Switch to: References

Citations of:

No expectations

Mind 115 (459):695-702 (2006)

Add citations

You must login to add citations.
  1. Know Your Way Out of St. Petersburg: An Exploration of “Knowledge-First” Decision Theory.Frank Hong - 2024 - Erkenntnis 89 (6):2473-2492.
    This paper explores the consequences of applying two natural ideas from epistemology to decision theory: (1) that knowledge should guide our actions, and (2) that we know a lot of non-trivial things. In particular, we explore the consequences of these ideas as they are applied to standard decision theoretic puzzles such as the St. Petersburg Paradox. In doing so, we develop a “knowledge-first” decision theory and we will see how it can help us avoid fanaticism with regard to the St. (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Infinite Prospects.Jeffrey Sanford Russell & Yoaav Isaacs - 2021 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 103 (1):178-198.
    People with the kind of preferences that give rise to the St. Petersburg paradox are problematic---but not because there is anything wrong with infinite utilities. Rather, such people cannot assign the St. Petersburg gamble any value that any kind of outcome could possibly have. Their preferences also violate an infinitary generalization of Savage's Sure Thing Principle, which we call the *Countable Sure Thing Principle*, as well as an infinitary generalization of von Neumann and Morgenstern's Independence axiom, which we call *Countable (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   11 citations  
  • In Defence of No Best World.Daniel Rubio - 2020 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy (4):811-825.
    Recent work in the philosophy of religion has resurrected Leibniz’s idea that there is a best possible world, perhaps ours. In particular, Klaas Kraay’s [2010] construction of a theistic multiverse and Nevin Climenhaga’s [2018] argument from infinite value theory are novel defenses of a best possible world. I do not think that there is a best world, and show how both Kraay and Climenhaga may be resisted. First, I argue that Kraay’s construction of a theistic multiverse can be resisted from (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  • How to co-exist with nonexistent expectations.Randall G. McCutcheon - 2021 - Synthese 198 (3):2783-2799.
    Dozens of articles have addressed the challenge that gambles having undefined expectation pose for decision theory. This paper makes two contributions. The first is incremental: we evolve Colyvan's ``Relative Expected Utility Theory'' into a more viable ``conservative extension of expected utility theory" by formulating and defending emendations to a version of this theory proposed by Colyvan and H\'ajek. The second is comparatively more surprising. We show that, so long as one assigns positive probability to the theory that there is a (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Surreal Decisions.Eddy Keming Chen & Daniel Rubio - 2020 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 100 (1):54-74.
    Although expected utility theory has proven a fruitful and elegant theory in the finite realm, attempts to generalize it to infinite values have resulted in many paradoxes. In this paper, we argue that the use of John Conway's surreal numbers shall provide a firm mathematical foundation for transfinite decision theory. To that end, we prove a surreal representation theorem and show that our surreal decision theory respects dominance reasoning even in the case of infinite values. We then bring our theory (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   23 citations  
  • Infinite Ethics.Nick Bostrom - 2011 - Analysis and Metaphysics 10:9–59.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   62 citations  
  • The Bounded Strength of Weak Expectations.J. Sprenger & R. Heesen - 2011 - Mind 120 (479):819-832.
    The rational price of the Pasadena and Altadena games, introduced by Nover and Hájek (2004 ), has been the subject of considerable discussion. Easwaran (2008 ) has suggested that weak expectations — the value to which the average payoffs converge in probability — can give the rational price of such games. We argue against the normative force of weak expectations in the standard framework. Furthermore, we propose to replace this framework by a bounded utility perspective: this shift renders the problem (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   8 citations  
  • Strong and weak expectations.Kenny Easwaran - 2008 - Mind 117 (467):633-641.
    Fine has shown that assigning any value to the Pasadena game is consistent with a certain standard set of axioms for decision theory. However, I suggest that it might be reasonable to believe that the value of an individual game is constrained by the long-run payout of repeated plays of the game. Although there is no value that repeated plays of the Pasadena game converges to in the standard strong sense, I show that there is a weaker sort of convergence (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   24 citations  
  • Evaluating the pasadena, altadena, and st petersburg gambles.Terrence L. Fine - 2008 - Mind 117 (467):613-632.
    By recourse to the fundamentals of preference orderings and their numerical representations through linear utility, we address certain questions raised in Nover and Hájek 2004, Hájek and Nover 2006, and Colyvan 2006. In brief, the Pasadena and Altadena games are well-defined and can be assigned any finite utility values while remaining consistent with preferences between those games having well-defined finite expected value. This is also true for the St Petersburg game. Furthermore, the dominance claimed for the Altadena game over the (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   20 citations  
  • Complex Expectations.Alan Hájek & Harris Nover - 2008 - Mind 117 (467):643 - 664.
    In our 2004, we introduced two games in the spirit of the St Petersburg game, the Pasadena and Altadena games. As these latter games lack an expectation, we argued that they pose a paradox for decision theory. Terrence Fine has shown that any finite valuations for the Pasadena, Altadena, and St Petersburg games are consistent with the standard decision-theoretic axioms. In particular, one can value the Pasadena game above the other two, a result that conflicts with both our intuitions and (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   14 citations  
  • Relative Expectation Theory.Mark Colyvan - 2008 - Journal of Philosophy 105 (1):37-44.
    Games such as the St. Petersburg game present serious problems for decision theory.1 The St. Petersburg game invokes an unbounded utility function to produce an infinite expectation for playing the game. The problem is usually presented as a clash between decision theory and intuition: most people are not prepared to pay a large finite sum to buy into this game, yet this is precisely what decision theory suggests we ought to do. But there is another problem associated with the St. (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   32 citations  
  • Is Evaluative Compositionality a Requirement of Rationality?Nicholas J. J. Smith - 2014 - Mind 123 (490):457-502.
    This paper presents a new solution to the problems for orthodox decision theory posed by the Pasadena game and its relatives. I argue that a key question raised by consideration of these gambles is whether evaluative compositionality (as I term it) is a requirement of rationality: is the value that an ideally rational agent places on a gamble determined by the values that she places on its possible outcomes, together with their mode of composition into the gamble (i.e. the probabilities (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   45 citations  
  • Perplexing expectations.Alan Hájek & Harris Nover - 2006 - Mind 115 (459):703 - 720.
    This paper revisits the Pasadena game (Nover and Háyek 2004), a St Petersburg-like game whose expectation is undefined. We discuss serveral respects in which the Pasadena game is even more troublesome for decision theory than the St Petersburg game. Colyvan (2006) argues that the decision problem of whether or not to play the Pasadena game is ‘ill-posed’. He goes on to advocate a ‘pluralism’ regarding decision rules, which embraces dominance reasoning as well as maximizing expected utility. We rebut Colyvan’s argument, (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   17 citations  
  • Why Decision Theory Remains Constructively Incomplete.Luc Lauwers - 2016 - Mind 125 (500):1033-1043.
    The existence of a transitive, complete, and weakly independent relation on the full set of gambles implies the existence of a non-Ramsey set. Therefore, each transitive and weakly independent relation on the set of gambles either is incomplete or does not have an explicit description. Whatever tools decision theory makes available, there will always be decision problems where these tools fail us. In this sense, decision theory remains incomplete.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  • Making Ado Without Expectations.Mark Colyvan & Alan Hájek - 2016 - Mind 125 (499):829-857.
    This paper is a response to Paul Bartha’s ‘Making Do Without Expectations’. We provide an assessment of the strengths and limitations of two notable extensions of standard decision theory: relative expectation theory and Paul Bartha’s relative utility theory. These extensions are designed to provide intuitive answers to some well-known problems in decision theory involving gaps in expectations. We argue that both RET and RUT go some way towards providing solutions to the problems in question but neither extension solves all the (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   19 citations  
  • Null probability, dominance and rotation.A. R. Pruss - 2013 - Analysis 73 (4):682-685.
    New arguments against Bayesian regularity and an otherwise plausible domination principle are offered on the basis of rotational symmetry. The arguments against Bayesian regularity work in very general settings.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   12 citations  
  • A Generalization of the Pasadena Puzzle.Martin Peterson - 2013 - Dialectica 67 (4):597-603.
    By generalizing the Pasadena puzzle introduced by Nover and Hájek (2004) we show that the sum total of value produced by an act can be made to converge to any real number by applying the Riemann rearrangement theorem, even if the scenario faced by the decision maker is non-probabilistic and fully predictable. A wide range of solutions put forward in the literature for solving the original puzzle cannot solve this generalized version of the Pasadena puzzle.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • An offer you can't refuse: systematically exploiting utility-maximisers with malicious gambles.Chalmers Adam - unknown
    Decision theory aims to provide mathematical analysis of which choice one should rationally make in a given situation. Our current decision theory norms have been very successful, however, several problems have proven vexing for standard decision theory. In this paper, I show that these problems all share a similar structure and identify a class of problems which decision theory overvalues. I demonstrate that agents who follow current standard decision theory can be exploited and have their preferences reordered if offered decision (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations