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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amos Tversky | 2/2 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Tversky | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T17:52:31.237412+00:00 | kb-cron |
=== Approach to research === Kahneman said that Tversky "had simply perfect taste in choosing problems, and he never wasted much time on anything that was not destined to matter. He also had an unfailing compass that always kept him going forward. Tversky's 1974 Science article with Kahneman on cognitive illusions triggered a "cascade of related research," Science News wrote in a 1994 article tracing the recent history of research on reasoning. Decision theorists in economics, business, philosophy and medicine as well as psychologists cited their work.
=== Recognition === In 1980, he became a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1984 he was a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship, and in 1985 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Tversky, as a co-recipient with Daniel Kahneman, earned the 2003 University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Psychology. After Tversky's death, Kahneman was awarded the 2002 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for the work he did in collaboration with Tversky. Nobel prizes are not awarded posthumously.
== Personality and characteristics == Kahneman has said "Amos was the freest person I have known, and he was able to be free because he was also one of the most disciplined." Persi Diaconis, a professor of mathematics at Stanford, has said "You were happy being in his presence. There was a light shining out of him." Gerhard Casper, President of Stanford University, said Tversky "maintained the highest standards of professional ethics", and "His dedication to Stanford and its institutions of faculty governance was exemplary." Whilst being very collaborative, Tversky also had a lifelong habit of working alone at night while others slept. In intellectual debate Tversky "wanted to crush the opposition". Tversky believed that humans live under uncertainty, in a probabilistic universe.
== Personal life == In 1963, Tversky married American psychologist Barbara Gans, who later became a professor in the human-development department at Teachers College, Columbia University. They had three children together. He died of a metastatic melanoma in 1996. He was a Jewish atheist.
== In popular culture ==
=== Tversky intelligence test === As recounted by Canadian writer Malcolm Gladwell in 2013's David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants, Tversky's peers thought so highly of him that they devised a tongue-in-cheek one-part test for measuring intelligence. As related to Gladwell by psychologist Adam Alter, the Tversky intelligence test was "The faster you realized Tversky was smarter than you, the smarter you were."
=== The Undoing Project === Michael Lewis's book The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds, released in 2016, is about Tversky's personal and professional relationship with Daniel Kahneman.
== References ==
== External links == Quotations related to Amos Tversky at Wikiquote Memorial Resolution - Amos Tversky Boston Globe: The man who wasn't there Daniel Kahneman – Autobiography Tversky in group discussion (39 mins) Tversky lecturing