Nash
Nash died this week, sadly, in a traffic collision.
That’s isn’t how I’m going to remember him.
My first introduction to Nash was from a book I found in a used book store titled “Game Theory and Canadian Politics”. There was a whole chapter on the Nash Equilibrium and the prisoner’s dilemma in there. This was the diving board for further exploration into game theory and, it was the gateway drug into the Garbage Can, Arrow, and the Genetic Algorithm.
He offered up a thread of thought: this idea that collectively, as people, we are capable of creating such sub-optimal outcomes. I didn’t like that one bit. I spent time trying to disprove it. It was Arrow that would end that effort. And that was it. I accepted it.
I took Nash’s insight as a warning.
Thanks for the thread, John.
