•  60
    Radical Uncertainty: Beyond Probabilistic Models of Belief
    Erkenntnis 79 (6): 1221-1223. 2014.
    Over the past decades or so the probabilistic model of rational belief has enjoyed increasing interest from researchers in epistemology and the philosophy of science. Of course, such probabilistic models were used for much longer in economics, in game theory, and in other disciplines concerned with decision making. Moreover, Carnap and co-workers used probability theory to explicate philosophical notions of confirmation and induction, thereby targeting epistemic rather than decision-theoretic as…Read more
  • Individual and social deliberation: Introduction
    Economics and Philosophy 31 (1): 1-2. 2015.
    Deliberation is the process through which we decide what do to, or what to believe. When we think about what to do, we are engaged in practical deliberation. Theoretical deliberation is when we think about what to believe, or about which judgement to make.
  •  34
    All agreed: Aumann meets DeGroot
    Theory and Decision 85 (1): 41-60. 2018.
    We represent consensus formation processes based on iterated opinion pooling as a dynamic approach to common knowledge of posteriors :1236–1239, 1976; Geanakoplos and Polemarchakis in J Econ Theory 28:192–200, 1982). We thus provide a concrete and plausible Bayesian rationalization of consensus through iterated pooling. The link clarifies the conditions under which iterated pooling can be rationalized from a Bayesian perspective, and offers an understanding of iterated pooling in terms of higher…Read more
  •  111
    Probabilistic Logics and Probabilistic Networks
    with Rolf Haenni, Gregory Wheeler, and Jon Williamson
    Synthese Library. 2010.
    Additionally, the text shows how to develop computationally feasible methods to mesh with this framework.
  •  274
    The discursive dilemma as a lottery paradox
    Economics and Philosophy 23 (3): 301-319. 2007.
    List and Pettit have stated an impossibility theorem about the aggregation of individual opinion states. Building on recent work on the lottery paradox, this paper offers a variation on that result. The present result places different constraints on the voting agenda and the domain of profiles, but it covers a larger class of voting rules, which need not satisfy the proposition-wise independence of votes
  •  101
    Probabilist antirealism
    Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 91 (1): 38-63. 2010.
    Until now, antirealists have offered sketches of a theory of truth, at best. In this paper, we present a probabilist account of antirealist truth in some formal detail, and we assess its ability to deal with the problems that are standardly taken to beset antirealism.
  •  25
    Combining Probability and Logic
    with Fabio Cozman, Rolf Haenni, Federica Russo, Gregory Wheeler, and Jon Williamson
    Journal of Applied Logic 7 (2): 131-135. 2009.
  •  72
    Mechanistic curiosity will not kill the Bayesian cat
    with Denny Borsboom and Eric-Jan Wagenmakers
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 34 (4): 192-193. 2011.
    Jones & Love (J&L) suggest that Bayesian approaches to the explanation of human behavior should be constrained by mechanistic theories. We argue that their proposal misconstrues the relation between process models, such as the Bayesian model, and mechanisms. While mechanistic theories can answer specific issues that arise from the study of processes, one cannot expect them to provide constraints in general
  •  36
    Intervention and Identifiability in Latent Variable Modelling
    Minds and Machines 28 (2): 243-264. 2018.
    We consider the use of interventions for resolving a problem of unidentified statistical models. The leading examples are from latent variable modelling, an influential statistical tool in the social sciences. We first explain the problem of statistical identifiability and contrast it with the identifiability of causal models. We then draw a parallel between the latent variable models and Bayesian networks with hidden nodes. This allows us to clarify the use of interventions for dealing with uni…Read more
  •  19
    Good Listeners, Wise Crowds, and Parasitic Experts
    with Tom Sterkenburg and Peter Grünwal
    Analyse & Kritik 34 (2): 399-408. 2012.
    This article comments on the article of Thorn and Schurz in this volume and focuses on, what we call, the problem of parasitic experts. We discuss that both meta-induction and crowd wisdom can be understood as pertaining to absolute reliability rather than comparative optimality, and we suggest that the involvement of reliability will provide a handle on this problem
  •  185
    A paper on how to adapt your probabilisitc beliefs when learning a conditional
  •  136
    This note contains a corrective and a generalization of results by Borsboom et al. (2008), based on Heesen and Romeijn (2019). It highlights the relevance of insights from psychometrics beyond the context of psychological testing.
  •  58
    Theory Change and Bayesian Statistical Inference
    Philosophy of Science 72 (5): 1174-1186. 2005.
    This paper addresses the problem that Bayesian statistical inference cannot accommodate theory change, and proposes a framework for dealing with such changes. It first presents a scheme for generating predictions from observations by means of hypotheses. An example shows how the hypotheses represent the theoretical structure underlying the scheme. This is followed by an example of a change of hypotheses. The paper then presents a general framework for hypotheses change, and proposes the minimiza…Read more
  •  4
    Wetenschapsfilosofie als grensganger
    Algemeen Nederlands Tijdschrift voor Wijsbegeerte 108 (4): 509-513. 2016.
    Amsterdam University Press is a leading publisher of academic books, journals and textbooks in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Our aim is to make current research available to scholars, students, innovators, and the general public. AUP stands for scholarly excellence, global presence, and engagement with the international academic community.
  •  25
    This paper explores the fact that linear opinion pooling can be represented as a Bayesian update on the opinions of others. It uses this fact to propose a new interpretation of the pooling weights. Relative to certain modelling assumptions the weights can be equated with the so-called truth-conduciveness known from the context of Condorcet's jury theorem. This suggests a novel way to elicit the weights.
  •  40
    Changing The Definition of The Kilogram: Insights For Psychiatric Disease Classification
    with Hanna M. Van Loo and Kenneth S. Kendler
    Philosophy, Psychiatry, and Psychology 26 (4): 97-108. 2019.
    In psychiatry, many scientists desire to move from a classification system based on symptoms toward a system based on biological causes. The idea is that psychiatric diseases should be redefined such that each disease would be associated with specific biological causes. This desire is intelligible because causal disease models often facilitate understanding and identification of new ways to intervene in disease processes. In its attempt to move from syndromal to specific etiological definitions,…Read more
  •  263
    This paper offers a new angle on the common idea that the process of science does not support epistemic diversity. Under minimal assumptions on the nature of journal editing, we prove that editorial procedures, even when impartial in themselves, disadvantage less prominent research programs. This purely statistical bias in article selection further skews existing differences in the success rate and hence attractiveness of research programs, and exacerbates the reputation difference between the p…Read more
  •  26
    This edited collection showcases some of the best recent research in the philosophy of science. It comprises of thematically arranged papers presented at the 5th conference of the European Philosophy of Science Association, covering a broad variety of topics within general philosophy of science, and philosophical issues pertaining to specific sciences. The collection will appeal to researchers with an interest in the philosophical underpinnings of their own discipline, and to philosophers who wi…Read more
  •  28
    Inherent Complexity: A Problem for Statistical Model Evaluation
    Philosophy of Science 84 (5): 797-809. 2017.
    This article investigates a problem for statistical model evaluation, in particular for curve fitting: by employing a different family of curves we can fit any scatter plot almost perfectly at apparently minor cost in terms of model complexity. The problem is resolved by an appeal to prior probabilities. This leads to some general lessons about how to approach model evaluation.
  •  17
    Moving Beyond Traditional Null Hypothesis Testing: Evaluating Expectations Directly
    with Rens Van de Schoot and Herbert Hoijtink
    Frontiers in Psychology 2. 2011.
  • Inductive Logic and Statistics
    In Dov M. Gabbay, Stephan Hartmann & John Woods (eds.), Handbook of the History of Logic: Inductive Logic, Elsevier: Amsterdam. pp. 625--650. 2009.
  •  232
    This paper concerns exchangeable analogical predictions based on similarity relations between predicates, and deals with a restricted class of such relations. It describes a system of Carnapian λγ rules on underlying predicate families to model the analogical predictions for this restricted class. Instead of the usual axiomatic definition, the system is characterized with a Bayesian model that employs certain statistical hypotheses. Finally the paper argues that the Bayesian model can be general…Read more
  •  66
    This chapter1 concerns the relation between statistics and inductive logic. I start by describing induction in formal terms, and I introduce a general notion of probabilistic inductive inference. This provides a setting in which statistical procedures and inductive logics can be cap- tured. Speciacally, I discuss three statistical procedures (hypotheses testing, parameter estimation, and Bayesian statistics) and I show to what extend they can be captured by certain inductive logics. I end with s…Read more
  •  277
    Learning juror competence: a generalized Condorcet Jury Theorem
    with David Atkinson
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 10 (3): 237-262. 2011.
    This article presents a generalization of the Condorcet Jury Theorem. All results to date assume a fixed value for the competence of jurors, or alternatively, a fixed probability distribution over the possible competences of jurors. In this article, we develop the idea that we can learn the competence of the jurors by the jury vote. We assume a uniform prior probability assignment over the competence parameter, and we adapt this assignment in the light of the jury vote. We then compute the poste…Read more
  •  58
    Psychiatric comorbidity: fact or artifact?
    with Hanna M. van Loo
    Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics 36 (1): 41-60. 2015.
    The frequent occurrence of comorbidity has brought about an extensive theoretical debate in psychiatry. Why are the rates of psychiatric comorbidity so high and what are their implications for the ontological and epistemological status of comorbid psychiatric diseases? Current explanations focus either on classification choices or on causal ties between disorders. Based on empirical and philosophical arguments, we propose a conventionalist interpretation of psychiatric comorbidity instead. We ar…Read more
  •  55
    Hypotheses and inductive predictions
    Synthese 141 (3). 2004.
    This paper studies the use of hypotheses schemes in generatinginductive predictions. After discussing Carnap–Hintikka inductive logic,hypotheses schemes are defined and illustrated with two partitions. Onepartition results in the Carnapian continuum of inductive methods, the otherresults in predictions typical for hasty generalization. Following theseexamples I argue that choosing a partition comes down to making inductiveassumptions on patterns in the data, and that by choosing appropriately an…Read more