Coordination problems and their experimental designs for their solution : A new experimental approach on the web

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Yuji Aruka suggested a new coordination problem called Avatamsaka situation and formulated into a two person game form tilted : Avatamsaka game. Avatamsaka is a well-known one of the Mahayana Buddhist Sutras. A Japanese professor working in the field of Buddhists philosophy, he skillfully illustrated the situation of Heaven and Hell in terms of Avatamsaka. Suppose that two people sit down at the table, across from each other. They are bound with rope so that one arm only is free, then each given a very long spoon. This spoon is so long that they cannot feed themselves with it. There is enough food for both of them on the table. If they cooperate and feed each other, they will both be happy. This is defined as heaven. However, if the first is kind enough to provide the second eith a meal, but the second does not feel cooperative, then only the second gains. This must give rise to a feeling of hate in the first. This situation denotes hell. The gain structure does not only depend on an altruistic willingness to cooperate. On an individual level, there is no difference between cooperation and refusal, and the same is true for risk taking. A situation of expected maximization of utility gives infinite equilibria. Our interest is to find a way to heaven from the other possible situations. We are concerned with how an actual player would reach in such experiments, through the international experiments on the web by Aruka's designed program, in Germany, USA and Japan. Stephen J.Gaustello, psychologist, in USA even at present is giving us his cooperation to achieve experiments. Leaving aside the Avatamsaka game, on the other hand, we also interested in a usual coordination problem with multiple equilibria and conducted the successive experiments by way of human subjects as well as computer to computer in the setting of the so-called cheap talk game to test the neologism proof.