A friend told this to me, and I thought I'd share it here:
100 pirates need to allocate 100 identical laptops among them. Their democratic system works as follows:
All pirates are ranked by their seniority (all pirates have different ranks). First, the most senior pirate proposes a plan that states exactly how many laptops each pirate gets. The 100 pirates vote on the plan and it passes at least half of the pirates vote for it. If it passes, all pirates take their laptops and go home. If it fails, the one who proposed the plan (the most senior pirate in this case) is killed, and the second most senior pirate takes his place and proposes his plan.The same process is repeated in the order of seniority until someone's plan is passed.
Assume every pirate makes his decision based on the following priorities:
1. He doesn't want to die.
2. Given he's not going to die, he would prefer to get as many laptops as possible.
3. Given he's going to get the same number of laptops, he would prefer as many other pirates to die as possible.
Also assume every pirate is logical, rational, and selfish (wants as many laptops as possible and doesn't care what anyone else gets as long as it doesn't affect him) and knows everyone else is the same. What will happen? i.e. whose proposal will be passed and what is the proposal?