The surprising question is why cooperation persists at all, not why it fails

Evidence

Thus Woody Allen, in Hannah and her sisters, says that the reason we cannot answer the question ‘Why the Holocaust?’ is that it is the wrong question. What we should ask is ‘Why doesn’t it happen more often?’ Somewhat similarly, we should ask why uncooperative behaviour does not emerge as often as game theory predicts. — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 2713

Categorization

• XREF: The ‘Why doesn’t it happen more often?’ inversion to the Holocaust narrative is a striking reframing that mirrors P. Hardin’s objection to treating trust as the exception needing explanation.
• CANDY: Woody Allen’s rephrasing of the Holocaust question is a memorable, tweetable inversion.