Scienceמיה בר-הלל

Maya Bar-Hillel

Maya Bar-Hillel is an Israeli psychologist and professor emeritus at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, known for her research on errors in human reasoning about probability.

born 1943The base rate fallacyResearch on probabilistic reasoningRebutting the Bible codeWork on Newcomb's paradox

Occupation: psychologist

Maya Bar-Hillel was born in 1943

Maya Bar-Hillel was born in 1943. She is the daughter of the philosopher and linguist Yehoshua Bar-Hillel. Her daughter, Gili Bar-Hillel, translated the Harry Potter books into Hebrew.

At the Hebrew University she earned bachelor's and master's degrees in mathematics and a Ph.D. in psychology, studying with Amos Tversky. Her 1975 dissertation introduced the idea of the base rate fallacy in judgments of probability.

She researches judgment and decision making, probabilistic thinking and paradoxes. With the philosopher Avishai Margalit she proposed a solution to Newcomb's paradox. She also studied how gender stereotypes can block problem solving, and she directed the university's Center for the Study of Rationality from 2001 to 2005.

In 1999 she published a paper with Brendan McKay, Dror Bar-Natan and Gil Kalai rejecting the claims of the Bible code. They found similar letter patterns in War and Peace.

She served on the board of B'Tselem from 2012 to 2018 and was on the public board of the New Israel Fund. In the 1981 Knesset election she was placed 84th on the Ratz list.