Nash equilibrium
Equilibrio de Nash
- Date
- 1950 · confidence high
- Place
- Princeton, New Jersey, United States
- Credited to
- John Forbes Nash (doctoral thesis)
- People
- 👤 John Forbes Nash1928–2015
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
What was discovered
Every finite game with any number of players has at least one equilibrium in mixed strategies in which no one improves their position by changing unilaterally. It extends game theory beyond zero-sum games and turns it into a universal tool of the social sciences.
The proof fits on one page; Nash received the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1994.
What it led to
- modern economics
- mechanism design
- evolutionary biology (evolutionarily stable strategies)
- algorithmic game theory
Built on
- von Neumann's game theory
- Kakutani fixed-point theorem
Made possible
- Traveler's dilemma1994
- spectrum auctions and online advertising
- market models