Here a fragment from a classic Travisano & Velicer paper on microbial cheating from 2004, looking at the strategy of punishing the cheats in microbial communities.
The key part: "Punishment (...) involves more than simply the absence of benefits that are conferred by social interactions."
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The key part: "Punishment (...) involves more than simply the absence of benefits that are conferred by social interactions."
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Comments
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Does this not describe judges? Judges are uniquely equipped to penalise cheat-like behaviours. And they imho use that power more frequently. 6/9
And I use the term cheat-like behaviours very consciously.
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https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966842X03003366
Other experiments showed how bacteria deal with cheating in efficient ways. But the moment policing stops, cheaters are always on the rise.
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