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325Hierarchical maximization of two kinds of expected utilityPhilosophy of Science 55 (4): 560-582. 1988.Causal decision theory produces decision instability in cases such as Death in Damascus where a decision itself provides evidence concerning the utility of options. Several authors have proposed ways of handling this instability. William Harper (1985 and 1986) advances one of the most elegant proposals. He recommends maximizing causal expected utility among the options that are causally ratifiable. Unfortunately, Harper's proposal imposes certain restrictions; for instance, the restriction that …Read more
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320Conditional 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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302Conditional utility and its place in decision theoryJournal of Philosophy 77 (11): 702-715. 1980.Causal decision theory attends to probabilities used to obtain an option's expected utility but for completeness should also attend to utilities of possible outcomes. A suitable formula for an option's expected utility uses a certain type of conditional utility.
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181Expected utility and riskBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 37 (4): 419-442. 1986.The rule to maximize expected utility is intended for decisions where options involve risk. In those decisions the decision maker's attitude toward risk is important, and the rule ought to take it into account. Allais's and Ellsberg's paradoxes, however, suggest that the rule ignores attitudes toward risk. This suggestion is supported by recent psychological studies of decisions. These studies present a great variety of cases where apparently rational people violate the rule because of aversion …Read more
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120Unsharp SharpnessTheoria 80 (1): 100-103. 2013.In a recent, thought-provoking paper Adam Elga argues against unsharp – e.g., indeterminate, fuzzy and unreliable – probabilities. Rationality demands sharpness, he contends, and this means that decision theories like Levi's, Gärdenfors and Sahlin's, and Kyburg's, though they employ different decision rules, face a common, and serious, problem. This article defends the rule to maximize minimum expected utility against Elga's objection
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118Mild Contraction: Evaluating Loss of Information Due to Loss of BeliefMind 114 (455): 753-757. 2005.This book review describes and evaluates Issac Levi's views about belief revision.
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117Belief and acceptanceIn Ilkka Niiniluoto, Matti Sintonen & Jan Wolenski (eds.), Handbook of Epistemology, 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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102Rousseau on proportional majority rulePhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 47 (1): 111-126. 1986.
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94Initiating 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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91The St. Petersburg gamble and riskTheory and Decision 17 (2): 193-202. 1984.One resolution of the St. Petersburg paradox recognizes that a gamble carries a risk sensitive to the gamble's stakes. If aversion to risk increases sufficiently fast as stakes go up, the St. Petersburg gamble has a finite utility.
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89Decision theory aims at a general account of rationality covering humans but to begin makes idealizations about decision problems and agents' resources and circumstances. It treats inerrant agents with unlimited cognitive power facing tractable decision problems. This book systematically rolls back idealizations and without loss of precision treats errant agents with limited cognitive abilities facing decision problems without a stable top option. It recommends choices that maximize utility usin…Read more
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84Decision 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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84Economic RationalityIn Alfred R. Mele & Piers Rawling (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Rationality, Oup Usa. 2004.Weirich examines three competing views entertained by economic theory about the instrumental rationality of decisions: the first says to maximize self-interest, the second to maximize utility, and the third to satisfice, that is, to adopt a satisfactory option. Critics argue that the first view is too narrow, that the second overlooks the benefits of teamwork and planning, and that the third, when carefully formulated, reduces to the second. Weirich defends a refined version of the principle to …Read more
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79Utility 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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79Interpersonal 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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78Collective actsSynthese 187 (1): 223-241. 2012.Groups of people perform acts. For example, a committee passes a resolution, a team wins a game, and an orchestra performs a symphony. These collective acts may be evaluated for rationality. Take a committee’s passing a resolution. This act may be evaluated not only for fairness but also for rationality. Did it take account of all available information? Is the resolution consistent with the committee’s past resolutions? Standards of collective rationality apply to collective acts, that is, acts …Read more
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77Thomas Mark on works of virtuosityJournal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 40 (3): 327-328. 1982.This paper proposes some amendments to Thomas Mark's account of virtuosity.
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73A computer simulation runs a model generating a phenomenon under investigation. For the simulation to be explanatory, the model has to be explanatory. The model must be isomorphic to the natural system that realizes the phenomenon. This paper elaborates the method of assessing a simulation's explanatory power. Then it illustrates the method by applying it to two simulations in game theory. The first is Brian Skyrms's (1990) simulation of interactive deliberations. It is intended to explain the e…Read more
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72Risk'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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71Utility Maximization GeneralizedJournal of Moral Philosophy 5 (2): 282-299. 2008.Theories of rationality advance principles that differ in topic, scope, and assumptions. A typical version of the principle of utility maximization formulates a standard rather than a procedure for decisions, evaluates decisions comprehensively, and relies on idealizations. I generalize the principle by removing some idealizations and making adjustments for their absence. The generalizations accommodate agents who have incomplete probability and utility assignments and are imperfectly rational. …Read more
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65Conventions and social institutionsSouthern Journal of Philosophy 27 (4): 599-618. 1989.This essay examines views of convention advanced by David Lewis and Margaret Gilbert.
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60CalibrationIn Henk W. de Regt (ed.), Epsa Philosophy of Science: Amsterdam 2009, Springer. pp. 415--425. 2009.Abner Shimony argues that degrees of belief satisfy the axioms of probability because their epistemic goal is to match estimates of objective probabilities. Because the estimates obey the axioms of probability, degrees of belief must also obey them to reach their epistemic goal. This calibration argument meets some objections, but with a few revisions it can surmount those objections. It offers a good alternative to the Dutch book argument for compliance with the probability axioms. The defense …Read more
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56Exclusion from the social contractPolitics, Philosophy and Economics 10 (2): 148-169. 2011.Does rational bargaining yield a social contract that is efficient and so inclusive? A core allocation, that is, an allocation that gives each coalition at least as much as it can get on its own, is efficient. However, some coalitional games lack a core allocation, so rationality does not require one in those games. Does rationality therefore permit exclusion from the social contract? I replace realization of a core allocation with another type of equilibrium achievable in every coalitional game…Read more
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52Labeling Genetically Modified Food: The Philosophical and Legal Debate (edited book)Oup Usa. 2007.Food products with genetically modified ingredients are common, yet many consumers are unaware of this. When polled, consumers say that they want to know whether their food contains GM ingredients, just as many want to know whether their food is natural or organic. Informing consumers is a major motivation for labeling. But labeling need not be mandatory. Consumers who want GM-free products will pay a premium to support voluntary labeling. Why do consumers want to know about GM ingredients? GM f…Read more
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49A decision maker's optionsPhilosophical Studies 44 (2). 1983.An agent's options in a decision problem are best understood as the decisions that the agent might make. Taking options this way eliminates the gap between an option's adoption and its execution.
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42Optimization 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
Areas of Specialization
Logic and Philosophy of Logic |
Philosophy of Probability |
Areas of Interest
Social and Political Philosophy |
General Philosophy of Science |