21 June 1943 6:03 pm

It was a little ironic when, after a half century of mathematicians trying to convert math into a set of non-numerical ideas, as the computer age dawned, a new technology produced a demand for a system that could render ideas as a series of numbers. One result was game theory, one of the most crucial pieces of a-plied math ever conceived.

A game of chance involves calculating the probabilities of winning or losing events. In 1928, American scientist John Von Neumann founded the field of game theory, in which probability and strategy were applied to real-world situations. 

Mathematics: An Illustrated History of Numbers. Ed. Tom Jackson  Shelter Harbor. Press  New York.