Reinhard Selten | |
|---|---|
 Selten in 2001 | |
| Born | Reinhard Justus Reginald Selten (1930-10-05)5 October 1930 |
| Died | 23 August 2016(2016-08-23) (aged 85) Poznań, Poland |
| Nationality | German |
| Education | Goethe University Frankfurt |
| Known for | Game theory |
| Awards | Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (1994) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Economics |
| Institutions | University of Bonn Free University of Berlin[1] |
| Doctoral advisor | Wolfgang Franz |
| Doctoral students | |
Reinhard Justus Reginald Selten (German:[ˈʁaɪnhaʁtˈzɛltn̩]ⓘ; 5 October 1930 – 23 August 2016) was a Germaneconomist, who won the 1994Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (shared withJohn Harsanyi andJohn Nash). He is also well known for his work inbounded rationality and can be considered one of the founding fathers ofexperimental economics.
Selten was born inBreslau (Wrocław) inLower Silesia, now inPoland, to aJewish father, Adolf Selten (a blind bookseller; d. 1942[2][3]), andProtestant mother, Käthe Luther.[3][4] Reinhard Selten was raised as Protestant.[4]
After a brief family exile in Saxony and Austria, Selten returned to Hesse, Germany, after the war and, in high school, read an article inFortune magazine about game theory by the business writerJohn D. McDonald. He recalled later, he would occupy his "mind with problems of elementary geometry and algebra" while walking back and forth to school during that time.[2][3] He studied mathematics atGoethe University Frankfurt and obtained his diploma in 1957. He then worked as scientific assistant to Heinz Sauermann until 1967. In 1959, he married with Elisabeth Langreiner. They had no children. In 1961, he also received his doctorate in Frankfurt in mathematics with a thesis on the evaluation of n-person games.
He was a visiting professor atBerkeley and taught from 1969 to 1972 at theFree University of Berlin and, from 1972 to 1984, at theUniversity of Bielefeld. He then accepted a professorship at theUniversity of Bonn. There he built the BonnEconLab, a laboratory for experimental economic research, where he was active even after his retirement.
Selten was professor emeritus at theUniversity of Bonn, Germany, and held several honorary doctoral degrees. He had been anEsperantist since 1959[4] and met his wife through the Esperanto movement.[5] He was a member and co-founder of theInternational Academy of Sciences San Marino.
For the2009 European Parliament election, he was the top candidate for the German wing ofEurope – Democracy – Esperanto.[6]
For his work ingame theory, Selten won the 1994Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (shared withJohn Harsanyi andJohn Nash). Selten was Germany's first and, at the time of his death, only Nobel winner for economics.[2] Among many other topics, he is credited with the first study ofaggregative games.
He is also well known for his work inbounded rationality, and can be considered one of the founding fathers ofexperimental economics. WithGerd Gigerenzer he edited the bookBounded Rationality: The Adaptive Toolbox (2001). He developed an example of a game called Selten's Horse because of its extensive form representation. His last work was "Impulse Balance Theory and its Extension by an Additional Criterion".
He was noted for his publishing in non-refereed journals to avoid being forced to make unwanted changes to his work.[7]
| Awards | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Laureate of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics 1994 Served alongside:John C. Harsanyi,John F. Nash Jr. | Succeeded by |
