Sociopath quote of the day: outplay

"You might get lucky and beat me, but you'll never outplay me."

-- Chris Ferguson, a.k.a. Jesus, poker champion

Sociopaths and poker

In the general public's mind the difference between a good sociopath and a bad sociopath is not who they are, but how they channel who they are -- e.g., what they do and accomplish. For instance, what is the difference between the fictional character Dexter and a typical serial killer? Dexter only kills other serial killers, people whom the public would consider "guilty" or "deserving" of dexter's treatment, perhaps in a brutal nod to an ancient eye-for-an-eye mentality, whereas most other serial killers target the "innocent." Even more clear cut than Dexter is when empaths color sociopaths' actions with something like a uniform, a badge, or political authority and reward the sociopath with medals and honors. Some empaths feel that a death is a death, but not the majority of them. High-functioning sociopaths understand these vagaries of the empathic mind and capitalize off of them by using their skills in more socially acceptable ways: politics, theatre, law enforcement... and poker?

The New Yorker published an article recently on the psychology and strategies of poker, "What Would Jesus bet?":

Poker played poorly is purely a gambler's game. Losers tend to think that they didn't get the cards, and not that they were beaten by someone who played better than they did. They return to the table and wait for big hands and lose more. Accomplished players strive to diminish the effects of luck. From the pattern of their opponents' bets and behaviors, they work like detectives to determine their cards. They play opportune hands deceptively, and feckless ones, too, and shed unpromising ones before the cards cause them too much harm. They know that some hands that seem auspicious are not, and that others are stronger than they appear.

As Chris "Jesus" Ferguson says, "you might get lucky and beat me, but you'll never outplay me."

I had recommended that our friend Chris study decisionmaking and game theory, skills that dominate poker strategy:

A player using optimal strategy assumes that his opponents know he is doing so--in other words, that his strategy has been found out. He can announce, for example, that a third of his bets will be bluffs, and then construct the game in such a way that his opponent still can't tell whether it is better to fold or call. If two players have each put fifty dollars into the pot, and the optimal-strategy player is bluffing, and two-thirds of the time he will lose, because the optimal-stratgy player is betting a hand that is strong enough to win. The opponent now has no means of knowing when it is better to call than to fold. This is described as making the opponent "indifferent." He might as well flip a coin. "Now it's a mind game," Ferguson said.

Apart from highlighting how sociopaths might be particularly well-suited to playing poker, I think the connection of game theory to poker strategy is interesting because in game theory, all outcomes for all possible choices are known, but there is still room for gamesmanship. I think this highlights my particular approach to my sociopathy, as illustrated in a favorite quote:

The art of life is to show your hand. There is no diplomacy like candor. You may lose by it now and then, but it will be a loss well gained if you do. Nothing is so boring as having to keep up a deception.
-- E. V. Lucas

And that is why I have the urge to out myself as a sociopath -- nothing is so boring as a deception that you must constantly keep up and from which the game can be played just as well without.