Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Quote of the Day

"The capacity of the human mind for formulating and solving complex problems is very small compared with the size of the problems whose solution is required for objectively rational behavior in the real world—or even for a reasonable approximation to such objective rationality."

" ... the first consequence of the principle of bounded rationality is that the intended rationality of an actor requires him to construct a simplified model of the real situation in order to deal with it. He behaves rationally with respect to this model, and such behavior is not even approximately optimal with respect to the real world. To predict his behavior we must understand the way in which this simplified model is constructed, and its construction will certainly be related to his psychological properties as a perceiving, thinking, and learning animal "

- Herbert Simon, Models of man: Social and national, 1957

Cited in the paper by Slovic, P. (1972). From Shakespeare to Simon: Speculations - and some evidence - about man's ability to process information

No comments: