Evolutionary Poker

(Picture from here.)

As both of the readers of this blog know, I'm an ardent evolutionophile, a word I just invented. It's not a "belief"-- I don't "believe" in the speed of light, Maxwell's equations or relativity. These are thing that have been proven adequately. As has evolution. "Belief" is not involved.

An Evolutionophile really enjoys evolution. Likes to think about it. Finds the science exciting. Etc.

Even so, I run into those for whom evolution is a dirty word. Often they don't understand to what they are objecting. One of the signs that they don't understand it is when they say something like "evolution is all about random chance" or "the chances of human beings being here is [insert improbably large number here] to one." For one thing, these people often do not understand statistics and for another they are under the mistaken belief that evolution is random. It is not. Nor is draw poker.

What? you say. But poker is a game of chance!

Yes it is and it is not random. The order of the cards is, in fact, random. Or should be-- though once, in a Sunday evening church gathering, I played cards with an off duty vice cop. He dealt each of us seven cards and proceeded to tell us what was in each of our hands. He was making a point about gambling to a bunch of high schoolers.

Anyway, you have 52 cards, 13 cards/suit, four suits. You get a deal:

4-hearts
2-clubs
J-diamonds
2-spades
A-hearts

A pair of 2's. You go with the twos, keep the ace and try to buck up the remainder by asking for two more cards.

This is not a random decision!

The chances of getting another two aren't great but there is a chance that you might pair up another card and get two pair. Hence it makes sense to keep the highest card. If the next two cards are trash, you're still ace high.

The ace and pair of 2's have been selected-- just as intelligence is selected for in humans or hooves are selected for in horses. The deal of the pair is random-- or should be as I said before-- but the evaluation of the cards is the result of the application of environment (your brain on poker) against the random set. The resulting selection is no more random than balancing your checkbook.

You could use the hand as a metaphor for a generation. A random generation occurs, selection applies to the members of that generation and 60% die before reproduction. The remaining 40% (our two pair) reproduce.

What's even more interesting and how evolution applies here is that now, the 2's are represented as having value (selection survival) and apply to the next generation. Two cards are dealt:

J-spades
6-hearts

If you'd kept the jack, you'd have two pair. So it goes: evolution cannot predict the future. It makes bets with what it has. Even so, you still have a pair of 2's and an ace.

We could extend this metaphor, keeping different cards and exchanging them, each generation's cards applied against the selection criteria. Evolution does that. In short order, with a deep deck and an indefinite number of draws, you could get any hand you wanted.

Or, you could follow the rules and make your bets and see who wins. Animals don't just compete within their own species, they compete with other species for the same resources-- in this case a pot of money. Different animals use different strategies. A bobcat and a fox use different strategies to obtain the same sort of dinner.

Or, you could do what evolution does all the time: break the rules. If you're a bacteria, you all exchange cards to maximize your hand. Randomly-- the bacteria just packages up what it has and sends it out. It has no idea what will be useful for another bacteria. But ultimately most of the recipients will benefit. Or you could attack the player next to you for his money, bypassing the common pot altogether. The player to your left observes this and while you're all distracted, he takes the pot and runs off. He'll be banned from the game but if there are enough games around, he might get away with it long enough.

In cards the rules are arbitrary ways of controlling the mechanism of the game. In evolution, the mechanism of the game (genetic variation and selection) is relatively constant but there are no rules. There is only cost and benefit, profit and risk. And luck.

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