Herbert Gintis
contemporaryBehavioral Economics and Evolutionary Game Theory1940 – 2023
Herbert Gintis (1940-2023) was an American behavioral scientist, economist, and game theorist known for his interdisciplinary work bridging economics, evolutionary biology, and moral philosophy. He made significant contributions to understanding human cooperation, strong reciprocity, and the evolutionary foundations of moral behavior, and critically examined the foundations of classical game theory.
Notable Achievements
1
Co-authored Schooling in Capitalist America (1976) with Samuel Bowles, a landmark critique of education and inequality
2
Developed the theory of strong reciprocity to explain human cooperation
3
Critiqued classical game theory's solution concepts, including backward induction in extensive-form games
4
Authored The Bounds of Reason (2009), unifying behavioral sciences under game-theoretic foundations
5
Advanced gene-culture coevolutionary theory of human prosocial behavior