The Use of Philosophy and Psychology by The Operational Research Analyst In Influencing The Decision-Maker

Abstract

In Operations Research (OR) today there are a number of concerns as to what direction it should take: should it become more abstract or should it become more readily accessible to the decision-maker? Curbing the abstract aspects of the discipline would certainly retard progress in our eventual understanding of the nature of OR problems. Conversely not making OR analyses more accessible to the decision-maker will discourage him from using OR as part of his decision-making process. The latter concern is emphasized by some recent trends in management which avoid using OR in their decision loan-making process. This problem or dilemma was presented to the Euro VIII Conference on OR in 1986. The theme of this conference as stated in the keynote address was that attention in the OR community needed to be focused on the harmonizing of these 2 aspects of OR. This paper is a follow-up to this theme.