The Monte Carlo method

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Who

Stanisław Ulam, a Polish-Jewish mathematician, together with John von Neumann, at Los Alamos.

When

1940s

Where

Los Alamos, New Mexico, United States

The Monte Carlo method uses repeated random sampling to solve problems too complex for exact calculation, and it is now fundamental across physics, finance, and computing. It was conceived by Stanisław Ulam and developed with John von Neumann while working on nuclear research at Los Alamos. Ulam was a Jewish mathematician from Lwów who emigrated before World War II and lost much of his family in the Holocaust.

Part of “The Gifts of the Jews” — verified Jewish contributions to the world, with sources.