Essays that pay tribute to the wide-ranging influence of the late Herbert Simon, by friends and colleagues. Herbert Simon (1916-2001), in the course of a long and distinguished career in the social and behavioral sciences, made lasting contributions to many disciplines, including economics, psychology, computer science, and artificial intelligence. In 1978 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics for his research into the decision-making process within economic organizations. His well-known book The Sciences of the Artificial addresses the implications of the decision-making and problem-solving processes for the social sciences. This book (the title is a variation on the title of Simon's autobiography, Models of My Life) is a collection of short essays, all original, by colleagues from many fields who felt Simon's influence and mourn his loss. Mixing reminiscence and analysis, the book represents "a small acknowledgment of a large debt." Each of the more than forty contributors was asked to write about the one work by Simon that he or she had found most influential. The editors then grouped the essays into four sections: "Modeling Man," "Organizations and Administration," "Modeling Systems," and "Minds and Machines." The contributors include such prominent figures as Kenneth Arrow, William Baumol, William Cooper, Gerd Gigerenzer, Daniel Kahneman, David Klahr, Franco Modigliani, Paul Samuelson, and Vernon Smith. Although they consider topics as disparate as "Is Bounded Rationality Unboundedly Rational?" and "Personal Recollections from 15 Years of Monthly Meetings," each essay is a testament to the legacy of Herbert Simon—to see the unity rather than the divergences among disciplines.
People sometimes ask me what they should read to find out about artificial intelligence. Herbert Simon's book The Sciences of the Artificial is always on the list I give them. Every page issues a challenge to conventional thinking, and the layman who digests it well will certainly understand what the field of artificial intelligence hopes to accomplish. I recommend it in the same spirit that I recommend Freud to people who ask about psychoanalysis, or Piaget to those who ask about child psychology: If you want to learn about a subject, start by reading its founding fathers." -- George A. Miller, "Complex Information Processing" Continuing his exploration of the organization of complexity and the science of design, this new edition of Herbert Simon's classic work on artificial intelligence adds a chapter that sorts out the current themes and tools -- chaos, adaptive systems, genetic algorithms -- for analyzing complexity and complex systems.
At the time of its initial publication, Public Administration helped to define this field of study and practice by introducing two major new emphases: an orientation toward human behavior and human relations in organizations, and an emphasis on the interaction between administration, politics, and policy. Without neglecting more traditional concerns with organization structure, Simon, Thompson, and Smithburg viewed administration in its behavioral and political contexts. The viewpoints they express still are at the center of public administration's concerns.
Nobel Laureate Herbert A. Simon has in the past quarter century been in the front line of the information-processing revolution; in fact, to a remarkable extent his and his colleagues' contributions have written the history of that revolution in cognitive psychology. Research in this burgeoning new branch of knowledge seeks to describe with precision the workings of the human mind in terms of a small number of basic mechanisms organized into strategies. Newly developed computer languages express theories of mental processes, so that computers can then simulate the predicted human behavior. This book brings together papers dating from the start of Simon's career to the present. Its focus is on modeling the chief components of human cognition and on testing these models experimentally. After considering basic structural elements of the human information-processing system (especially search, selective attention, and storage in memory), Simon builds from these components a system capable of solving problems, inducing rules and concepts, perceiving, and understanding. These essays describe a relatively austere, simple, and unified processing system capable of highly complex and various tasks. They provide strong evidence for an explanation of human thinking in terms of basic information processes.
Offering alternative models based on such concepts as satisficing (acceptance of viable choices that may not be the undiscoverable optimum) and bouded rationality (the limited extent to which rational calculation can direct human behaviour), Simon shows why more empirical research based on experiments and direct observation, rather than just statistical analysis of economic aggregates, is needed.
Organizations: Management Without Control provides a comprehensive understanding of the functions of formal organizations and the challenges they face. The most effective organizations provide members with opportunities to achieve their personal goals while pursuing the organization′s objectives. Using a practical approach with minimal jargon, author Howard P. Greenwald covers the basic features of organizations such as roles, structure, reward systems, power and authority, and culture and introduces important theoretical perspectives related to these features. Key Features Emphasizes the theme of "management without control": This volume differs from most standard texts by highlighting both the challenges and opportunities that result from the independence of the individuals in the organization′s ranks. Stresses the importance of individual motivation and self-fulfillment: Recognizing the individual′s responsibility for their own success, the book helps readers evaluate clues to whether the organization to which they belong is an adequate opportunity. Offers a critical perspective on current fads and management ideologies: Proposing no formulaic solutions, the book provides the perspectives required to understand each organization′s uniqueness and to develop remedies to issues as they arise. Makes theory accessible through numerous real-life examples: Chapters include examples from life in business organizations, government agencies, non-profits, clubs, friendship groups, and families. Examines multinational corporations: Challenges involved in management on an international scale are explored as the book applies the principle of individual and group independence to global matters. Underscores multidisciplinary interest in organizations: Content is drawn from sociology, social psychology, anthropology, and management science. Intended Audience This introductory textbook on formal organizations is designed for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses such as Organizational Behavior, Managing Complex Organizations, Sociology of Organizations, and Government/Non-profit Management in the departments of business, public administration, health administration, social work, sociology, and psychology. Instructor′s Resources An Instructor′s Resource CD is available upon request. This CD provides PowerPoint presentations, test questions, additional examples and cases, suggested exercises, and much more!
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