Abstract
We argue that philosophers ought to distinguish epistemic decision theory and epistemology, in just the way ordinary decision theory is distinguished from ethics. Once one does this, the internalist arguments that motivate much of epistemic decision theory make sense, given specific interpretations of the formalism (for example, that epistemic utility functions be at least as psychologically real as ordinary utility functions are for decision theory). Making this distinction also causes trouble for the principle called Propriety, which says, roughly, that the only acceptable epistemic utility functions make probabilistically coherent credence functions immodest (expect themselves to be least inaccurate). We cast doubt on this requirement, but then argue that epistemic decision theorists should never have wanted such a strong principle in any case.
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Notes
Throughout, we use ‘\(\varphi\)’ to denote both the action, \(\varphi\)-ing, and the proposition that S\(\varphi\)-s interchangeably.
For this distinction, see, among others, Railton (1984).
“Somewhat different” because Lewis is evaluating “inductive methods”, i.e., functions from evidence to credences, rather than credence functions in general. We believe that the intuition remains compelling when translated to the present case.
See also Gibbard (2007).
This might not be the right analysis of suspension of judgment. See Friedman (2013) for discussion. For this paper, we’re more interested in partial credence functions than suspension of judgment, at least if that analysis turns out to be incorrect; we use the phrase ‘suspension of judgment’ merely for convenience.
See, e.g., Wedgwood (2013).
Most of the authors in this tradition use a stronger notion, strict propriety, where ‘<’ replaces ‘\(\le\)’ in our definition. We think, with Mayo-Wilson and Wheeler (2016), that the Lewis–Gibbard argument clearly does not support strictness, whatever it else it may support, since the existence of other equally good credence functions from an individual’s point of view does not undermine the goodness of the individual’s own credences.
Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for pressing us to clarify the statement of the Joyce argument.
Propriety’s basic thought is that no probabilistically coherent function ought to be rationally disincentivized by one’s epistemic utility function. Our rejection of this argument, then, amounts to this: that case has not been made. There might be other ways to make it, but this very general way won’t work. In section 3 we will provide a general argument for thinking that anything like Joyce’s argument here will fail, but here, our only aim was to attack premise R3, and thereby Joyce’s argument. We thank an anonymous reviewer for helping us to clarify our response to Joyce’s argument.
For discussion of this sort of terminology, see Elga (2007).
Thanks to Sarah Moss and Cat Saint Croix here.
That doesn’t mean it’s rational to have such credences. See Horowitz (2014), Greco (2014), and Lasonen-Aarnio (2015) for some discussion. We note, though, that even for those those who think it is irrational, surely it is so only after some unspecified and unspecifiable period of time in which one can correct those beliefs.
Thanks to Sarah Moss for raising this worry.
Thanks to a reviewer for pressing us to be clearer on exactly what Practical Propriety comes to.
It’s important that we are criticizing Practical Propriety and not a practical analogue of Immodesty. The reason is that a practical analogue of Immodesty is just the normative requirement to maximize expected utility. We think that might be a correct normative principle. Our issue with Practical Propriety is that we don’t think it’s a functional constraint on admissible utility functions that they necessarily render every probabilistically coherent agent practically immodest. Thanks to a reviewer for pressing us here.
See, e.g., Feldman (2006).
For the thought that it is irrational, see Titelbaum (2015).
See, e.g., Boutilier (2003).
Thanks to a reviewer for getting us to clarify what we meant here.
More on this as it applies to our argument against thinking of epistemic decision theory as epistemology in a moment.
We are aware of some people who try to derive ethics from decision theory (or at least from game theory), like Gauthier (1986), but we are convinced that that cannot be done. If you do think it can, however, you’ll be far less interested in the distinction we make in this section, but we think sufficiently many people share our suspicion to motivate what we’ll say.
See Williams (1981).
A reviewer objects: this looks like a criticism of a practical analogue to Immodesty rather than of Practical Propriety, because it looks like our criticism is of agents’ actual choices rather than their utility functions. But this appearance is a little misleading. Our concern is that it be possible to criticize agents for failing to maximize expected utility, which is made impossible by requiring for the evaluation of agents’ intentions practically proper utility functions. So our criticism is, in the first instance, of a requirement on utility functions, though it is true that that criticism derives from our wish to criticize intentions or choices. Recall from footnote 14 that we think the practical analogue of Immodesty, conceived of as a rational or normative requirement on (now) credence-utility-intention triples, might very well be right. We thank the reviewer for this objection.
See, e.g., Feldman and Conee (1985).
See, e.g., Easwaran and Fitelson (2012).
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Acknowledgements
Thanks to Sara Aronowitz, Zoë Johnson King, Sarah Moss, Cat Saint Croix, Eric Swanson, an audience at Michigan, and especially Boris Babic, Jim Joyce, and an anonymous referee for this journal. Daniel Drucker also gratefully acknowledges the support of the Postdoctoral Fellow program at UNAM.
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Blackwell, K., Drucker, D. When propriety is improper. Philos Stud 176, 367–386 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-017-1020-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-017-1020-4