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150Economic Choice Theory: An Experimental Analysis of Animal Behavior, John H. Kagel, Raymond C. Battalio, and Leonard Green. Cambridge University Press, 1995, xii + 230 pages (review)Economics and Philosophy 15 (2): 295. 1999.Economic theory may explain the behavior of animals. Its application to animals is not straightforward, however.
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59Does collective rationality entail efficiency?Logic Journal of the IGPL 18 (2): 308-322. 2010.Collective rationality in its ordinary sense is rationality’s extension to groups. It does not entail efficiency by definition. Showing that it entails efficiency requires a normative argument. Game theorists treating cooperative games generally assume that collective rationality entails efficiency, but formulating the reasoning that leads individuals to efficiency, and verifying the rationality of its steps, presents challenging philosophical issues. This paper constructs a framework for addres…Read more
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39Review of Erik J. Olsson (ed.), Knowledge and Inquiry: Essays on the Pragmatism of Isaac Levi (review)Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2007 (8). 2007.
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105Optimization and improvement (review)Philosophical Studies 148 (3). 2010.Agents face serious obstacles to making optimal decisions. For instance, their cognitive limits stand in the way. John Pollock’s book, Thinking about Acting , suggests many ways of revising decision principles to accommodate human limits and to direct limited, artificial agents. The book’s main proposal is to replace optimization, or expected-utility maximization, with locally global planning. This essay describes optimization and locally global planning, and then argues that optimization among …Read more
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152Belief and acceptanceIn Belief and acceptance, Kluwer Academic. pp. 499--520. 2004.The attitudes of belief and acceptance are similar but differ in important respects such as their relation to degree of belief.
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132Interpersonal utility in principles of social choiceErkenntnis 21 (3). 1984.This paper summarizes and rebuts the three standard objections made by social choice theorists against interpersonal utility. The first objection argues that interpersonal utility is measningless. I show that this objection either focuses on irrelevant kinds of meaning or else uses implausible criteria of meaningfulness. The second objection argues that interpersonal utility has no role to play in social choice theory. I show that on the contrary interpersonal utility is useful in formulating go…Read more
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74From rationality to coordinationBehavioral and Brain Sciences 26 (2): 179-180. 2003.Game theory's paradoxes stimulate the study of rationality. Sometimes they motivate the revising of standard principles of rationality. Other times they call for revising applications of those principles or introducing supplementary principles of rationality. I maintain that rationality adjusts its demands to circumstances, and in ideal games of coordination it yields a payoff-dominant equilibrium.
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46The Hypothesis of Nash Equilibrium and Its Bayesian JustificationIn Dag Prawitz & Dag Westerståhl (eds.), Logic and Philosophy of Science in Uppsala: Papers From the 9th International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science, Kluwer Academic Publishers. pp. 245--264. 1994.How does Bayesian reasoning support participation in a game's Nash equilibrium? This paper provides an answer.
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187Auguste Comte, John Stuart Mill, et l'economie politiqueJournal of French and Francophone Philosophy 8 (1): 40-53. 1996.none.
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70Decisions to follow a ruleBehavioral and Brain Sciences 25 (2): 280-281. 2002.Rachlin favors following patterns over making decisions case by case. However, his accounts of self-control and altruism do not establish the rationality of making decisions according to patterns. The best arguments for using patterns as a standard of evaluation appeal to savings in cognitive costs and compensation for irrational dispositions. What the arguments show depends on how they are elaborated and refined.
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182Risk's Place in Decision RulesSynthese 126 (3): 427-441. 2001.To handle epistemic and pragmatic risks, Gärdenfors and Sahlin (1982, 1988) design a decision procedure for cases in which probabilities are indeterminate. Their procedure steps outside the traditional expected utility framework. Must it do this? Can the traditional framework handle risk? This paper argues that it can. The key is a comprehensive interpretation of an option's possible outcomes. Taking possible outcomes more broadly than Gärdenfors and Sahlin do, expected utility can give risk its…Read more
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430Conditional probabilities and probabilities given knowledge of a conditionPhilosophy of Science 50 (1): 82-95. 1983.The conditional probability of h given e is commonly claimed to be equal to the probability that h would have if e were learned. Here I contend that this general claim about conditional probabilities is false. I present a counter-example that involves probabilities of probabilities, a second that involves probabilities of possible future actions, and a third that involves probabilities of indicative conditionals. In addition, I briefly defend these counter-examples against charges that the proba…Read more
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Richmond Campbell and Lanning Sowden, eds., Paradoxes of Rationality and Cooperation Reviewed by (review)Philosophy in Review 6 (4): 141-143. 1986.This collection treats classic problems in decision theory such as Newcomb's Problem and the Prisoner's Dilemma. The reviews describes and evaluates the essays.
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49Liberal UtilitarianismPhilosophical Books 30 (3): 182-183. 1989.This book review describes and evaluates Jonathan Riley's views about utilitarianism.
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282Initiating coordinationPhilosophy of Science 74 (5): 790-801. 2007.How do rational agents coordinate in a single-stage, noncooperative game? Common knowledge of the payoff matrix and of each player's utility maximization among his strategies does not suffice. This paper argues that utility maximization among intentions and then acts generates coordination yielding a payoff-dominant Nash equilibrium. ‡I thank the audience at my paper's presentation at the 2006 PSA meeting for many insightful points. †To contact the author, please write to: Philosophy Department,…Read more
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131Utility and framingSynthese 176 (1). 2010.Standard principles of rational decision assume that an option's utility is both comprehensive and accessible. These features constrain interpretations of an option's utility. This essay presents a way of understanding utility and laws of utility. It explains the relation between an option's utility and its outcome's utility and argues that an option's utility is relative to a specification of the option. Utility's relativity explains how a decision problem's framing affects an option's utility …Read more
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104Adam Morton on DilemmasDialogue 33 (1): 95. 1994.Adam Morton offers a novel approach to making decisions. This review describes and evaluates his innovations
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Ellery Eells and Tomasz Maruszewski, eds., Probability and Rationality: Studies on L. Jonathan Cohen's Philosophy of Science Reviewed by (review)Philosophy in Review 12 (3): 189-191. 1992.This book review describes and evaluates the essays collected by the editors.
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45The Cement of SocietyPhilosophical Books 33 (1): 1-9. 1992.This critical notice describes and evaluates Jon Elster' views in Solomonic Judgments, Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences, and The Cement of Society
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46Thinking about Acting: Logical Foundations for Rational Decision Making - by John L. PollockPhilosophical Books 48 (3): 283-285. 2007.This book review describes and evaluates John Pollock's view about rational decision-making.
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134Decision instabilityAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 63 (4). 1985.In some decision problems adoption of an option furnishes evidence about the option's consequences. Rational decisions take account of that evidence, although it makes an option's adoption changes the option's expected utility.
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Comte et Mill sur l'économie politiqueRevue Internationale de Philosophie 52 (203): 79-93. 1998.This essay compares the views of Auguste Comte and John Stuart Mill on political economy.
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8PreferenceIn Hugh LaFollette (ed.), The International Encyclopedia of Ethics, Wiley-blackwell. 2013.Decision theory relies on an account of preference. Some accounts are behaviorist and others are mentalistic. The account used affects the explanatory power of decision theory.
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56[Book review] equilibrium and rationality, game theory revised by decision rules (review)Ethics 109 (3): 684-686. 1998.This book represents a major contribution to game theory. It offers this conception of equilibrium in games: strategic equilibrium. This conception arises from a study of expected utility decision principles, which must be revised to take account of the evidence a choice provides concerning its outcome. The argument for these principles distinguishes reasons for action from incentives, and draws on contemporary analyses of counterfactual conditionals. The book also includes a procedure for ident…Read more
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34Review: The Foundations of Causal Decision Theory (review)Philosophical Books 41 (3): 217-219. 2002.Books reviewed: Joyce, J.M. The Foundations of Causal Decision Theory.
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53Value in Ethics and Economics (review)Philosophical Books 36 (2): 139-141. 1995.This review describes and evaluates a book by Elizabeth Anderson.
Areas of Specialization
| Logic and Philosophy of Logic |
| Philosophy of Probability |
Areas of Interest
| Social and Political Philosophy |
| General Philosophy of Science |