You don’t have to be a mathematician to have a feel for numbers. —— John Forbes Nash, Jr. 

你無需成為數學家，也能對數字有感覺。——小約翰．福布斯．納殊

The world was shocked and saddened by the sudden death of John Forbes Nash, Jr. and his wife in a car accident two weeks ago. John Nash was a brilliant economist and mathematician. His contributions to “game theory”（「博弈論」）, the mathematical study of decision-making, have made a great impact on virtually everything, from chess games, economics, international relations to our daily life. He successfully extended his analysis beyond “zero-sum” games（零和遊戲） with an “I-win-you-lose” outcome in decision-making processes. He provided insights into more complex everyday situations where all of the participants could gain, or all could lose. 

John Nash was born in 1928 in the USA. As a young teenager, he spent much time in reading and doing scientific experiments alone. His interest in mathematics was inspired by E. T. Bell’s “Men of Mathematics”（《數學大師》）, which he read at the age of 14. During his final year of high school, he won a nationally awarded full scholarship and used it to enrol in the Carnegie Institute of Technology（卡內基科技學院）. Initially he majored in engineering. Then he switched to chemistry and eventually to his life-long passion, mathematics. In 1948, he was awarded a prestigious fellowship to study for a doctorate in mathematics at Princeton University （普林斯頓大學）. In 1950, when John Nash was twentyish, he received a doctorate with a dissertation on “non-cooperative games”（「非合作博弈」）. Forty-four years later, he won the Nobel Prize in Economics（諾貝爾經濟學獎）for the theory studied in this dissertation with another two game theorists. 

The life of John Nash was made known to the world by the film called “A Beautiful Mind”（《有你終生美麗》）. The film was adapted from a biography, which revealed his two-decade-long struggle with his mental illness and his recovery. Both John Nash and his wife became mental health care advocates. 

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