[MUD-Dev] Finding What a Gamer Lacks in Their Day

[John Buehler]

Sasha Hart writes:

> If everyone acts just because they lack things, then every
> behavior becomes a new need.  E.g., I observe a woman listening to
> Elvis, and infer that she is satisfying her Elvis-need. But when I
> say that the woman is satisfying an Elvis-need, this adds no new
> information; it makes no predictions, except perhaps that she will
> listen to more Elvis as a perfect function of how much Elvis she
> "has" (I would assume, has listened to recently.)

> And this prediction is almost certainly wrong, because the
> performance of many behaviors and the consumption of many goods ,
> in point of fact, do not vary as a clean function of their
> scarcity and scarcity alone.  This is the point made with the
> ridiculous dessert example.  _There are other factors_.

> Well,that's not a fair example, you might say: she is satisfying
> her need for rock and roll, or beautiful singing, or dopamine or
> whatever. But even if it were conceded that this difficult problem
> were not actually a problem, (e.g., which need is it?)  you would
> still be missing the fundamental point that the only way to make
> observed behavior a perfect function of "needs" or "lacks" is to
> invariably infer needs when behavior occurs.  Then you would lose
> empirical testability, and your assertion that needs can be
> exploited is practically useless.

So lacking a perfect function that can translate between oberved
behaviors and actual needs, this entire thought experiment is
fundamentally flawed?  I don't buy that for a moment.  To postulate
that our behaviors are a result of a desire for stimulus is a
perfectly valuable working theory, despite the fact that we cannot
perfectly observe behaviors.  Perhaps perfect observance of a
behavior WOULD tell us what stimuli the individuals were interested
in.  And that's how I'm looking at this.  If we can PERFECTLY
observe behaviors, then we can PERFECTLY determine the stimuli that
the individual is interested in.  The less perfectly we observe
their behaviors, the less perfectly we can determine the stimuli.

> So... my opinion is that supplying scarce goods does not exhaust
> the options designers have.  But if you can really put the idea to
> the test - provide analogues to calories, things which you can
> quantify and demonstrate that some responding occurs as an orderly
> (and exclusive) function of, then you can with some useful meaning
> say that those things are needed and that such behavior occurs
> only because it is needed.

I'm supplying a working theory, not a proof.  I leave it to others
to look at the world around them to see if their observations match
this theory.  So goes any theory.  Evolution, plate tectonics, a
spherical planet, whatever.  As people who believe this theory
attempt to apply it and either succeed or fail, we'll begin to get a
better sense of its accuracy.

> Even if you can't (which I strongly believe,) the question is
> still an interesting one, because there is still no doubt that in
> some cases (e.g. eating) scarcity of some definite thing
> (e.g. caloric stimulus in the gut) has a big influence on behavior
> (e.g. time spent eating and calories eaten.)  And I will grant
> that this probably comes into play in some cases in MUDs, maybe
> for things like "social interaction" or "success."

Well, that's a start anyway.  :)

> The question becomes less useful as we stray into "needs" (i'd
> assume this means things which, when scarce, are specifically
> sought out) which have no real empirical basis. So my hunch, for
> example, that some people play MUDs substantially because they are
> lonely isn't so useful (even more since we can hardly experiment
> with that ethically, and in any case we don't need to do
> experiments to find that social games will attract players.)

You can certainly experiment with it in an ethical fashion.  It just
means that your experiments will be limited - you will not be able
to apply the scientific method in an ideal fashion.

I submit to everyone here that the problems that we are beginning to
consider are ones that we don't even have nomenclatures for.  This
is why we have lengthy discussions about what a given word even
means.  I further submit that the terms we are using are too
abstract and that theories such as the one that I suggested are
needed in order to begin coming up with more concrete and specific
words that cover behavior at an observable level - whether
sociological, physical or biochemical.  I suspect that the words
exist in various scientific fields, but that we are amateurs in each
of the involved fields, and that over time we will develop a basic
competency in the various necessary fields.  That will give us the
tools to construct virtual experiences that provide customers with a
positive, ethical experience.

Here's hoping that laws will require ethical behavior from all those
who entertain.

I'll undoubtedly get more activity on that statement than anything
else that I'll ever say here.

JB

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