The games that we participate in are themselves defined by human actions. Do we rationally choose the games we play? Which of my preferences are compatible with your preferences? How do we compare utility between two individuals?<p>Since we live in the same universe and have to deal with some of the consequences of each others&#x27; actions, there&#x27;s some natural correlation between our utilities, but we live in civilizations which have far more social structure built on top of this basic structure, and these social structures inform and structure our possible preferences and the relations between them.<p>In fact, these social structures can have preferences and play their own games! The United States government, for example, is an entity whose preferences and actions are embodied in the coherence of its constituent individuals, and its structure informs the games and preferences of its individuals in a feedback loop we like to call bureaucracy. Does the large-scale behavior of the US government explain the choices of its constituents, or vice versa? Clearly the answer is neither and both: They are two ways of looking at the same dynamical structure.<p>In one view, things can look perfectly rational. In the other view, things can look stark raving mad. I don&#x27;t think either point of view is distinguished as canonical.