Every economics major student is very much familiar with the infamous game theory. Do you know someone who won a Nobel Prize in Economics for his fundamental contribution to the field of game theory? The best part- the guy was a highly functioning mathematician with no major formal education in the field of economics. He was, what you call a sick psycho, suffering from schizophrenia, and was even admitted to mental hospital 9 times.
He is none other than the famous Princeton professor- John Nash. He resumed teaching after being hospitalized for a very long period of time and eventually made peace with his incurable disease.
John Nash is the only person to be awarded both the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and the Abel Prize. His theories are widely used in economics
What’s interesting is that he got his doctorate under Albert B.Tucker, a Professor under whom Lloyd Stowell Shapley, another Nobel prize winning economist completed his doctorate.
Nash is the embodiment of the fact that one can overcome any obstacle in life. His struggles with his illness and his recovery became the basis for Sylvia Nasar’s biography, A Beautiful Mind, which was later adapted into a film of the same name.
Born June 13, 1928
Bluefield, West Virginia, U.S.
Died May 23, 2015 (aged 86)
Monroe Townshi, Middlesex
County, New Jersey, U.S.
Education • Carnegie Institute of
Technology B.S and M.S.
• Princeton University Ph.D.
Known for • Nash equilibrium
• Nash embedding theorem
• Nash functions
• Nash–Moser theorem
• Hilbert’s nineteenth problem
Awards • John von Neumann Theory
Prize (1978)
• Nobel Memorial Prize in
Economic Sciences (1994)
• Member of the National
Academy of Sciences (1996)
• Abel Prize (2015)
Scientific career
Fields • Mathematics
• Economics
Institutions • Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
• Princeton University
Thesis Non-Cooperative Games
Doctoral advisor Albert W. Tucker
-Yadu
Beyond Assumptions 