Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Dutch books and agent rationality

  • Published:
Theory and Decision Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

According to the Dutch Book Argument (DBA), if an agent's subjective probabilities fail to satisfy the axioms of the probability calculus and so make the agent vulnerable to a Dutch Book, the agent's subjective probabilities are incoherent and the agent is therefore irrational. Critics of DBA have argued, however, that probabilistic incoherence is compatible with various kinds of rationality – logico-semantic, epistemic, instrumental and prudential. In this paper, I provide an interpretation of DBA on which it is true that probabilistic incoherence entails agent irrationality. Articulating this interpretation requires the specification of some of the connections among the varieties of rationality. Once this is done, it becomes possible to vindicate a modest version of DBA.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

REFERENCES

  • Carnap, R. (1962), Logical Foundations of Probability, 2nd edn. Chicago: University of Chicago.

    Google Scholar 

  • DeFinetti, B. (1937), La prevision: ses lois logiques, ses sources subjectives, Annales de l'Institut Henri Poincare 7: 1–68. English translation: Foresight: its logical laws, its subjective sources, in H.E. Kyburg and H.E. Smokler, eds (1980), Studies in Subjective Probability, 2nd edn. Huntingdon, NY: Krieger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kaplan, M. (1996), Decision Theory as Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Keynes, J.M. (1921), A Treatise on Probability. London: Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kyburg, H.E. and Smokler, H.E., eds. (1980), Studies in Subjective Probability, 2nd edn. Huntingdon, NY: Robert E. Krieger.

    Google Scholar 

  • Plantinga, A. (1993),Warrant: The Current Debate. New York: OxfordUniversity Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pollock, J.L. (1986), Contemporary Theories of Knowledge. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Resnik, M.D. (1987), Choices: An Introduction to Decision Theory.Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Savage, L.J. (1972), The Foundations of Statistics, 2nd edn. New York: Dover.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sobel, J.H. (1987), Self-doubts and Dutch strategies, Australasian Journal of Phiolsophy 65: 56–81.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Religion and Philosophy, Florida Southern College, 111 Lake Hollingsworth Drive, Lakeland, FL, 33801-5698, U.S.A. Phone

    Daniel Silber

Authors
  1. Daniel Silber
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Silber, D. Dutch books and agent rationality. Theory and Decision 47, 247–266 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005154608426

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005154608426

Search

Navigation