Teaching About the Tragedy

Today, my favorite Youtubers posted a video about the Tragedy of the Commons. The Tragedy of the Commons is a dilemma when a resource is shared by a group of individuals. Collectively, this group has a mutual interest in using this resource wisely, but individually, each person has something to gain by taking as much of the shared resource for themselves. Inevitably, people get greedy. One person tries to get more than their share, or at least seems like they might do so in the future, and in response, everyone rushes to make sure they can get as much of the resource as they can before it's all snatched up by someone else. When people behave this way, the resource runs out quickly, which is bad for everyone, but if people could learn to be fair and patient, they could use the resource wisely, and perhaps even use it to gain more of that resource, which would be great for everyone. Everyone has a short-term incentive to take what they can get, but long-term, each person has an incentive to cooperate with the rest of the group.

So much of the trouble in life stems from people not behaving wisely. People make dumb decisions all the time, which hurt themselves and the rest of society. Fortunately, the gospel teaches us principles that can help us avoid these pitfalls. These include patience, wisdom, charity, humility, and developing a more eternal perspective. If we apply these principles, they can help us avoid falling into the trap of thinking that we'd be best served by taking as much as we can for ourselves.

Unfortunately, the true tragedy in the Tragedy of the Commons is that, in order to avoid a total collapse of the system, everyone needs to understand the Tragedy of the Commons and work together to prevent it. It's not enough for a few individuals to use the resource wisely; everyone needs to follow that plan. Otherwise, any individual could still take everything, and those who mutually agreed to not take more than their share would all be out of luck. We need to cooperate with each other to make the best use of our resources, so, as important as it is to be a wise individual, it's also important to teach wisdom as well.