Suppressing defection by increasing temptation: the impact of smart cooperators on a social dilemma situation

In a social dilemma situation, where individual and collective interests are in conflict, it sounds a reasonable assumption that the presence of super or smart players, who simultaneously punish defection and reward cooperation without allowing exploitation, could solve the basic problem. The behavior of such a multi-strategy system, however, is more subtle than it is firstly anticipated. When exploring the complete parameter space, we find that the emergence of cyclic dominance among strategies is rather common, which results in several counter-intuitive phenomena. For example, the defection level can be lowered at higher temptation, or weaker punishment provides better conditions for smart players. Our study indicates that smart cooperators can unexpectedly thrive under high temptation, emphasizing the complexity of strategic interactions. This study suggests that the principles governing these interactions can be applied to other moral behaviors, such as truth-telling and honesty, providing valuable insights for future research in multi-agent systems.