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Milestone · 1978

Herbert Simon's Nobel Prize

Simon received the economics prize for research into decision-making within organisations and for the notion of bounded rationality.

Why it matters

The idea that rational action is satisfactory action under limited time and data reached AI and economics from one source.

Bounded rationality holds that an agent does not optimise but stops at the first option good enough, because the resources for search are finite. The same thesis underlies the heuristic search in Logic Theorist and GPS. Simon is a rare holder of both a Nobel Prize and a Turing Award, the latter shared with Newell in 1975.

Event record

Event date
1978
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Event date
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Sources gathered automatically · September 17, 2026
ID
evt-0133

The 1978 prize in economic sciences; presented in December 1978.

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