Customer Reviews

Game Theory: Analysis of Conflict

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I just completed a game theory book (Game Theory Evolving, Princeton University Press, 2000). To find the best way to present various materials, I went through virtually every game theory book in existence. For the presentation of the basic material on normal and extensive form games, nothing even came close to this book in clarity of presentation and depth of understanding of the issues. Most textbooks, even highly touted ones that are mathematically challenging, do not even come close, and rarely even present the material in a coherent form at all.

I used to do a lot of carpentry, and I always knew the good carpenters from the run of the mill. The latter talk about how to build stuff. The good ones talked about how you choose, preserve, treat, and sharpen your tools. Myerson is, for game theory, like the good carpenter, and this book is more about the nature of the tools of game theory than their deployment--although it is certainly that, too.

The subtitle of this book is silly ("The Analysis of Conflict"). Game theory is the analysis of cooperation as much as conflict, and much, much else as well. So is this book.

This book is a masterpiece: it goes from the simple and straightforward (with examples of sequential equilibria) to technical and challenging material (such as the Mertens-Zamir type space). I own Fudenberg-Tirole and Osborne-Rubinstein, but it is Myerson that gets picked up the most. What I find most rewarding is that Myerson introduces everything gently, working from examples to build a general theory.

I found this book very helpful in my first year of the Ph D in Economics. I also have used MasColell and Kreps but Myerson was the only one that actually help me understanding complicated concepts as the always Hard Sequential Equilibrium. It is the only book that covers both, sequential and Perfect equilibrium with examples and solutions so that you understand what is going on. If you are willing to buy a Game Theory book I will definitely go for this one. If that is not enough you should also see that the cost benefit ratio of Myerson's book is undoubtly the best of any other one.

Adrian Peralta. Graduate Student University of Minnesota Economics Department

This is a great book, containing an incredible wealth of knowledge. It's all explained very well, by one of the premier game theory experts in the world (who also won the Nobel Prize, by the way). I'm not surprised at all to see that this book has been reviewed by several Ph D students.

The only problem is that it's a difficult read. Don't be fooled by the word "introduction" in the description: this book is packed with mathematics, and is written in a very dense, academic style. If you want a more lighthearted introduction to game theory, without all the equations, I highly recommend "Thinking Strategically" by Dixit and Nalebuff. It may not be quite as substantive as this tome, but it's a much better choice for the semi-casual reader.

excellent book,very comprehensive step by step approach.I especially enjoyed the sections on Nash equilibria and infinite strategies.Great for those who wish to understand the underlying foundations of decision making via both simple and intricate mathematics. The concepts are also explained well in english through generally understood examples.

This book is highly recommended for those starting in game theory and need its mathematical background.
It covers everything it should in a concise and accurate way. It is not for those not interested in the math underlying the theory.
If your choice is between Myerson's, and Rubinstein and Osborne's "A course in Game Theory", I would choose Myerson's for a first course, it's more detailed and therefore better for self study.

This is a very good game theory textbook, but has some small flaws, with I would put into more detail later. The author is one of the most important game theorists of your time, and received the Nobel prize himself in 2007, however although he is an excellent theorist, his pedagogical skills are still imperfect.

I didn't read the entire book, but only the first 400 pages, so I don't hold the best position to evaluate this book compared to some readers here, with had almost memorized the book for their game theory courses. But I think that I am still qualified enough to talk about some details of the first 7 chapters of the book. One with left me a bit puzzled: Myerson said that the Myerson-Satterthwaite theorem converges in the limit to the competitive equilibrium type of efficiency when the number of players is multiplied, or at least argues that modern game theory helps to explain how such equilibrium can be reached, that is true, but his example is not adequate for this argument because competitive general equilibrium has some very important differences from a trading mechanism involving units of indivisible goods with infinite players. In this case (the mechanism) we have efficiency because a continuum of players of the same set of types makes a probability distribution of valuation turn into a certainty about the valuation of the group of individuals. The classical general equilibrium case is demonstrated by game theory as an special case of cooperative games with perfect information, divisible goods and an infinite number of players of each type, where are allocation that is not consistent with classical GE is outside the core. So, his comparison in that section is really incorrect: There is no direct connection between classical GE and that type of mechanism design problem.

But other than this case, I couldn't find any flaws in the book and the clarity of "Myersonian writing" is good enough for me. Also, the math is not very advanced, but requires a good grasp of calculus and linear algebra, with many undergraduate students don't have.

Even though Myerson asserts that this book is intended to be "a general introduction to game theory" in Preface, it is difficult to understand for beginners who have not mathematics knowledge in the level of upper class. In this point, the volume is different from other introductions - e.g. Morton Davis' "Game Theory"-, rather is suitable for M.A. or first year Ph.D students. However, this book is not so much for students majoring economics as for various social sceintists in the sense that it does not focus on only "economics" but on pure game "theory" in nearly all areas.

A wonderful book that introduces the subject rigorously, but also provides exceptional intuition, examples, and understanding.

This book treats all the principal arguments of actual game theory. But particullary it studies the Bayes theorem. The importance of this fact is known also in biology and in the information theory. The tree strategies have the possibility to converge at equilibria. Myerson analyses the method for stabilizing also random subcessions.