Innovations and Info-Gaps: An overview

Abstract

Info-gap theory is a method for modeling and managing severe uncertainty and for prioritizing the options facing a decision maker. We consider uncertainty both in parameters and in the shape of functions. The analysis reveals intuitively meaningful concepts: the trade off between robustness and requirements, cost of robustness, zero robustness of predicted outcomes, innovation dilemmas, preference reversals resulting from uncertainty, and opportuneness from uncertainty. These insights underlie decision making under severe uncertainty. We consider an example of modeling a mechanical system.