Game Theory

<p><b>Brian Clegg's</b> many books include <i>Dice World</i> and <i>A Brief History of Infinity</i> both longlisted for the Royal Society Science Book Prize and most recently <i>Ten Days in Physics That Shook the World</i>.</p> <p><b>Brian Clegg was always fascinated by Isaac Asimov's classic Foundation series of books in which the future is predicted using sophisticated mathematical modelling of human psychology and behaviour.</b><br><br>Only much later did he realise that Asimov's 'psychohistory' had a real-world equivalent: game theory.<br><br>Originating in the study of probabilistic gambling games that depend on a random source - the throw of a dice or the toss of a coin - game theory soon came to be applied to human interactions: essentially what was the best strategy to win whatever you were doing? Its mathematical techniques have been applied with varying degrees of wisdom to fields such as economics evolution and questions such as how to win a nuclear war.<br><br>Clegg delves into game theory's colourful history and significant findings and shows what we can all learn from this oft-misunderstood field of study.</p> <p><b>Brian Clegg was always fascinated by Isaac Asimov's classic Foundation series of books in which the future is predicted using sophisticated mathematical modelling of human psychology and behaviour.</b><br><br>Only much later did he realise that Asimov's 'psychohistory' had a real-world equivalent: game theory.<br><br>Originating in the study of probabilistic gambling games that depend on a random source - the throw of a dice or the toss of a coin - game theory soon came to be applied to human interactions: essentially what was the best strategy to win whatever you were doing? Its mathematical techniques have been applied with varying degrees of wisdom to fields such as economics evolution and questions such as how to win a nuclear war.<br><br>Clegg delves into game theory's colourful history and significant findings and shows what we can all learn from this oft-misunderstood field of study.</p>