Computer science meets economics
Daedalus of Crete — who, according to Greek myth, designed the labyrinth that trapped the Minotaur — is one of the oldest symbols of human ingenuity, credited with the invention of the saw, the ax, glue, and the ship’s sail, among other things. Constantinos Daskalakis, a recently tenured associate professor of computer science and engineering at MIT, comes from a Cretan family, and while it’s fanciful to suggest that the ingenuity of his work in theoretical computer science owes anything to the example of Daedalus, the problems he explores are undoubtedly labyrinthine. Much of Daskalakis’ work concentrates on the application of computer science techniques to game theory, a discipline that attempts to get a quantitative handle on human strategic reasoning. Game theory models human interactions as a series of moves in a clearly defined game; each move represents an instance of a particular strategy and may elicit a different response from the...