UGB253NA Games and Strategic Thinking (2008-2009)

Every Tuesday 10:30am-12:00 noon at MMW702 and every Thursday 12:30pm-1:15pm at MMW702.

Office Hours: Tuesday 3:30pm - 4:30pm. Please write to me or call me (2609-7970) first if possible.

Grader: WU Tao, Rm 101, Lady Shaw Building

About the course:

From the simple "scissors, paper, and stone" game to the complex buy-and-sell financial decisions, we encounter games in our everyday life. While you are trying to figure out what your opponents are doing, they are trying to figure out what you are doing too. To maximize your outcome, you may want to cooperate or compete with all or some of them. Game theory is a way to analyze what rational people like you and me should do under these circumstances, and what the expected outcome will be if optimal strategies are followed.

The aim of this course is to provide students with a non-technical exploration of game theory. Required background in mathematics are addition, subtraction, and multiplication. (Well, we may need few divisions somewhere in the course though.) Required materials in mathematics will then be covered in the beginning of the course.

We will start with very simple parlor games to more realistic problems in economics, social psychology, biology, and business, where optimal strategies that are against intuition will be epitomized. In particular, the celebrated "Nash equilibrium" glossed over by Russell Crowe in the movie "A Beautiful Mind" will be explained in full detail in simple mathematical terms.

Teaching Schedule:

• Weeks 1-2: An Overview of Game Theory -- a power-point presentation
• Weeks 3-4: Mathematical Background
• Weeks 5: What is Game Theory?
• Weeks 6-7: Two-person Zero-Sum Games
• Weeks 8-9: General m-by-n Matrix Games
• Week 9: Computer Lab, Rm 232, Lady Shaw Building
• Weeks 10: Sequential Games and mid-term exam (November 4, 2008)
• Weeks 11-12: Two-person Nonzero-sum Games
• Weeks 13: N-person Games

Text books:

• Game and Strategic Thinking, Lecture notes prepared by Raymond Chan.
• Game Theory and Strategy, by Philip Straffin, AMS, 1993. (We will basically follow this book.)

• Game Theory, A Nontechnical Introduction, by Morton D. Davis, Dover Publication Inc., 1970. (This book makes a good reading, non-technical, easy to read.)
• Strategy and Conflict: An Introductory Sketch of Game Theory. (This on-line lecture notes provides excellent background information on Game Theory and a whole lot of examples.)
• Operations Research, An Introduction, by H. Taha, 6th Ed., Maxwell Macmillan, 1997. (This book covers the 2-person zero-sum games in some depth. Good for students who wants to know more about the topic.)
• Fun and Games -- A Text on Game Theory, by Ken Binmore, D.C. Heath and Company, 1992. (This book is good for those who have finished this course, but still want to know more about games.)

Lecture notes, assignments, and solutions

Grade:

• In-class Games = 10%
• Four Assignments = 20%
• One 1.5-hour Open-book Test = 20% (November 4, 2008)
  
• Open-book Final Examination = 50% (Centrally scheduled)