ABSTRACT
How, then, do human beings handle strategic problems that are too complex to solve, or how ought they to handle them? The most influential theory bearing on this question was originally formulated by Herbert Simon (1957, pp. 241-273) to explain organizational decision making. Rejecting the assumption of neoclassical economics that decision makers invariably act to optimize their payoffs, Simon put forward the concept of satisficing. Instead of searching for the optimum strategy in every situation, a process that consumes an undue amount of time and energy and is in any event often impossible to complete, the wise decision maker, according to this theory, searches just long enough to find a strategy that is satisfactory, or that suffices; in other words one that" satisfices". For example, a newly married couple looking for a house to buy usually settle for the first one they find that is acceptable according to certain minimal requirements - price, location, number of rooms, amenities, and so on - without attempting to examine every available alternative to ensure an optimal choice. Human chess players also usually adopt satisficing moves, something that computers cannot be programmed to do effectively on account of their lack of positional judgement. It is partly because of this that chess-playing computers are weakest in certain types of "non-tactical" positions, as chess players call them, in which positional judgement is at a premium.
