Definition:Game Theory/Historical Note
Historical Note on Game Theory
The origins of the mathematical discipline of game theory can be traced to Ernst Zermelo's 1913: Über eine Anwendung der Mengenlehre auf die Theorie des Schachspiels ("On an Application of Set Theory to the Theory of the Game of Chess") (Proceedings of the Fifth International Congress of Mathematicians Vol. 2: pp. 501 – 504) (edited by E.W. Hobson).
Another early landmark was Émile Borel's 1921: La Théorie du Jeu et les Équations Intégrales à Noyau Symétrique (C.R. Acad. Sci. Vol. 173: pp. 1304 – 1308).
He also stated, but failed to prove, a special case of the Fundamental Theorem of Games in his paper of 1927: Sur les systèmes de formes linéaires à déterminant symétrique gauche et la théorie générale du jeu (C.R. Acad. Sci. Vol. 184: pp. 52 – 54).
The proof was given in a lecture by John von Neumann, documented as 1928: Zur Theorie der Gesellschaftspiele (Math. Ann. Vol. 100: pp. 295 – 320).
The field was properly established by John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern in their Theory of Games and Economic Behaviour of $1944$, as a result of their observation that certain problems in economics were identical with those of games of strategy.
As the field evolved, it became apparent that this new discipline had a considerable number of wide-ranging applications.
Sources
- 1956: Steven Vajda: The Theory of Games and Linear Programming ... (next): Chapter $\text{I}$: An Outline of the Theory of Games
- 1957: R. Duncan Luce and Howard Raiffa: Games and Decisions ... (previous) ... (next): Chapter $1$: General Introduction to the Theory of Games: $1.2$ Historical Backgrounds
- 1983: Morton D. Davis: Game Theory (revised ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): Author's Introduction
- 1991: Roger B. Myerson: Game Theory ... (previous) ... (next): $1.1$ Game Theory, Rationality, and Intelligence
- 1998: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (2nd ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): game theory
- 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): game theory