Benjamin Franklin

Statyn föreställer Benjamin Franklin, 1706-90, amerikansk statsman, fysiker och författare.

Benjamin Franklin skrev så här till sin vän Joseph Priestly den 19 september 1772:

"I cannot, for want of sufficient premises, advise you what to determine, but if you please I will tell you how... My way is to divide half a sheet of paper by a line into two columns; writing over the one Pro, and over the other Con. Then, doing three or four days' consideration, I put down under the different heads short hints of the different motives, that at different times occur to me for or against the measure. When I have thus got them all together in one view, I endeavor to estimate the respective weights ... [to] find at length where the balance lies ...And, though the weight of reasons cannot be taken with the precision of algebraic quantities, yet, when each is thus considered, separately and comparatively, and the whole matter lies before me, I think I can judge better, and am less liable to make a rash step; and in fact I have found great advantage for this kind of equation, in what may be called moral or prudential algebra."
          

Detta citat är fortfarande mycket aktuellt och innehåller en del av det som ses som kärnan i teorin om beslutsfattande.