Instrumental Virtues

2020 ◽  
pp. 168-186
Author(s):  
Sergio Tenenbaum
Keyword(s):  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
Rational Agent

Chapter 7 argues that (non-trivial) principles of rationality cannot fully capture the nature of our instrumentally rational powers. A fully rational agent not only complies with the principle of instrumental rationality but also exhibits a number of instrumental virtues of character. An agent suffers a defect of rationality insofar as she fails to have one of these virtues, or insofar as she manifests one of its corresponding vices. However, an agent can manifest instrumental vices without violating any principle of rationality. This chapter proposes that courage is one of the instrumental virtues, and shows how one of its corresponding vices, cowardice, must be understood as a defect of our rational powers.

Pursuing Ends as the Fundamental Given Attitude

2020 ◽  
pp. 49-82
Author(s):  
Sergio Tenenbaum
Keyword(s):  
Decision Theory ◽  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
Rational Agent ◽  
Extended Theory ◽  
Instrumental Reasoning

The extended theory of instrumental rationality (ETR) takes the intentional pursuit of ends to be the only relevant attitude for the theory of instrumental rationality, and takes the principle of instrumental reasoning, a non-comparative principle, to be the only principle of derivation. However, it seems that if the agent has more than one end, we’ll need to introduce comparative or graded attitudes, such as the preference orderings in orthodox decision theory, in order to explain the rationality of choices among competing ends. In fact, ETR can provide a significantly better account of how a rational agent pursues multiple indeterminate ends through time than theories that make use of comparative and graded attitudes. ETR proposes that in the pursuit of such ends a rational agent must inevitably “satisfice” rather than maximize. At the same time, the chapter explains how some comparative attitudes, such as preferences, can be incorporated into ETR.

Rationalization and self-sabotage

2020 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason D'Cruz
Keyword(s):  
Instrumental Rationality

Abstract In making the case that “rationalization is rational,” Cushman downplays its signature liability: Rationalization exposes a person to the hazard of delusion and self-sabotage. In paradigm cases, rationalization undermines instrumental rationality by introducing inaccuracies into the representational map required for planning and effective agency.

The Inner Rational Agent

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Sugden
Keyword(s):  
Human Agency ◽  
Welfare Economics ◽  
Rational Agent ◽  
Empirical Content ◽  
Normative Economics ◽  
Normative Analysis ◽  
True Preference ◽  
Implicit Model ◽  
The World ◽  
Psychological Foundation

Chapter 4 reviews ‘behavioural welfare economics’—the approach to normative analysis that is favoured by most behavioural economists. This approach assumes that people have context-independent ‘true’ or ‘latent’ preferences which, because of psychologically-induced errors, are not always revealed in actual choices. Behavioural welfare economics aims to reconstruct latent preferences by identifying and removing the effects of error on decisions, and to design policies to satisfy those preferences. Its implicit model of human agency is of an ‘inner rational agent’ that interacts with the world through an imperfect psychological ‘shell’. I argue that there is no satisfactory evidence to support this model, and no credible psychological foundation for it. Since the concept of true preference has no empirical content, the idea that such preferences can be reconstructed is a mirage. Normative economics needs to be more radical in giving up rationality assumptions.

Truth and Consequences: When Is It Rational to Accept Falsehoods?

2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 147-169
Author(s):  
Taner Edis ◽  
Maarten Boudry
Keyword(s):  
Rational Agent ◽  
False Beliefs ◽  
Reflective Awareness ◽  
Collective Beliefs

AbstractJudgments of the rationality of beliefs must take the costs of acquiring and possessing beliefs into consideration. In that case, certain false beliefs, especially those that are associated with the benefits of a cohesive community, can be seen to be useful for an agent and perhaps instrumentally rational to hold. A distinction should be made between excusable misbeliefs, which a rational agent should tolerate, and misbeliefs that are defensible in their own right because they confer benefits on the agent. Likely candidates for such misbeliefs are to be found in the realm of nationalism and religion, where the possession costs of true beliefs are high, and where collective beliefs in falsehoods may allow for a cohesive community. We discuss the paradoxes of reflective awareness involved in the idea of deliberately embracing falsehoods. More rigorous, fully reflective concepts of rationality would still disallow false beliefs, but such demanding versions of rationality would commit agents to pay large costs, thereby weakening the motivation for acquiring true beliefs.

The Instrumental Rationality of Extermination

Peace Review ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-218
Author(s):  
Frances B. McCrea ◽  
Gerald E. Markle
Keyword(s):  
Instrumental Rationality

On the Conversation Between Theologians and Economists: A Contribution to Public Theology

2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 127-142
Author(s):  
Jan Peil ◽  
Aloys Wijngaards ◽  
Toine van den Hoogen
Keyword(s):  
Social Reality ◽  
Instrumental Rationality ◽  
Alternative Conception ◽  
Public Theology ◽  
Value Rationality

AbstractThis article seeks to contribute to the development of a conversation between public theology and economics. A major problem for this conversation is the dichotomy between normative and positive judgements about our social reality. This translates into the use of distinctive concepts of value rationality and instrumental rationality. This article proposes an alternative conception of rationality that offers a way out of the positive‐normative dichotomy and embeds our approach in the framework of public theology.

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