[Tristan Lall]

How about another philosophical question, applied to a hypothetical situation?

Isn't it possible to contend that, after considering the likelihood of the various outcomes, on a per-elimination-rank basis, your team makes the best overall use of its ranking?¹ That's to say, that for some function of how far you advance in the eliminations—we could say community inspiration, charitable contributions received by FIRST or number of STEM undergrads produced, or even the combination of these and other factors—the world (or some other community) will be best off if your team goes as far as possible.

So in theory, if you're looking at the big picture (and taking things like other teams' displeasure into account), isn't it possible to conclude that you might have to throw matches in order to go as far as possible in the eliminations, and hence do the most good? In that case, isn't the higher objective not to win, but to make everybody as well off as possible?

(There's a Rawlsian counterargument to be made here—that you can't totally screw people, even if it maximizes society's well-being—but I think it probably applies most strongly to extreme cases. While it could be considered objectively wrong to ruin some team's entire competition, it might not necessarily be wrong to ruin just one match, for the greater good.)

I don't think that logic is wrong; merely subject to enormous practical difficulties in calculation. It wouldn't be wrong for a team to believe this—though the likelihood of self-delusion is substantial. But therefore, a discussion of morality needs to show that this is not applicable to the case at hand, in order to draw a distinction between what's immoral (what's generally being discussed in other posts) and what's moral, but problematic (because the team has likely failed to predict the situation accurately, but has good intentions).

Incidentally, I'd better disclaim responsibility for subscribing to this train of logic in its entirety: I don't believe that I've been adequately well informed to make anything approaching a definitive prediction about the outcomes resulting from a team's ranking. The uncertainty is staggering.

Nevertheless, for this and other (perhaps less noble) reasons, I don't think that throwing a match is always a bad thing. After all, what underlies the expectation that your teammates should depend on you? It's a convention, (indeed one that serves us well most of the time), but is it also part of the tacit agreement that you make as a participant?² (And while you may believe it is, how can you be sure that everyone else feels the same way?)

Furthermore, who's in violation of the convention/agreement? The whole team? The strategists that put them up to it? The drivers who executed it? And was the violation the product of deep consideration, or a spur-of-the moment decision? If we're going to apportion blame, we've got to do it carefully, recognizing that every situation is unique.

What I think this really comes down to is a question about what FRC is. While it's reasonably obvious that it is neither a pure competition nor a pure collaboration, there is no one combination of the two that all teams can be expected to take to heart. Accordingly, they will differ as to their tolerance for strategies which are disproportionately beneficial to their team, and harmful to others.

At the risk of striking a nerve, let me use a religious analogy. The team that is unwilling to harm any opponent³ to the slightest degree is like a Jain fundamentalist—powerless and ineffective to an amazing degree. By contrast, the team that would place their goals above those of other teams is a lot like a Christian crusader—they think they're right, and maybe they are, but the consequences of being wrong are pretty deplorable. But just as a continuum of religious belief is acceptable in society, I think it's reasonable to accept a variety of beliefs as to the acceptability of strategies that might run afoul of the simplistic and possibly unrealistic ideal of complete fidelity to your alliance partners.

Ultimately, people are going to judge each team for their actions, but I think it's worthwhile to discuss the basis and philosophy behind those judgments once in a while.

¹ And furthermore, the rest of the world also maximizes the utility when you rank highest. (Again, this is a pretty uncertain proposition.)
² I mean this in the sense of a sort of social contract of FIRST: by participating, you agree to certain things, like following the rulebook. What else is included?
³ Perhaps this betrays my opinion, but I'm considering opponent in the broad sense as "some team that you'd prefer to outrank". You can still be nice to them, but I think this recognizes the fact that much of our motivation is derived from the opportunity to demonstrate a level of superiority.