Marginalism versus Algorithmism
think there is an analogy here between the ultimate influence of economic reasoning on military planning and the gradual influence that economists are achieving in some types of business planning. In the first place, it is easier to convince somebody that he has done less than a perfect job in making complicated decisions than to tell him that his fundamental principles are unsound, that he misconceives the simplest problems of choice. Operations research, dealing with specific problems on which the client is aware of his need for help, can be an elementary lesson in disguise, a means of drawing the client into intellectual participation in the application of economic reasonlng. There is another reason why operations research is a good medium through which to reach the heads of business and the heads of military establishments. It gives the economist some credentials. Instead of posing as a mentor or intellectual kibitzer he can pull out a slide rule and save the man a little money, and show that there is a practical value to his way of looking at problems. Lawyers, I think, serve well in the higher echelons of business and government because of intellectual qualities and training; but they get started toward the top because there is a particular kind of problem, legal problems, that they can solve better than other people. Discussion of this topic is almost bound to sound patronizing towards the military establishment; the patronizing tone needs to be counteracted. Fortunately, there is evidence in the papers collected here that military planners compare well with the other professions. Heads of business too, according to Baumol, can make mistakes that look egregious to an economist; and perhaps the nature of their business gives them less excuse than the military planners. More than that, even the heroes of this symposium, the operations researchers, are accused by Mr. Hitch, with good illustrations, not just of making errors, but of making precisely the elementary error that has been attributed to military planners. So there is nothing in what I have said that in any way contradicts Mr. Hitch when, asking what lies behind military judgment, he answers, Frequently, first rate intellectual capacity.
- DOI
- 10.2307/1927412
- Volume
- 40 (3)
- Pages
- 224
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