Shubik, left, circa 1967
Beatrice Cherrier has asked me to put together a post on Martin Shubik’s informal tripartite classification of work in game theory:
- High church
- Low church
- Conversational
Shubik discussed this classification in two retrospective, reflective articles:
- M. Shubik, “What is an Application and When is Theory a Waste of Time?” Management Science 33 (1987): 1511–1522.
- Martin Shubik, “Game Theory and Operations Research: Some Musings 50 Years Later,” Operations Research 50 (2002): 192–196.
Neither article is exactly what you would call philosophical. They belong to the ill-organized, often repetitious genre of commentary addressing 1) the epistemological status of formal modeling, and 2) the always-dicey relationship between theory development and practical application. Beatrice, I should note, is something of a connoisseuse of this important, under-respected literature, at least as it pertains to economics. Follow her on Twitter for occasional dispatches from its labyrinths.