That's a very interesting example. Individual lies don't necessarily meet the greater-good standard, but the overall system needs lying built into it to make it fun. I'll have to give some more thought to that.

Quote from Skeletonxf

Hang on, going back to what Zed said on the first page, surely games such as poker are an exception, because everyone has consented that others will be supplying them false info.

False information is still being given. Either way, they make the world a better place so, by Zed they should be cool.

Quote from Zed

It's certainly possible to construct scenarios in which a poker lie makes the world worse. If a rich man has a weak hand but raises a huge amount against a very poor man who has already put a lot of money in the pot and can't afford to lose, then it seems clear that the bluff is going to make the world a worse place. If the lie is believed then the poor man will fold and give the rich man his money, but that same amount of money will bring the rich man less happiness than it would have brought the poor man (because of diminishing returns and so on). We could argue that the poor man was wrong to play poker with money he couldn't afford to lose, but if we stipulate that he has done this and analyse the lie on its own, it seems like it won't be for the greater good but at the same time it is just part of the game.

Then the poor guy drinks away his problem. That way, it won't matter anymore.

It's certainly possible to construct scenarios in which a poker lie makes the world worse. If a rich man has a weak hand but raises a huge amount against a very poor man who has already put a lot of money in the pot and can't afford to lose, then it seems clear that the bluff is going to make the world a worse place. If the lie is believed then the poor man will fold and give the rich man his money, but that same amount of money will bring the rich man less happiness than it would have brought the poor man (because of diminishing returns and so on). We could argue that the poor man was wrong to play poker with money he couldn't afford to lose, but if we stipulate that he has done this and analyse the lie on its own, it seems like it won't be for the greater good but at the same time it is just part of the game.

Quote from Zed

We could argue that the poor man was wrong to play poker with money he couldn't afford to lose, but if we stipulate that he has done this and analyse the lie on its own, it seems like it won't be for the greater good but at the same time it is just part of the game.

Stick empires also, for example, involves hiding knowledge from your opponent to gain an advantage, it's more omission than lying but still leads to false info being given. That being said, each game would be totally different without the fog of war. You could again argue like in poker that a loss coming from lies leads to bad things but with games not entirely involved around bluffing, like in stick empires (and actually poker because it does involve some luck), plenty of similar negative consequences in losses could come from just being out played by someone with more skill. Losing and winning could each have bad and good consequences, and omitting info to your opponent comes into that, but focus back on the game and that fog of war does good for the game nearly every match, because it makes the game more fun (at least for most players) and adds in scouting mechanics. As a whole omitting data in games designed around that mechanic or partly, seems to me like it's almost always going to lead to positive consequences, so when you then take negative and positive consequences into account from losses and wins that have effects outside the game, like in most poker games, the positive still outweighs overall. But again, as you said, we can blame the poor guy for playing when he can't risk it as well. Does being able to construct a situation where lying in games like poker having bad consequences sometimes make lying in those games bad on a whole?

(Okay I think I just about managed to just introduce a second example rather than arguing from one thing to another but if I've totally misrepresented poker in relation to what I said about SE I wouldn't be too surprised, I don't exactly play poker or know a lot about it)