Rock, Paper, Scissors: Game Theory in Everyday Life

Praised by Entertainment Weekly as the man who "put the fizz into physics," IgNobel Prize-winner Len Fisher turns his attention to game theory to shed light on why we have trouble cooperating. His quest to understand what makes us all get along takes him to: New York City sidewalks to play "chicken" with commuters, a child's birthday party to calculate the proper distribution of gifts, the polite confines of an English dinner party, the busy streets of India, the wilds of the Australian outback, and more....

Len Fisher, Ph.D., is Visiting Research Fellow in the Physics Department at the University of Bristol. He is the author of Weighing the Soul and How to Dunk a Doughnut, which was named Best Popular Science Book of 2004 by the American Institute of Physics. He has been featured on the BBC, CBS, and the Discovery Channel, as well as in newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal, the San Francisco Chronicle, and more. He is the recipient of a 1999 IgNobel Prize for calculating the optimal way to dunk a doughnut. He lives in Wiltshire, England, and Blackheath, Australia.