Dan Silber

For most animals (and historically for humans as well) play is form of practice/training for adult life.  Animals pretend to bite and scratch each other for fun, but it is direct training for survival in predatory world.  Children used to go fishing – a skill set that has a pretty direct application in that it is a means of obtaining food.  Likewise, children would play with dolls in part as preparation/familiarization for parenthood.

Sooo… what does that say about the games we play (or create)?

Either developers are either inadvertently training our audiences to solve problems with force, or (what I find to be more accurate and relevant) NOT training our audiences for anything they are more likely face in their lives.

The play that developers are currently offering isn’t relevant to our players’ lives.

Could we make interesting games with more general relevance?  Perhaps there could be some form of economic content that would help folks understand money and debt better in real life. Maybe there could be something that helps people to better understand how to work up the social hierarchy of the corporate ladder.

Could we make a game that prepares people for life in a cubicle?  Would we want to?

On the game that I am currently working on, the core mechanic is all about exploration, which seemed fine to me – as it does not have any particularly negative aspect to it.

But perhaps that is not good enough. The ‘message’ of the game as I intend it, would be the importance of exploration and experimentation. But then I wonder if it’s just an excuse and that I could be offering content that is more directly useful in people’s lives.

I have been thinking and reading about artificial intelligence a little bit lately and this has spawned some thoughts about why we only perceive some of our surroundings.

When a child is first born, it cannot make sense of the images it sees and hears.  It has no model of the world yet, and therefore sees only meaningless shapes.  Only after it has experiences can the child start to make a crude map of what these shapes represent.  A mother’s face might initially only be understood as food and safety.

As children have new experiences their mental model of the world quickly becomes more detailed.   After some time, the child starts to construct ideas of what to view as ’safe’ and what is unknown or could be a threat.

Eventually we grow into adults and have an extremely sophisticated models of perception.  We have a very complicated understanding of what is safe and what is a threat, what is out of the ordinary, and what parts of our environment could be useful. 

As an adult, we can walk by a tree and have a model of what to expect — there is very little chance of that tree attacking.  Nor is that tree likely to have $100 bills hidden away in the branches.  Trees are certainly useful and wonderful, but there is no signal to react (or sometimes even notice them) as we walk by.  We have walked past thousands of trees in our lifetime and usually have no trigger for concern. 

The same could be said about the leaves on the tree, but with even less trigger for concern, as there are so many more present.  It could take years just to look at and notice the differences between the leaves on a single tree.  Even if we try to perceive the individual leaves on the tree, it is extremely difficult because we have built a mental model that categorizes the individual leaves as being so similar that they are more or less interchangeable.

Alternatively, if there is an EXPLOSION nearby – we have no choice but to perceive it.  There is a very intense signal sent to the brain that this is something important and out of the ordinary.  Even if you wanted ignore it, there is almost no likelihood that you would succeed.  Your body has considered it a potential threat and will most likely flinch in reaction.  

This line of thought raises a few new issues for me.  For one - if we are a slave to our perceptions and predispositions, can we change our mental models?  If so, how difficult is that to accomplish?  Also, how does Art fit into this?  Art (by some definitions) has no practical quality, but can be extremely compelling. 

For those interested, the book that I was looking through is called ‘Society of Mind’ by Marvin Minsky.  I haven’t read the whole thing yet, but the chapters I’ve read have been extremely thought provoking.

But then someone comes along and says something attacking that is hypocritical/untrue/irrelevant. Or maybe you are chewed out for something that is beyond your control. It could even be a genuine accident on your part that was blown way out of proportion.

Often it comes from a loved one or someone you generally respect. You might have even been going out of your way to help that person, making the attack feel even more inappropriate.

And you feel your blood begin to boil at the injustice! You feel an instant need to set them straight and clear your maligned name.

Hold on there, partner. There are a couple ways this could go:
1. You could ‘set them straight’ and defend your position. Or
2. You could ‘accept’ the barrage of negativity without taking a position.

Let’s consider the two options.

Scenario Number 1 – You point out the flaws in the other person’s argument. You masterfully argue your side logically and mask your inner rage (with great effort).

For some reason, the other person only becomes more unreasonable. Now they are bringing up issues from the past that aren’t directly relevant to the current situation. They are citing times where you did the exact same thing. What a shit storm!

You can’t understand why the other person is fighting you so hard. You wish you had a microphone to record the conversation so that you could share it with the other person when they are feeling more rational.

Eventually, the discussion/argument is discontinued without resolve. You just barely escape – but you still feel resentful. Neither party has gotten resolution from the ‘discussion’.

Sometimes the other person apologizes for the actions. Sometimes not.

And if the other person doesn’t see your side of the argument, you never fully forgive them because in your heart you know that you were right.

With time, the bad feelings fade and life goes more or less back to normal but your connection with this person has been weakened.

Scenario Number 2 – **You sit and listen while the other person attacks. Instead of using you masterful understanding of logic to contradict the other person, you focus that logic silently on figuring out why this person is attacking you.

You are already secure in the fact that you did nothing wrong. You don’t need to prove that to anyone else. So you listen. And ask questions. And an interesting thing happens.

After a bit of time, the two of you realize that the REASON for the attack has nothing to do with CONTENT of the attack. Even though you were chastised for something unfairly, it will eventually come out that there is an underlying issue.

Again you choke back the urge to point your finger at them screaming “See! See! Don’t you see how UNFAIR you were being!” – because you know that this would start another wave of attacks, citing times where you did the exact same thing, etc….

You find out that the person has some big issue that is clouding their judgment. You realize that whatever insignificant thing that you did was only a catalyst that opened the door to their deeper feelings. Usually it has something to do with feelings of fear on some level.

By not engaging in the argument, you have shown that you will not judge their feelings. You have indirectly made the environment ’safe’ for talking about the deeper feelings of fear.

You realize that you no longer feel the need to be right. You understand their feelings and why your insignificant action ignited such a strong reaction. You still feel that their reaction was unfair and out of place, but you forgive them.

You forgive them because you understand why it happened (whether justified or not). You forgive them because they have gotten their temper out of control and you want to enjoy their company once again. But most of all you forgive them so that YOU can move on - so that you don’t have to carry around resentment.

It is unfair. But this is an important component to maintaining happiness.

Why do we always feel such a compulsion to be right?

**Note – I know that some feel that this would be ‘backing down’ or ‘being weak’. The truth is that it takes a tremendous amount of strength not to engage when someone is egging you on. It’s easy to indulge in your negative emotions. Keeping positive throughout someone else’s negativity is way harder.

I told this other parent that I don’t believe that a job is a very logical way to earn income and he found this curious and a bit shocking. Then he politely asked just how one could earn income other than a job.

I said that there are actually a lot of different ways but growing up with traditional middle class ideals doesn’t expose us to anything different. We learn both explicitly and implicitly to pick a profession so that you can get a ‘good’ job.

Then I used this analogy for the mindset of the entrepreneur:

• Suppose you earn your living mowing people’s lawns. You can mow 8 lawns in a day at $20 each. You are earning $160 a day. So you make roughly $40,000 a year (before taxes, etc) - not so bad for something so straightforward.

• The middle class mindset is to learn more about landscaping and become an expert so you can charge $30 an hour. Then you buy the best lawnmower, so that you can mow a whopping 10 yards in a day! Now you’re making roughly $75,000 a year before expenses. Wow, now you are rolling in the dough!

• Now in walks the entrepreneur. He heard through the grapevine that you are making some big bucks doing some simple lawn mowing and decides that this might be worth pursuing.So he hires someone to start mowing lawns – 8 a day. He pays the new employee $18 a lawn and withholds $2 for himself/the company. Now the employee gets roughly $36,000 a year before expenses, and the entrepreneur only gets $4,000. But the entrepreneur doesn’t work for it.

  So after a little while, the entrepreneur decides that he wants to earn a bit more income. So he hires 9 more employees. Now there are 10 folks all on the work force earning their $36,000 a year before expenses. Now the owner is making about the same as the employees. At this point the entrepreneur is working pretty hard to obtain clients.

  After some legwork, business continues to expand. Word of the company has gotten around and there is more business than the 10 employees can handle. So the owner hires 5 more people and better lawn mowers to speed up the process. He also increases the price of the service to $26 a yard.

  The owner splits the price increase with the employees and now they are each mowing 10 yards a day and making $52,000 before taxes. The owner is now making roughly $187,500 a year before taxes.

  Business continues to pick up and the owner, so he hires 10 more employees – bringing the total up to 25 people. Then he increases their share of earnings from each lawn from $21 per lawn mowed up to $22 per lawn mowed. The workers get a little bump in salary to $55,000 a year before taxes.

  The owner is now making $250,000 a year before taxes and expenses. And he doesn’t mow any lawns. What’s more is that now the business is stable, he is free to start a second business on the side if he chooses to.

And that is the entrepreneurial mindset.