Games and Guardians 165Secondly, it gets narrower and narrower – there are many
possible experiences but only one action comes out at the
end, as if all our experiences have been squeezed down an
ever-narrowing funnel until a tiny trickle emerges from the
end. Thirdly, the actions are feedback that may reinforce
those selections and so bolster those beliefs (first order
learning), or cause me to re-evaluate my beliefs (second
order learning), and that leads to different actions and even-
tually to a different selection of my experience.
This model suggests three ways to avoid misunderstand-
ings, especially when someone hurts your feelings. First,
trace your own reasoning in your own mind and question
whether you have drawn reasonable conclusions from what
you saw and heard. Secondly, make your own reasoning
clear. Say what you noticed and the conclusions you drew
and how you feel about that (if appropriate). Check whether
the meaning you make is actually what the other person in-
tended. Thirdly, check other people’s reasoning. Ask them
to describe how they came to their conclusions and see
whether there is any merit in their interpretation.
References
1 For an exhaustive treatment of the prisoner’s dilemma see
Anatol Rapoport, Albert Chammah and Carol Orwant,
Prisoner’s Dilemma: A Study in Conflict and Co-operation, Uni-
versity of Michigan Press, 1965.
See also Dudley Lynch and Paul Kordis, The Strategy of
the Dolphin, Ballantine Books, 1988.
2 I am indebted to Chris Argyris for his work on the ‘ladder
of inference’. See his Overcoming Organizational Defences,
Prentice Hall, 1990.
Also, see page 242 et seq.in The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook
by Peter Senge, Charlotte Roberts, Richard Ross, Bryan
Smith and Art Kleiner, Doubleday, 1994.