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This article examines how perceptions in operations research can mislead expected outcomes in everyday life, suggesting a reevaluation of views.
Operations research: What you see is not what you get! In this article, Richard C. Larson, Mitsui Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Institute for Data, Systems, and Society, explores the ‘seeing aspect’ of operations research in everyday life. We have all heard the popular phrase: ‘Seeing is Believing.’ (1) But perhaps this is not always true, especially if ‘what we see’ does not imply the outcome that we expect. Here, as another of our occasional papers, we explore this ‘seeing aspect’ of operations research in everyday life.
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Richard C. Larson (2026) studied this question.
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