Robert Leonard wrote:  
>Re. Kevin Quinn's point about individualism and norms, it's worth mentioning  
>that social norms (independent of individual rationality) were central to  
>von Neumann's game theory.  They were what helped distinguish various  
>equilibria in his stable set solution.  The "social" played a greater role  
>in von N's game theory than I think most people realize.  
  
  
Point well taken.  There is a very interesting passage in Schelling where,   
commenting on a coordination game, he says (I paraphrase) : here *we* have   
reason to create a tradtion - to eliminate the indeterminacy.  
  
Kevin Quinn