he had offspring, for it makes so much of offspring, and lack (or loss) of offspring elsewhere–of Gideon, Jephthah, and the minor judges. Nevertheless, if he is not helping his own genes, Samson is trying to help his tribe to satisfy their selfish genes. But in tribal situations, “to neutralize the power of an alpha male requires a large coalition,” as Ridley admits (160). Neither the Philistines nor the Danites can manage it. Samson seems to be someone whom no brute force can conquer.

His remarkable successes up until his capture no doubt make him overconfident, and he begins to court greater and greater dangers. It would take the power of a woman to do him in. But he keeps up his high-stakes game until the very last, and his opponents never succeed in crushing him, though his game requires that he sacrifice himself in the process.

With this ancient model in mind, one wonders how the Palestinian/Israeli conflict will turn out in the present day. We incline toward pessimism. The upshot of Samson’s feud with the Philistines is that Samson’s tribe left the territory. Samson won, but the Danites lost. Today, neither the Palestinians nor the Israelites are likely to leave–a least, not en masse.

–Excerpt from Intricacy, Design, and Cunning in the Book of Judges by E. T. A. Davidson (Xlibris 2008), pp. 274-276.

Endnotes

  1. In Biblical Games: A Strategic Analysis of Stories in the Old Testament (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT, 1980), Steven J. Brams applies game theory to several stories from the Hebrew Bible. From Judges he selects Jephthah’s sacrifice of his daughter (11.30-37) and Samson’s revenge (14:25-20; 16: 9-29). The three other books that I have used for game theory are those of Matt Ridley, Peter Axelrod, and Steven Pinker.
  2. Matt Ridley, The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation (New York: Penguin, 1997), 77-78.
  3. The story of Nash was made into a movie starring Russell Crowe in 2001, A Beautiful Mind.
  4. Shibley Talhami, Anwar Sadat Professor of Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, recently spoke in just these terms: “The Palestinians and Israelites have played the tit-for-tat game for the last 20 years and each time end up worse than they were before. They have to cooperate, but won’t unless someone on the outside intervenes.” Paraphrase from the Lehrer Report broadcast on PBS, March 5, 2002.
  5. In game theory terminology, “defect” refers to “behavior harmful to the opponent,” while “cooperate” is just the opposite.
  6. Roger Axelrod, The Evolution of Cooperation ([NP]: Basic Books, 1984), 15.
  7. Ridley , Ch. 8 passim.
  8. For “selfish genes,” see Robert Frank, in Ridley 132-133.

 

ISBN13 (TP) 978-1-4257-0077-5
ISBN13 (HB) 978-1-4257-0078-2