Professor of Psychology and Computer Science
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA
|
|
|
|
Vital Stats
Born June 15, 1916 -- Milwaukee, WI
Undergraduate Degree -- University of Chicago 1936
Ph.D. -- University of Chicago 1943
Early Occupations:
Internation City Managers Association Editor 1938-39
University of California - Berkeley, Administrator 1939-42
Illinois Institute of Technology Professor 1942-49
Carnegie Mellon University Professor and Administrator 1949-Present
Awards and Honors:
Mosher Award, American Society of Public Administration 1974
Turing Award, Association for Computing Machinery 1975
Dow-Jones Award 1983
National Medal of Science 1986
Nobel Peace Prize for Economics 1978
"It might have been necessary a decade ago to argue for the
commonality of the information processes that are employed by such disparate
systems as computers and human nervous systems. The evidence for that commonality
is now overwhelming." (Simon, 1980)
Herb Simon's list of talents have contributed to a wide range of academic, commercial,
and research institutions. He is best known for his work with Alan Newell in the
design of the "information processing" model of human cognition. Their book
Human Problem Solving was a landmark in rethinking how the brain functions
and also provided pathways toward Artificial Intelligence theory and Cognitive
Psychology. The basic premise breaks down human cognition into components that
are guided by symbol systems. Here's a good primer in their general theory of
intelligence.
Simon's earlier work focused on human decision making, an account for why human's
behave in not always optimum manner called bounded rationality. His theory of decisions underscores the limited
capacity of human processing systems, reflected in the observed pattern of least
best decision choices. Hence, Simon's interest and influence in public administration,
and administrative organizations. It was for this work that he won the Nobel Prize.
Simon is also noted for his Artificial Intelligence work, and EPAM theory of human
perception and memory. His work with Newell was pioneering in the use of computer
simulation to map human behavior. In computers, Simon has found a tool that can closely model
and record problem solving techniques. This is critical to HCI, in that
we can rethink computers and people, using these theories, as different instantiations,
of the same system.
Abbreviated Bibliography
"The New Science of Management Decision," Harper 1960.
"The Sciences of the Artificial", MIT, 1968.
"Human Problem Solving," Simon and Allen Newell, Prentice Hall, 1972.
"Administrative Behavior: study of decision making processes in administrative
organization, " Free Press, 1976.
"Models of Thought," Yale University Press 1979.
"Models of Bounded Rationality", MIT Press, 1982.
"Reason in Human Affairs," Stanford University Press, 1983.
Zhu, X. & Simon, H.A. (1987). Learning mathematics from examples and by doing. Cognition and Instruction, 4, 137-166.
Larkin, J.H. & Simon, H.A. (1987). Why a diagram is (sometimes) worth 10,000 words. Cognitive Science, 11, 65-100.
Kaplin C. & Simon, H.A. (1990). In search of insight. Cognitive Psychology, 22, 374-419.
Qin, Y. & Simon, H.A. (1992) Imagery as process representation in problem solving. Proceedings of the 14th Annual Conference
of the Cognitive Science Society, 1050-1055.
Vera A.H. & Simon, H.A. (1993) Situated action: A symbolic interpretation. Cognitive Science, 17, 7-48.
Leonardo, A.M., Tabachneck, H.J.M. & Simon, H.A. (1995). A computational model of diagram reading and reasoning.
Proceedings of the 17th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, 1050-1055.