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Tettamanzi–Da Costa Pereira Simulation
The 2014 IEEE paper that computationally validated Cipolla's stupidity distribution through agent-based simulations — demonstrating that the stupid fraction emerges and persists under realistic parameter settings.
Andrea Tettamanzi and Célia Da Costa Pereira's 2014 IEEE paper 'On the Evolution of Stupidity' built agent-based simulations to test whether Cipolla's laws were compatible with evolutionary dynamics. The finding: parameter settings corresponding to intuitive assumptions about real populations — specifically, conditions involving zero-sum interactions and relative rather than absolute wealth perception — produced the emergence of a stable stupid fraction consistent with Cipolla's predictions. The stupid fraction did not diminish over simulated generations. It persisted, because the conditions that produced it were structural rather than contingent.
In The You On AI Field Guide
The simulation addressed a persistent objection to Cipolla's framework: if stupidity produces losses for both the actor and others, why doesn't evolutionary selection eliminate it? Standard evolutionary game theory predicts that strategies producing consistent negative payoffs should be selected against. Cipolla's archival observation was that the stupid fraction persists across populations and centuries despite this theoretical prediction.
Tettamanzi and Da Costa Pereira tested the framework by implementing agent populations in which