Dutch Book Arguments (Elements in Decision Theory and Philosophy)

by Richard Pettigrew

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Our beliefs come in degrees. I'm 70% confident it will rain tomorrow, and 0.001% sure my lottery ticket will win. What's more, we think these degrees of belief should abide by certain principles if they are to be rational. For instance, you shouldn't believe that a person's taller than 6ft more strongly than you believe that they're taller than 5ft, since the former entails the latter. In Dutch Book arguments, we try to establish the principles of rationality for degrees of belief by appealing to their role in guiding decisions. In particular, we show that degrees of belief that don't satisfy the principles will always guide action in some way that is bad or undesirable. In this Element, we present Dutch Book arguments for the principles of Probabilism, Conditionalization, and the Reflection Principle, among others, and we formulate and consider the most serious objections to them.
  • ISBN13 9781108713443
  • Publish Date 17 September 2020 (first published 31 July 2020)
  • Publish Status Active
  • Publish Country GB
  • Imprint Cambridge University Press
  • Format Paperback (US Trade)
  • Pages 75
  • Language English