Dissertation Research: The Politics of Game Theory: Mathematics and Cold War Culture, 1944-1984

科学与技术研究论文改进助学金将提供资金，使博士生能够收集所需的数据，目的是使学生更接近完成博士学位。资金将支持前往华盛顿特区、密歇根和伦敦进行档案研究，并在这些地点进行面试。该项目关注博弈论的历史，因为它是在冷战期间发展并引入到许多应用领域的。它将聚焦于四个背景，这些背景在这一时期对博弈论的发展至关重要，并深刻塑造了当今博弈论领域：应用数学、行为科学、和平研究和冲突解决以及生物学。在这些不同的背景下考察博弈论，将有助于增加关于冷战期间科学史以及数学和科学理论社会学的文献。虽然战后科学史学家已经做了很多工作来表明表面上“纯粹的”科学的行为和内容是如何在冷战(特别是军事资助)的背景下塑造的，但本文将试图探索冷战文化的更精细结构及其对博弈论发展的影响。在理解这些过程的过程中，这篇论文将借鉴并促进越来越多的文献，这些文献试图理解理论、数学模型、文化价值观和推理风格之间的关系。自从约翰·冯·诺伊曼和奥斯卡·摩根斯坦在1944年发表了他们开创性的博弈论和经济行为理论以来，博弈论得到了戏剧性的发展。从20世纪40年代末开始，由美国军方资助的数学家们非常迅速地发展了博弈论的形式结构及其与其他数学思想的联系，如信息论、控制论和线性规划。在同一时期，行为科学家开始对照观察到的人类行为来检验博弈论的预测，从而导致在实践背景下对形式博弈论和决策理论模型的丰富传统的批评。鉴于博弈论的军事根源，20世纪60年代初出现了密切相关的“和平研究”和“冲突解决”专业，进一步发展了(特别是)非零和博弈论和博弈行为的心理学研究。最后，在20世纪60年代和70年代，关注动物攻击性的生物学家开发了一套令人震惊的与“进化游戏”相关的新概念，这是一个研究领域，今天继续增长的重要性。本文认为，博弈论之所以朝着这些方向发展，是因为冷战所特有的文化和政治条件。数学家们精心设计了一种博弈论，以应对他们的军事赞助人的战术和后勤问题。对于行为科学家来说，关于冲突和合作的博弈论研究往往是在一个更广泛的背景下进行的，目的是将人类行为数学化，并为一个稳定而民主的冷战社会奠定基础。和平研究的先驱转向博弈论，努力为传统的军事战略研究提供一种以和平为导向的“科学”替代方案，他们经常抨击传统军事战略研究滥用博弈论。最后，对于生物学家来说，博弈论允许对动物行为的令人费解的现象进行新达尔文主义的解释，例如利他主义，这些现象在和平研究议程中也很重要。通过研究这些事件，研究人员将阐明科学理论与这个时代的政治背景之间的关系。我们将从博弈论的几个流派的形成，以及对数学模型和人类价值之间关系的更广泛的理解中获得一个视角，这些流派继续影响着今天的科学知识和实际决策。

This Science and Technology Studies Dissertation Improvement Grant will provide funds to enable the doctoral student to collect needed data with the purpose of bringing the student to closer completion of the Ph.D. Funds will support travel to conduct archival research in Washington D.C., Michigan, and London, and to conduct interviews at these locations. The project focuses on a history of game theory as it was developed and imported into many fields of application during the Cold War. It will focus on four contexts that were central to game theory's development during this period and that have profoundly shaped the field of game theory as it exists today: applied mathematics, behavioral science, peace research and conflict resolution, and biology. An examination of game theory in these different contexts will contribute to growing literatures on the history of science during the Cold War, and on the sociology of mathematics and scientific theory. While historians of postwar science have done much to suggest how the conduct and content of ostensibly "pure" science was shaped by the context of the Cold War (and especially military funding), this dissertation will seek to explore the finer texture of Cold War culture and its influence on game theory's development. In understanding these processes, this dissertation will both draw upon and contribute to a growing literature that seeks to understand the relationship between theory, mathematical models, and cultural values and styles of reasoning. Game theory has developed dramatically since John von Neumann and Oskar Morganstern published their seminal Theory of Games and Economic Behavior in 1944. Starting in the late 1940s, mathematicians funded by the U.S. military very rapidly developed the formal structure of game theory and its connections to other ideas in mathematics, such as information theory, cybernetics, and linear programming. In this same period, behavioral scientists began to test game theory's predictions against observed human behavior, thereby leading to a rich tradition of critiques of formal game theoretic and decision-theoretic models in practical contexts. Given game theory's military roots, the early 1960s saw the creation of the closely related specialties of "peace studies" and "conflict resolution" that further developed (especially) non-zero-sum game theory and psychological studies of game-playing behavior. Finally, in the 1960s and 1970s, biologists concerned with animal aggression developed a startling new set of concepts associated with "evolutionary games," an area of research that continues to grow in importance today. This dissertation will argue that game theory developed in these directions because of the cultural and political conditions that characterized the Cold War. Mathematicians crafted a game theory that was responsive to the tactical and logistical problems of their military patrons. For behavioral scientists, game-theoretic investigations of conflict and cooperation were often performed in the context of a broader effort to mathematize human behavior and to lay the foundations for a stable yet democratic Cold War society. The progenitors of peace research turned to game theory in an effort to provide a "scientific" peace-oriented alternative to conventional military-strategic studies, which they often attacked for its alleged misuse of game theory. And finally, for biologists, game theory permitted a neo-Darwinian explanation of puzzling phenomena of animal behavior, such as altruism, that were also important in the peace studies agenda. By examining these episodes, the researcher will shed light on the relationship between scientific theories and the political context of this era. A perspective will be gained on the formation of several schools of game theory that continue to shape scientific knowledge and practical decision-making today, as well as a broader understanding of the relationship between mathematical models and human values.