Rustics and Politics by Feldman Leslie Dale;

Author:Feldman, Leslie Dale;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Lexington Books
Published: 2012-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

Granny Is Kind with “A Beautiful Mind”: Clampetts and Game Theory

It is not enough that I succeed: my friends must also fail.

—Unknown (variously attributed to Gore Vidal and others)[19]

Hobbes said humans are by nature competitive, belligerent, and desire fame and glory. Hobbes was a philosopher of rational choice theory, also known as game theory, “generally dated to 1944, with the publication of von Neumann’s Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, which imagined human interactions as a series of moves and countermoves aimed at maximizing ‘payoff.’”[20] Game theory looks at all human actions as rational choices to maximize what Hobbes calls “felicity.” Why don’t the Clampetts follow this competitive model? If “life is a race” and “felicity” is defined by Hobbes as “to out-go the next before,” then why aren’t the Clampetts competitive and materialistic?[21]

The Clampetts are competitive, they just do not compete for the same things and play by the same rules as modern, urban Americans and particularly the residents of Beverly Hills. In “The Clampetts Stike Oil,” Pearl says to Jed “you can have anything you want” and tells him to move. But Jed is skeptical. Pearl tries to convince him:

Look around you—you’re eight miles from your nearest neighbor. You’re overrun with skunks, possum, coyotes, bobcats. You use kerosene lamps for light, you cook on a wood stove summer and winter. You’re drinkin’ homemade moonshine, washin’ with homemade lye soap and your bathroom is 50 feet from the house and you ask should you move?!

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