Sterling Terrell

recovering economist

John von Neumann

If you don’t know John von Neumann, he worked on game theory before the now-famous mathematician John Nash did.

John Von Neumann made advances in zero-sum games, and Nash in non-zero-sum games.

Essentially, Von Neumann proved that the uncertainty that comes with bluffing in poker, a fraction of the time, will give your odds of winning an edge.

It’s hard for a scientist to become a household name. So it shouldn’t be surprising that for most people the name John von Neumann doesn’t ring a bell. That’s a shame because von Neumann is a hero of mine, and should be to anyone committed to making better decisions. His contributions to the science of decision-making were immense, and yet they were just a footnote in the short life of one of the greatest minds in the history of scientific thought. (And, not coincidentally, he was a poker player.)

-Annie Duke, Thinking In Bets (Amazon)

Here’s that Nash trailer:

Making Hundreds Of Decisions

Poker (and chess?) might be some of the best ways to practice making lots of decisions in a short amount of time.

You have to assess, decide, and then execute on your conviction – with significant potential losses – and under a time constraint.

Like everything else, it’s like a muscle that gets stronger the more it is used…

Some crazy hands come out:

Every poker hand requires making at least one decision (to fold your starting cards or play them), and some hands can require up to twenty decisions. During a poker game in a casino card room, players get in about thirty hands per hour. An average hand of poker takes about two minutes to complete, including the time it takes for the dealer to gather, shuffle, and deal the cards between hands. Poker sessions typically last for several hours, with many decisions in every hand. This means a poker player makes hundreds of decisions per session, all of which take place at breakneck speed.

-Annie Duke, Thinking In Bets (Amazon)

Sterling Terrell