Operational Research as a Science

We hear a lot these days about a type of research in which the objects studied, instead of being either materials or machines or people, are the activities of all these together—research into “operations.” To many, operational research conjures up a vision of a busy executive seated at his desk faced with the almost unending problem of making decisions. Everything depends on the speed and correctness with which he makes these decisions, and these in turn depend on the way the facts and factors are presented to him and on his judgment or his ability to weigh them up. Someone tells him about a new tool to help him—the “scientific method.” Finding this tool rather heavy and intricate, he employs specialists to help him, people trained in the scientific method, i.e., scientists. Thus is born an operational research section such as is now to be found in numerous organizations and industries in Britain and the United States. Operations Research, ISSN 0030-364X, was published as Journal of the Operations Researc...