American political scientist, economist, sociologist, and psychologist (1916–2001)
He cracked the code on how humans actually decide — not as perfect calculators, but as creatures settling for "good enough" under pressure. That insight, "bounded rationality," won him a Nobel and reshaped economics, AI, and management in one stroke.
Born June 15, 1916, Simon spent most of his career at Carnegie Mellon from 1949 until his death in 2001, helping establish one of the world's first computer science departments. His core obsession was decision-making inside organizations, which led him to reject the fantasy of rational actors and argue instead that people "satisfice" — seek workable solutions within limits. The theory earned him the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1978. Three years earlier, he and Allen Newell had shared the Turing Award for pioneering artificial intelligence and information processing. Along the…
Sourced, dated quotes from Herbert A. Simon
Economic man deals with the "real world" in all its complexity. Administrative man recognizes that the world he perceives is a drastic simplified model...
It is not my aim to surprise or shock you – but the simplest way I can summarize is to say that there are now in the world machines that think, that learn and that create.
Over Christmas, Allen Newell and I created a thinking machine.
The world you perceive is drastically simplified model of the real world.
A major task in organizing is to determine, first, where the knowledge is located that can provide the various kinds of factual premises that decisions require.
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