El Farol Bar Problem
The El Farol Bar problem is a problem in game theory and there a special case of a minority game . It was set up in 1994 by Brian Arthur . A bar in Santa Fe ( New Mexico ) was the godfather.
The problem is as follows: The population of a certain place - always the same size - wants to go to the El Farol Bar every Thursday evening. However, the El Farol is quite small and it is not fun to spend the evening there when it is crowded. Put in numbers, this leads to the following situation:
- When less than 60% of the population goes to El Farol, they spend a more pleasant evening in the bar than at home.
- However, if more than 60% of the population goes to El Farol, it would have been more comfortable for them to have stayed at home.
All residents have to decide at the same time whether they want to go to El Farol or not. You cannot wait for others to decide and make your own dependent on it.
The significance of the problem is that whatever (deterministic) method a person uses to decide whether to go to El Farol or not, that method will fail if everyone uses it. If everyone uses the same method, the El Farol will be empty if the method gives the result that the El Farol is overcrowded and vice versa.
There are variations of the problem in which people are allowed to communicate, but not have to tell the truth before making their decision.
Individual evidence
- ↑ W. Brian Arthur, Inductive Reasoning and Bounded Rationality ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , American Economic Review (Papers and Proceedings), 84, 406-411, 1994. (English, pdf; 884 kB). Accessed March 5, 2010
