The genesis of the idea
The “Law of Karma” in ancient Hindu thought doesn’t come from a single book or founder—it evolves across layers of texts over many centuries. To understand its source properly, you have to trace it through three major stages:
1. Early Roots: The Vedas (c. 1500–1000 BCE)
Karma refers to ritual action (yajna); the moralistic tone seems to be conspicuous by its absence.
Right ritual action → maintains cosmic order → brings desired outcomes (rain, prosperity, etc.)
2. Conceptual Shift: The Upanishads (c. 800–300 BCE)
Karma becomes moral causation, not just ritual correctness. It is linked to Samsara, the cycle of birth & death. Your actions have a causal effects on your future experiences & births. Good karma leads you to moksha – release from the cycle of life & death impelled by the law of karma.
3. Systematization: Bhagavad Gita (c. 200 BCE – 200 CE)
The idea of karma got practical drift with the concept of nishkam karma – action aligned to contextual duty (dharma) without any attachment to results.
The “law of karma” is a gradually refined doctrine of action and consequence, emerging from Vedic ritualism and philosophically transitioning in the Upanishads and the getting a practical definition in the Bhagwat Gita.
For centuries, the “law of karma” has been wrapped in layers of metaphysics—past lives, cosmic justice, invisible moral ledgers. To the modern, rational mind, much of this feels untestable, even unnecessary. But what if karma doesn’t need mysticism at all?
Here, I am attempting to give a more modern, scientific explanation of the Law of Karma, devoid of any mysticism through the Iterative Game Theory.
The Shift: From Cosmic Law to System Feedback
At its core, the law of Karma makes a simple claim – your actions have consequences boomeranging on yourself. Game Theory, especially the iterated, gives the most coherent and logical explanation of this.
Game Theory
Game Theory is a study of how individuals or entities make decisions when their outcomes influence the environment and vice versa. The environment includes other interacting individuals, entities or the system as a whole.
Iterated Game Theory
Iterated Game Theory studies repeated interactions of the same game over time. Instead of a one-off decision, players encounter each other multiple times, allowing for memory, reputation, and strategy evolution.
If the interaction is one time, there is a strong incentive for individuals or entities to ‘defect’ – act selfishly and look for win-lose outcomes. However, most interactions in life are complex iterated ones – action of one entity leads to a response from counterparties and the system, which affects future actions. In other words, there is a shadow of the future. Entities realise that in a long iterated interaction, endeavours for win-lose outcomes often lead to lose-lose outcomes (e.g. wars). Thus the most rational approach is to cooperate and look for win-win solutions, even among selfish individuals and even without any central authority (e.g. global trade).
- Today’s action boomerangs tomorrow
- Short term selfish gain can create long term loss
- Cooperation becomes rational, not just moral
The Big Lesson: Cooperation is not idealism – it can be the most rational long term strategy when interactions are repeated, compounded and complex. This theory provides a scientific foundation for karma-like reciprocity – trust, nicety, cooperation, win-win mindset. Karma then, is not divine justice. It is feedback in a complex iterated system.
Tit-forTat – The Best Strategy of Iterated Game Theory
Cooperate first, then reciprocate the others’ actions. This strategy has been proven time & again to emerge as a winner amongst hundreds of other strategies. The essence of this strategy is:
- To be nice to everyone to begin with. Think long term, win-win solutions. Cooperate with everyone. Your nicety will get reciprocated by others creating a lollapalooza effect.
- Stop being nice to nasty ones; do not let them take advantage of your nicety. Get fooled once, but never twice. The world must get the message that being nice with you is the most rational choice for you, for them and for the entire ecosystem.
- Revert to the default state of being nice if the counterparty does so. Be forgiving.
Explaining Karma from the lens of Game Theory
1. Karma as Feedback in Repeated Systems
Karma says, actions have consequences that return to the actor.
Iterated Game Theory, agents repeatedly interact affecting immediate payoffs and future response. Therefore:
- Cooperation → builds trust → long-term gain
- Defection → triggers retaliation → long-term loss
This explains the law of karma in a perfect non-mystical way.
2. Reputation – Karm as Memory
Your actions create a system memory, compounding into a reputation as your past actions create a memory and others condition their behaviour accordingly. Karma essentially is distributed and accumulated memory across the system. There is no invisible ledger—just people updating their models of you.
3. Delayed Consequences (The illusion of “Karmic Lag”)
A key feature of Karma is that the consequences are often delayed. The lag in “karmic justice” is often the time it takes for the system to build your reputation (social credit or social deficit) and respond. A selfish move today may pay off instantly—but it alters how others engage with you going forward. The consequence is delayed, not absent. What feels like “karmic lag” is simply the latency of system response.
Here’s The Thing
The traditional arc of Karma:
Ritual → Philosophical → Practical
The modern scientific explanation:
Karma is not some divine accounting. It is a feedback loop of a complex adaptive system.
We don’t have to invoke the divine and cosmic explanations for what is simply an emergent phenomenon of iterated interactions of a complex network. Cooperation & looking for win-win solutions is a rational consequence of being embedded in such an interconnected complex adaptive system.