Review: Game Theory: A Nontechnical Introduction

Game Theory: A Nontechnical Introduction by Morton D. Davis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When I read that Douglas R. Hofstadter called this work a “lucid and penetrating development of game theory that will appeal to the intuition,” I knew I wanted to read this overview of "the study of mathematical models of conflict and cooperation between intelligent rational decision-makers”, as Roger B. Myerson defined game theory. Published originally in 1970, the reprinted classic looks back to the foundations of game theory laid by John von Neumann. Von Neumann’s basic minimax theorem, proved in 1928, is core to Chapter 2 on two-person, zero-sum games. Being a nontechnical introduction, proof and a good detail of mathematical mechanics are foregone to get a high-level view of the properties of this technique as an applied art and its many applications to social, economic, and political problems...

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