IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tor/tecipa/tecipa-330.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Communication Can Destroy Common Learning

Author

Listed:
  • Jakub Steiner
  • Colin Stewart

Abstract

We show by example that communication can generate a failure of common knowledge acquisition. In the absence of communication, agents acquire approximate common knowledge of some parameter, but with communication they do not.

Suggested Citation

  • Jakub Steiner & Colin Stewart, 2008. "Communication Can Destroy Common Learning," Working Papers tecipa-330, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:tor:tecipa:tecipa-330
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.economics.utoronto.ca/public/workingPapers/tecipa-330.pdf
    File Function: Main Text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Martin W. Cripps & Jeffrey C. Ely & George J. Mailath & Larry Samuelson, 2008. "Common Learning," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 76(4), pages 909-933, July.
    2. Rubinstein, Ariel, 1989. "The Electronic Mail Game: Strategic Behavior under "Almost Common Knowledge."," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(3), pages 385-391, June.
    3. Parikh, Rohit & Krasucki, Paul, 1990. "Communication, consensus, and knowledge," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 178-189, October.
    4. Heifetz, Aviad, 1996. "Comment on Consensus without Common Knowledge," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 273-277, July.
    5. Monderer, Dov & Samet, Dov, 1989. "Approximating common knowledge with common beliefs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 170-190, June.
    6. Koessler, Frederic, 2001. "Common knowledge and consensus with noisy communication," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 139-159, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Steiner, Jakub & Stewart, Colin, 2011. "Communication, timing, and common learning," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(1), pages 230-247, January.
    2. Antonio Jiménez-Martínez, 2015. "A model of belief influence in large social networks," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 59(1), pages 21-59, May.
    3. Antonio Jiménez-Martínez, 2012. "Consensus in Communication Networks under Bayesian Updating," Working Papers DTE 529, CIDE, División de Economía.
    4. Crescenzi, Michele, 2022. "Learning to agree over large state spaces," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    5. John Geanakoplos, 1993. "Common Knowledge," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1062, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    6. , & ,, 2011. "Agreeing to agree," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 6(2), May.
    7. Tsakas, Elias & Voorneveld, Mark, 2011. "On consensus through communication without a commonly known protocol," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(6), pages 733-739.
    8. Koessler, Frederic, 2001. "Common knowledge and consensus with noisy communication," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 139-159, September.
    9. Morris, Stephen, 2014. "Coordination, timing and common knowledge," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(4), pages 306-314.
    10. Martin Cripps & Jeffrey Ely & George Mailath & Larry Samuelson, 2013. "Common learning with intertemporal dependence," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 42(1), pages 55-98, February.
    11. Tsakas, Elias & Voorneveld, Mark, 2007. "Efficient communication, common knowledge, and consensus," Working Papers in Economics 255, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    12. Chen, Yi-Chun & Mueller-Frank, Manuel & Pai, Mallesh M., 2022. "Continuous implementation with direct revelation mechanisms," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    13. Strzalecki, Tomasz, 2014. "Depth of reasoning and higher order beliefs," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 108-122.
    14. Qin, Cheng-Zhong & Yang, Chun-Lei, 2009. "An Explicit Approach to Modeling Finite-Order Type Spaces and Applications," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt8hq7j89k, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    15. Arieli, Itai & Levy, Yehuda John, 2015. "Determinacy of games with Stochastic Eventual Perfect Monitoring," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 166-185.
    16. Basu, Pathikrit & Chatterjee, Kalyan & Hoshino, Tetsuya & Tamuz, Omer, 2020. "Repeated coordination with private learning," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    17. Satoru Takahashi, 2020. "Non-equivalence between all and canonical elaborations," The Japanese Economic Review, Springer, vol. 71(1), pages 43-57, January.
    18. Carroll, Gabriel, 2016. "Informationally robust trade and limits to contagion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 334-361.
    19. Blume, Andreas, 2018. "Failure of common knowledge of language in common-interest communication games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 132-155.
    20. Kris De Jaegher, 2015. "Beneficial Long Communication in the Multiplayer Electronic Mail Game," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 233-251, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Common knowledge; communication;

    JEL classification:

    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tor:tecipa:tecipa-330. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: RePEc Maintainer (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.