Several axiom systems for preference among acts lead to a unique probability and a state-independent utility such that acts are ranked according to their expected utilities. These axioms have been used as a foundation for Bayesian decision theory and subjective probability calculus. In this article we note that the uniqueness of the probability is relative to the choice of whatcounts as a constant outcome. Although it is sometimes clear what should be considered constant, in many cases there are several (...) possible choices. Each choice can lead to a different "unique" probability and utility. By focusing attention on statedependent utilities, we determine conditions under which a truly unique probability and utility can be determined from an agent's expressed preferences among acts. Suppose that an agent's preference can be represented in terms of a probability P and a utility U.That is, the agent prefers one act to another iff the expected utility of that act is higher than that of the other. There are many other equivalent representations in terms of probabilities Q, which are mutually absolutely continuous with P, and state-dependent utilities V, which differ from U by possibly different positive affine transformations in each state of nature. We describe an example in which there are two different but equivalent state-independent utility representations for the same preference structure. They differ in which acts count as constants. The acts involve receiving different amounts of one or the other of two currencies, and the states are different exchange rates between the currencies. It is easy to see how it would not be possible for constant amounts of both currencies to have simultaneously constant values across the differentstates. Savage (1954, sec. 5.5) discovered a situation in which two seemingly equivalent preference structures are represented by different pairs of probability and utility. He attributed the phenomenon to the construction of a "small world." We show that the small world problem is just another example of two different, but equivalent, representations treating different actsas constants. Finally, we prove a theorem (similar to one of Karni 1985) that shows how to elicit a unique state-dependent utility and does not assume that there are prizes with constant value. To do this, we define a new hypothetical kind of act in which both the prize to be awarded and the state of nature are determined by an auxiliary experiment. (shrink)

Arguments for value incommensurability ultimately depend on a certain diagnosis of human motivation. Incommensurablists hold that each person's basic ends are not only irreducible but also incompatible with one another. It isn't merely that some goals can't, in fact, be jointly realized; values actually compete for influence. This account makes a mistake about the nature of human motivation. Each value underwrites a ceteris paribus evaluation. Such assessments are mutually compatible because the observation that there is something to be said (...) for an outcome from a particular perspective allows for any ultimate evaluation of that outcome; Values can be irreducible without thereby being incommensurable. (shrink)

Sequences of numbers representing prior resource size were presented to participants in a common-pool resource dilemma. The numbers were sampled from uniform probability distributions with either a low variance (low resource uncertainty) or a high variance (high resource uncertainty). Presentations were both sequential and simultaneous. Three groups of 16 undergraduates either estimated the size of the resource when it did not represent value to them; requested an amount from the resource, identified with a sum of money, when the outcome (...) of the requests only depended on resource size; or requested from the resource (sum of money) when the outcome of the requests depended on both resource size and how much others in a group requested. In support of an individual outcome-desirability bias due to selective recall of the number sequences, after sequential presentation larger requests were observed when resource uncertainty was high than when it was low. No effects of resource uncertainty or presentation were found on the estimates of resource size. Whether or not the outcome of the requests depended on others' requests made little difference. (shrink)

Conventional economic theory assumes that people care only about ultimate outcomes and are indifferent to the decision and allocation processes by which outcomes are brought about. Building on Sen (1997), I relax this assumption, and investigate the formal and philosophical issues that arise. I extend the formal apparatus of preference theory to analyse how processes may enter preferences, and investigate whether traditional invariance requirements like the Weak Axiom of Revealed Preference are still satisfied in this new setting. I show that (...) it is, provided certain conditions of separability hold, and I discuss the plausibility of these conditions. Further, I argue that processes are often valued in a mode that diverges from the conventional modes of instrumental and intrinsic/independent valuation. I introduce the notion of dependent non-instrumental valuation, and show how processes could depend on their instrumental function for their value – making their value dependent – and yet derive their value from something else – making it non-instrumental. Dependent non-instrumental value, I argue, can be explained by symbolic and evidential relations between processes and outcomes. (Published Online July 31 2007) Footnotes1 This article is based on the third chapter of my Ph.D. dissertation (Sandbu 2003). I would like to thank Richard Tuck for many discussions over several years, which helped me develop and elaborate the ideas presented here. I am also very grateful to Amartya Sen, Nien-hê Hsieh, Luc Bovens, and Xaq Pitkow for their close readings of various versions of the paper and their incisive comments, questions, and suggestions. Further thanks go to Christopher Avery, Matthias Benz, Jerry Green, Waheed Hussain, David Laibson, Robert Sugden, Alan Strudler, Justin Wolfers, and seminar participants at Harvard University and the Wharton School of Business. Akshay Jashnani provided helpful research assistance. Most of the ideas in the present article were developed while I was the recipient of a doctoral grant from the Research Council of Norway, which I gratefully acknowledge. (shrink)

Can it be better or worse for a person to exist than not to exist at all? This old and challenging existential question has been raised anew in contemporary moral philosophy, mainly for two reasons. First, traditional “impersonal” ethical theories, such as utilitarianism, have counterintuitive implications in population ethics, for example, the repugnant conclusion. Second, it has seemed evident to many that an outcome can be better than another only if it is better for someone, and that only moral (...) theories that are in this sense “person affecting” can be correct. The implications of this Person-Affecting Restriction will differ radically, however, depending on which answer one gives to the existential question. The negative answer, which we argue against, would make the restriction quite untenable. Hence, many of the problems regarding our moral duties to future generations turn around the issue at hand. (shrink)

In order to guide the decisions of real people who want to bring about good epistemic outcomes for themselves and others, we need to understand our epistemic values. In Knowledge in a Social World, Alvin Goldman has proposed an epistemic value theory that allows us to say whether one outcome is epistemically better than another. However, it has been suggested that Goldman's theory is not really an epistemic value theory at all because whether one outcome is epistemically (...) better than another partly depends on our non-epistemic interests. In this paper, I argue that an epistemic value theory that serves the purposes of social epistemology must incorporate non- epistemic interests in much the way that Goldman's theory does. In fact, I argue that Goldman's theory does not go far enough in this direction. In particular, the epistemic value of having a particular true belief should actually be weighted by how interested we are in the topic. (shrink)

BackgroundDouble-blind peer review has been proposed as a possible solution to avoid implicit referee bias in academic publishing. The aims of this study are to analyse the demographics of corresponding authors choosing double-blind peer review and to identify differences in the editorial outcome of manuscripts depending on their review model.MethodsData includes 128,454 manuscripts received between March 2015 and February 2017 by 25 Nature-branded journals. We investigated the uptake of double-blind review in relation to journal tier, as well as gender, (...) country, and institutional prestige of the corresponding author. We then studied the manuscripts’ editorial outcome in relation to review model and author’s characteristics. The gender (male, female, or NA) of the corresponding authors was determined from their first name using a third-party service (Gender API). The prestige of the corresponding author’s institutions was measured from the data of the Global Research Identifier Database (GRID) by dividing institutions in three prestige groups with reference to the 2016 Times Higher Education (THE) ranking. We employed descriptive statistics for data exploration, and we tested our hypotheses using Pearson’s chi-square and binomial tests. We also performed logistic regression modelling with author update, out-to-review, and acceptance as response, and journal tier, author gender, author country, and institution as predictors.ResultsAuthor uptake for double-blind submissions was 12% (12,631 out of 106,373). We found a small but significant association between journal tier and review type (p value < 0.001, Cramer’s V = 0.054, df = 2). We had gender information for 50,533 corresponding authors and found no statistically significant difference in the distribution of peer review model between males and females (p value = 0.6179). We had 58,920 records with normalised institutions and a THE rank, and we found that corresponding authors from the less prestigious institutions are more likely to choose double-blind review (p value < 0.001, df = 2, Cramer’s V = 0.106). In the ten countries with the highest number of submissions, we found a large significant association between country and review type (p value < 0.001, df = 10, Cramer’s V = 0.189). The outcome both at first decision and post review is significantly more negative (i.e. a higher likelihood for rejection) for double-blind than single-blind papers (p value < 0.001, df = 1, Cramer’s V = 0.112 for first decision; p value < 0.001; df = 1, Cramer’s V = 0.082 for post-review decision).ConclusionsThe proportion of authors that choose double-blind review is higher when they submit to more prestigious journals, they are affiliated with less prestigious institutions, or they are from specific countries; the double-blind option is also linked to less successful editorial outcomes. (shrink)

Using diversity climate theory and research, this paper examines the relationships among an organization’s actions which indicate a value for age diversity and potential applicants’ reactions toward that organization. Specifically, we investigate the interactive effects of an organization’s age diversity, an organization’s age diversity management practices, and potential applicants’ individual attitudes toward age diversity on two outcome variables, organizational attractiveness and expected age discrimination. We conducted an experimental survey study with a sample of 244 German employees likely to be (...) in the job market again in their careers. Organizational age diversity and age diversity management practices were positively related to organizational attractiveness and negatively related to expected age discrimination. Results also support a three-way interaction of an organization’s age diversity, an organization’s age diversity management practices, and potential applicants’ attitudes toward age diversity on both dependent variables. The findings demonstrate the importance of considering individual attitudes toward age diversity in assessing the effectiveness of an organization’s age diversity and age diversity management practices. (shrink)

Temporal discounting is the tendency to devalue temporally distant rewards. Past studies have examined the k-value, the indifference point, and the area under the curve as dependent measures on this task. The current study included these three measures and a fourth measure, called the interest rate total score. The interest rate total score was based on scoring only those items in which the delayed choice should be preferred given the expected return based on simple interest rates. In addition, associations (...) with several individual difference measures were examined including intelligence, executive functions (inhibition, working memory, and set-shifting), thinking dispositions (Need for Cognition and Consideration of Future Consequences) and engagement in substance use and gambling behavior. A staircase temporal discounting task was examined in a sample of 99 university students. Replicating previous studies, temporal discounting increased with longer delays to reward and decreased with higher reward magnitudes. A hyperbolic function accounted for variance in temporal discounting better than an exponential function. Reaction time at the indifference point was significantly longer than at the other choice points. The four dependent measures of temporal discounting were all significantly correlated and were also significantly associated with our individual difference measures. That is, the tendency to wait for a larger delayed reward on all of the temporal discounting measures was associated with higher intelligence, higher executive functions and more consideration of future consequences. Associations between our measures of temporal discounting and outcomes related to substance use and gambling behavior were modest in our university sample. (shrink)

We develop a model of Disappointment in which disappointment and elation arise from comparing the outcome received, not with an expected value as in previous models, but rather with the other individual outcomes of the lottery. This approach may better reflect the way individuals are liable to experience disappointment. The model obtained accounts for classic behavioral deviations from the normative theory, offers a richer structure than previous disappointment models, and leads to a Rank-Dependent Utility formulation in a transparent (...) way. Thus, our disappointment model may provide a clear psychological rationale for the subjective transformation of probabilities. (shrink)

Social egalitarianism holds that individuals ought to have equal power over outcomes within relationships. Egalitarian philosophers have argued for this ideal by appealing to features of political society. This way of grounding the social egalitarian principle renders it dependent on empirical facts about political culture. In particular, egalitarians have argued that social equality matters to citizens in political relationships in a way analogous to the value of equality in a marriage. In this paper, we show how egalitarian philosophers are (...) committed to psychological premises, and then illustrate how to test the social egalitarian’s empirical claims. Using a nationally representative survey experiment, we find that citizens will sometimes prioritize equality over competing values, but that the weight of social equality diminishes when moving from personal to political cases. These findings raise questions for thinking about how to explain the normative significance of social equality. (shrink)

Reports of quantitative experimental results often distinguish between the statistical uncertainty and the systematic uncertainty that characterize measurement outcomes. This article discusses the practice of estimating systematic uncertainty in high-energy physics. The estimation of systematic uncertainty in HEP should be understood as a minimal form of quantitative robustness analysis. The secure evidence framework is used to explain the epistemic significance of robustness analysis. However, the empirical value of a measurement result depends crucially not only on the resulting systematic uncertainty estimate, (...) but on the learning aims for which that result will be used. Important conceptual and practical questions regarding systematic uncertainty assessment call for further investigation. _1_ Introduction _2_ Systematic Uncertainty: The Very Idea _3_ Systematic Uncertainty in High-Energy Physics _4_ Methodological Debates in High-Energy Physics _5_ The Secure Evidence Framework _6_ Systematic Uncertainty Assessment as Robustness Analysis _7_ Security and Sensitivity _8_ Conclusion Appendix. (shrink)

The identification of regularities in time-dependent functional structures leads to turn patterns, observed according to a given time resolution, into functional attractors on which it is first possible to found any complex system. Rationality is introduced under the form of probabilities for functions to make up a given attractor beyond the first rough descriptive pattern. These physically characterized attractors are the medium enabling the definition of value as an extension of the Prospect Theory overall utility, considering that the actions (...) produced by their functions are outcomes which are modulated by PT psychological value functions and an operational value appears naturally as an optimization taking account of diminishing sensitivity to action efficiency. Nevertheless, this diminishing sensitivity, when applied to negative actions, introduces also a bias of negative externalities underestimation. An attractor-based complex system evolution in an industrial context is described according to Manufacturing Readiness Level and to the main milestones of an industrial project, corresponding to singular points of maturity expressed in terms of probability—or decision—weighting, up to the system release to the market. So, a maturity assessment heuristics is proposed both for the system development and for its marketing. The supply and demand law is established, highlighting that the ideal case of a purely mature economy can be a good approximation reducing the complexity of the exchanges analysis. Equilibria are discussed as depending on an initial point from which the usual Gaussian probability distribution and a speculative weight qualify equilibrium. (shrink)

This article investigates the ability of mental incapacity tests to account for problems of control, through a study of the approach to alcohol dependence and a comparison with the approach to anorexia nervosa, in England and Wales. The focus is on two areas of law where questions of legal and mental capacity arise for people who are alcohol dependent: decisions about treatment for alcohol dependence and diminished responsibility for a killing. The mental incapacity tests used in these legal contexts (...) are importantly different—one involves a ‘cognitive’ test, while the other includes an explicit impaired-control limb—and the comparison provides insight into a longstanding debate about the virtues of one type of test over the other. It is shown that both kinds of test can take control problems into account, but also that both can be interpreted in narrow and wide ways that significantly influence the outcome of the assessment. It is therefore argued that to a large extent, it is not the kind of mental incapacity test that matters, but how the test is interpreted. It is further proposed that value judgements are playing an unrecognised and inappropriate role in shaping this interpretation. This raises concerns about the current approach to assessing the impact of alcohol dependency on the capacity to make decisions about alcohol use or treatment, as well as broader concerns about flexibility within incapacity tests. (shrink)

Processing the motivational relevance of a visual scene and reacting accordingly is crucial for survival. Previous work suggests the emotional content of naturalistic scenes affects response speed, such that unpleasant content slows responses whereas pleasant content accelerates responses. It is unclear whether these effects reflect motor-cognitive processes, such as attentional orienting, or vary with the function/outcome of the motor response itself. Four experiments manipulated participants’ ability to terminate the picture and, thereby, the response’s function and motivational value. Attentive orienting (...) was manipulated via picture repetition, which diminishes orienting. A total of N = 81 participants completed versions of a go/no-go task, discriminating between distorted versus intact pictures drawn from six content categories varying in positive, negative, or neutral valence. While all participants responded faster with repetition, only participants without offset control exhibited slower responses to unpleasant and accelerated responses to pleasant content. Emotional engagement, measured by the late positive potential, was not modulated by attentional orienting, suggesting that the interaction between repetition and offset control is not due to altered emotional engagement. Together, results suggest that response time changes as a function of emotional content and sensitivity to attention orienting depends on the motivational function of the motor response. (shrink)

A theoretical framework for the reinforcement learning of aesthetic biases was recently proposed based on brain circuitries revealed by neuroimaging. A model grounded on that framework accounted for interesting features of human aesthetic biases. These features included individuality, cultural predispositions, stochastic dynamics of learning and aesthetic biases, and the peak-shift effect. However, despite the success in explaining these features, a potential weakness was the linearity of the value function used to predict reward. This linearity meant that the learning process employed (...) a value function that assumed a linear relationship between reward and sensory stimuli. Linearity is common in reinforcement learning in neuroscience. However, linearity can be problematic because neural mechanisms and the dependence of reward on sensory stimuli were typically nonlinear. Here, we analyze the learning performance with models including optimal nonlinear value functions. We also compare updating the free parameters of the value functions with the delta rule, which neuroscience models use frequently, vs. updating with a new Phi rule that considers the structure of the nonlinearities. Our computer simulations showed that optimal nonlinear value functions resulted in improvements of learning errors when the reward models were nonlinear. Similarly, the new Phi rule led to improvements in these errors. These improvements were accompanied by the straightening of the trajectories of the vector of free parameters in its phase space. This straightening meant that the process became more efficient in learning the prediction of reward. Surprisingly, however, this improved efficiency had a complex relationship with the rate of learning. Finally, the stochasticity arising from the probabilistic sampling of sensory stimuli, rewards, and motivations helped the learning process narrow the range of free parameters to nearly optimal outcomes. Therefore, we suggest that value functions and update rules optimized for social and ecological constraints are ideal for learning aesthetic biases. (shrink)

In this paper, we demonstrate (1) how harnessing stochasticity can be the basis of creative agency; (2) that such harnessing can resolve the apparent conflict between reductionist (micro-level) accounts of behaviour and behaviour as the outcome of rational and value-driven (macro-level) decisions; (3) how neurophysiological processes can instantiate such behaviour; (4) The processes involved depend on three features of living organisms: (a) they are necessarily open systems; (b) micro-level systems therefore nest within higher-level systems; (c) causal interactions must occur (...) across all the boundaries between the levels of organization. The higher levels constrain the dynamics of lower levels. The experimental evidence and theoretical arguments are shown to be consistent with previous research on the neuronal mechanisms of conscious choice, and with the interconnected multi-level processes by which organisms harness stochasticity, whether conscious or unconscious. (shrink)

The relationship between willingness to pay to reduce the probability of an adverse event and the degree of risk aversion is ambiguous. The ambiguity arises because paying for protection worsens the outcome in the event the adverse event occurs, which influences the expected marginal utility of wealth. Using the concept of downside risk aversion or prudence, we characterize the marginal WTP to reduce the probability of the adverse event as the product of WTP in the case of risk neutrality (...) and an adjustment factor. For the univariate case, the adjustment factor depends on risk aversion and prudence with respect to wealth. For the bivariate case, the adjustment factor depends on risk aversion and cross-prudence in wealth. (shrink)

With agriculture the primary driver of biodiversity loss, farmers are increasingly expected to produce environmental outcomes and protect biodiversity. However, lack of attention to the way farmers perceive native vegetation has resulted in conservation targets not being met. The Yorke Peninsula (YP), South Australia, is an agricultural landscape where 50% farmers perceived that long-term planning was for ≤ 30 years, not enough time to promote ecosystem conservation; (5) a lack of natural resource management information for farmers—as a result, farmers relied (...) on their own experience to manage vegetation. Furthermore, most farmers depended on agronomists, who generally had no stake in biodiversity conservation. We recommend that (1) the Local Council restore social capital by liaising with farmers to promote roadside vegetation (2) long-term farmer-led conservation action be established and supported by Government and industry acting as facilitators rather than project managers; (3) a change in policy and training promote the involvement of agronomists in conservation and its management on private properties; (4) all levels of Government develop schemes to demonstrate the tangible benefits of native vegetation as habitat for wildlife; (5) on-farm conservation be celebrated as successful farming. (shrink)

I agree with the commentators that study of physical disease risk conferred by affective dispositions such as anger/hostility, anxiety, and sadness, should be more cognizant of developments in emotion theory. Emotions differ in their functional value depending on the person’s lifespan trajectory. Discrete emotions have different psychophysiological signatures; and emotional competence, including production, regulation, and knowledge, may be critical in determining whether specific negative affects, or general negative affectivity, are toxic for physical health. Emotion researchers, however, have mainly focused on (...) acute affective experiences and ignored the general effects of negative affectivity, which subsumes the discrete negative affects. Most diseases develop over years so more needs to be known about the biological signatures of chronic specific affects and negative affectivity. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn Democratic Reason, Hélène Landemore makes an epistemic argument for democracy. She contends that, due to their greater cognitive diversity, democratic groups will engage in superior deliberation and information aggregation than will groups of experts; consequently, the quality of their policies will be better. But the introduction of value diversity into Landemore's model—which is necessary if the argument is to apply to the real world—undermines her argument for the epistemic superiority of democratic deliberation. First, the existence of value diversity threatens (...) to stop deliberation prematurely. This has the effect of making the outcome of group deliberation more dependent on individual ability, which gives groups of experts a distinct advantage. Second, the introduction of value diversity raises the question of how to understand the standard of correctness of an epistemic argument, which Landemore does not adequately answer. (shrink)

Despite the general expectation that ethical leadership fosters employees’ ethical behaviors, surprisingly little empirical effort has been made to verify this expected effect of ethical leadership. To address this research gap, we examine the role of ethical leadership in relation to a direct ethical outcome of employees: moral voice. Focusing on how and when ethical leadership motivates employees to speak up about ethical issues, we propose that moral efficacy serves as a psychological mechanism underlying the relationship, and that leader–follower (...) value congruence serves as a boundary condition for the effect of ethical leadership on moral efficacy. We tested the proposed relationships with matched reports from 154 Korean white-collar employees and their immediate supervisors, collected at two different points in time. The results revealed that ethical leadership was positively related to moral voice, and moral efficacy mediated the relationship. Importantly, as the relationship between ethical leadership and moral efficacy depended on leader–follower value congruence, the mediated relationship was effective only under high leader–follower value congruence. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

In this article, I outline a framework for the sociological study of culture that connects three intertwined elements of human culture and demonstrates the concrete contexts under which each most critically influences actions and their subsequent outcomes. In contrast to models that cast motivations, resources, and meanings as competing explanations of how culture affects action, I argue that these are fundamental constituent elements of culture that are inseparable, interdependent, and simultaneously operative. Which element provides the strongest link to action, and (...) how this link operates, must be understood as a function of the actor's position within wider social contexts. I argue that on average motivations have the most discernable link to action within a social strata, cultural resources provide the strongest link across strata, and meanings have the greatest direct influence when codified and sanctioned. I then offer a reframing and synthesis that reintegrates previously “competing” theories of culture into a more holistic context-dependent model of culture in action. Finally, I use evidence from prior empirical research, as well as new data from an ongoing ethnographic study of health behaviors among the aged, to show how various elements of culture are concretely linked to action in eight different social contexts. In doing so, I provide a roadmap for the transition out of the “either-or” logic underlying much of cultural theory and reemphasize the importance of the classical sociological concern for “when” and “how” various aspects of culture influence action and outcomes in concrete social contexts. (shrink)

Sennett (1999) and Pawl & Timpe (2009; 2013) attempt to show how we can praise heavenly agents for things they inevitably do in heaven by appealing to the notion of derivative freedom. Matheson (2017) has criticized this use of derivative freedom. In this essay I show why Matheson's argument is inconclusive but also how the basic point may be strengthened to undermine the use Sennett and Pawl & Timpe make of derivative freedom. I then show why Matheson is mistaken to (...) claim that the value of free choice depends on an agent retaining the ability to change their mind; in so doing I demonstrate that some choices which result in fixed outcomes - a feature of the choices leading to impeccability - can indeed be valuable even if they cannot be undone. (shrink)

Sterelny (2003) develops an idealised natural history of folk-psychological kinds. He argues that belief-like states are natural elaborations of simpler control systems, called detection systems, which map directly from environmental cue to response. Belief-like states exhibit robust tracking (sensitivity to multiple environmental states), and response breadth (occasioning a wider range of behaviours). The development of robust tracking and response-breadth depend partly on properties of the informational environment. In a transparent environment the functional relevance of states of the world is directly (...) detectable. Outside transparent environments, selection can favour decoupled representations. Sterelny maintains that these arguments do not generalise to desire. Unlike the external environment, the internal processes of an organism, he argues, are selected for transparency. Parts of a single organism gain nothing from deceiving one another, but gain significantly from accurate signalling of their states and needs. Key conditions favouring the development of belief-like states are therefore absent in the case of desires. Here I argue that Sterelny’s reasons for saying that his treatment of belief does not generalise to motivation (desires, or preferences) are insufficient. There are limits to the transparency that internal environments can achieve. Even if there were not, tracking the motivational salience of external states suggests possible gains for systematic tracking of outcome values in any system in which selection has driven the production of belief-like states. (shrink)

ABSTRACT According to one widely accepted view, our actions and emotions ought to be proportional to the degree of value present in their objects. Against this proportionality principle, Pettigrove sketches a view according to which the value of some virtuous actions and attitudes derives from the characteristic way of being of the agent herself, and not from any other goods that agent appreciates, pursues, or promotes. Granting Pettigrove’s rejection of the proportionality principle, I raise some questions for his replacement account. (...) I suggest that it is not just the characteristic way of being of an agent who loves and forgives virtuously that explains the goodness of their love and forgiveness, but also the role such virtues play in making possible valuable relationships that are partially constitutive of human flourishing. (shrink)

Values have a profound influence on the behaviour of all people, scientists included. Biodiversity is studied by ecologists, like myself, most of whom align with the “mission-driven” field of conservation biology. The mission involves the protection of biodiversity, and a set of contextual values including the beliefs that biological diversity and ecological complexity are good and have intrinsic value. This raises concerns that the scientific process might be influenced by biases toward outcomes that are aligned with these (...) class='Hi'>values. Retrospectively, I have identified such biases in my own work, resulting from an implicit assumption that organisms that are not dependent on natural habitats effectively do not count in biodiversity surveys. Finding that anthropogenic forest disturbance reduces the diversity of plant species dependent on shady forests can thus be falsely equated with more general biodiversity loss. Disturbance might actually increase overall plant diversity. In this paper I ask whether ecologists share values that are unrepresentative of broader society, I discuss examples of potential value-driven biases in biodiversity science, and I present some hypotheses from behavioral economics on possible psychological underpinnings of shared values and preferences among ecologists. (shrink)

Sentencing outcomes turn on moral and evaluative determinations. For example, a finding of “irreparable corruption” is generally a precondition for juvenile life without parole. A finding that the “aggravating factors outweigh the mitigating factors” determines whether a defendant receives the death penalty. Should such moral determinations that expose defendants to extraordinary penalties be subject to a standard of proof? A broad range of federal and state courts have purported to decide this issue “in the abstract and without reference to our (...) sentencing case law,” as the Supreme Court recently put it. Kansas v. Carr, 577 U.S. 108, 119 (2016). According to these courts, “it would mean nothing” to ask whether the defendant “deserves mercy beyond a reasonable doubt” or “more-likely-than-not deserves it” because moral questions are not “factual.” Instead, moral determinations are highly subjective “value calls” to which concepts of doubt and certainty do not intelligibly apply. -/- Implicit in these rulings is a controversial view of the nature of moral judgment. This Article traces the contours of the view and argues that it is out of step with the way the broader public thinks about morality and fails to address the issues defendants have raised. Courts should avoid wading into such controversial waters for two reasons. First, the judiciary has historically maintained neutrality on issues of significant public concern. Second, even if moral determinations are not factual, applying a standard of proof to at least some moral decisions at sentencing would change the outcome of the sentencer’s deliberations, and improve the legitimacy of the legal system. For the reasonableness of doubt depends on context; and moral questions—"are you certain the defendant deserves death?”—make salient the stakes relative to which a person should decide what to believe about ordinary empirical matters. On the resulting view, reasonable doubt in the final moral analysis is not just intelligible, but essential for correcting a bias in the structure of the bifurcated criminal trial that systematically disadvantages defendants: the tendency for de-contextualized "factual findings” in the guilt phase to control outcomes at sentencing. (shrink)

This paper defines and defends time-slice epistemology, according to which there are no essentially diachronic norms of rationality. First I motivate and distinguish two notions of time-slice epistemology. Then I defend time-slice theories of action under indeterminacy, i.e. theories about how you should act when the outcome of your decision depends on some indeterminate claim. I raise objections to a theory of action under indeterminacy recently defended by Robbie Williams, and I propose some alternative theories in its place. Throughout (...) this discussion, I defend a more general moral about action under indeterminacy, namely that time-slice theories are supported by strong analogies with ethical theories. In particular, our understanding of agents torn between interpretations of a decision situation should be guided by our theories of agents torn between incommensurable values. (shrink)

Scientific activities strongly depend on concepts and classifications to represent the world in an orderly and workable manner. This creates a trade-off. On the one hand, it is important to leave space for conceptual and classificatory criticism. On the other hand, agreement on which concepts and classifications to use, is often crucial for communication and the integration of research and ideas. In this paper, we show that this trade-off can sometimes be best resolved through conceptual governance, in which scientific institutions (...) set a collective conceptual standard, and that voting can be a reasonable way to implement that governance. Voting is a means to simultaneously aggregate among conflicting values, preferences and priorities that often underpin conceptual or classificatory debates, all while signaling ongoing disagreement. We also discuss how the legitimacy of the voting process and its outcome can be ensured. (shrink)

In many real-world gambles, a non-trivial amount of time passes before the uncertainty is resolved but after a choice is made. An individual may have a preference between gambles with identical probability distributions over final outcomes if they differ in the timing of resolution of uncertainty. In this domain, utility consists not only of the consumption of outcomes, but also the psychological utility induced by an unresolved gamble. We term this utility anxiety. Since a reflective decision maker may want to (...) include anxiety explicitly in analysis of unresolved lotteries, a multiple-outcome model for evaluating lotteries with delayed resolution of uncertainty is developed. The result is a rank-dependent utility representation (e.g., Quiggin, 1982), in which period weighting functions are related iteratively. Substitution rules are proposed for evaluating compound temporal lotteries. The representation is appealing for a number of reasons. First, probability weights can be interpreted as the cognitive attention allocated to certain outcomes. Second, the model disaggregates strength of preference from temporal risk aversion and thus provides some insight into the old debate about the relationship between von Neumann–Morgenstern utility functions and strength of preference value functions. (shrink)

Epistemic trust is crucial for science. This article aims to identify the kinds of assumptions that are involved in epistemic trust as it is required for the successful operation of science as a collective epistemic enterprise. The relevant kind of reliance should involve working from the assumption that the epistemic endeavors of others are appropriately geared towards the truth, but the exact content of this assumption is more difficult to analyze than it might appear. The root of the problem is (...) that methodological decisions in science typically involve a complex trade-off between the reliability of positive results, the reliability of negative results, and the investigation's power. Which balance between these is the ‘correct’ one can only be determined in light of an evaluation of the consequences of all the different possible outcomes of the inquiry. What it means for the investigation to be ‘appropriately geared towards the truth’ thus depends on certain value judgments. I conclude that in the optimal case, trusting someone in her capacity as an information provider also involves a reliance on her having the right attitude towards the possible consequences of her epistemic work. 1 Introduction2 Epistemic Reliance within the Sciences3 Methodological Conventionalism4 Trust in Science5 Conclusions. (shrink)

I argue that Scanlon's Value of Choice View does not offer a plausible account of substantive responsibility. I offer a new account, which I call the Potential Value of Opportunities View. On this view, when a person is in a position to freely and capably make an informed choice, we assess her situation not by the outcome she achieves but by the potential value of her opportunities. This value depends on the value of the various things that she can (...) achieve through her choices, as well as on how disposed she is to choose her better options and avoid her worse options. This view explains the priority we give to preventing harm that a person cannot avoid by choosing appropriately over harm that a person can so avoid by the fact that the second person has a valuable opportunity that the first does not have. It explains the importance of protecting people against choosing badly by the value of being placed in circumstances in which one is disposed to choose well, and the disvalue of being exposed to the danger of coming to harm by choosing badly. (shrink)

This chapter defines and defends time-slice epistemology, according to which there are no essentially diachronic norms of rationality. The chapter begins by distinguishing two notions of time-slice epistemology, and ends by defending time-slice theories of action under indeterminacy, i.e. theories about how you should act when the outcome of your decision depends on some indeterminate claim. In a recent chapter, J. Robert G. Williams defends a theory of action under indeterminacy which is subject to several objections. An alternative theory (...) is proposed in its place. The resulting discussion highlights a more general moral about action under indeterminacy, namely that time-slice theories are supported by strong analogies with ethical theories. In particular, our understanding of agents torn between interpretations of a decision situation should be guided by our theories of agents torn between incommensurable values. (shrink)

Moral egalitarianism will depend on one of two basic ideas. The first is the idea of equality itself. We might believe that it is a good thing if different people have equal shares of resources, or if their lives score equally well in terms of whatever makes lives valuable, at least if there is no reason based on some other moral value for one person to do better than the other. Equality is a relationship between the lives of different people. (...) This version of egalitarianism claims that the existence of the relationship makes an outcome better. It attributes value to relations between lives rather than to the content of lives. (shrink)

Virtue signaling serves to express moral and ethical values publicly, showcasing commitment to social and sustainable ideals. This research, conducted with non-WEIRD samples to mitigate the prevalent WEIRD bias (i.e., the tendency to solely rely on samples from Western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic societies), examines whether the scarcely studied virtue-signaling construct mediates the influence of consumers’ attachment anxiety (vs. avoidance) on their green purchase behavior and prosocial responses. Drawing on attachment theory and the emerging virtue-signaling literature, the current (...) work reports the results from three studies (_N_ total = 898) in which consumers’ attachment patterns were not only measured, as in most prior related research, but also manipulated. Study 1 confirmed the unique ability of measured attachment anxiety, but not attachment avoidance, to predict consumers’ green purchase behavior and prosocial tendencies, with virtue signaling mediating these links. Study 2 manipulated participants’ attachment patterns, finding further support for the mediating role of virtue signaling between attachment anxiety (vs. avoidance) and these dependent variables. Study 3 provided a more nuanced account for our virtue-signaling conceptualization by documenting that self-oriented, but not other-oriented, virtue signaling mediated the link between attachment anxiety and both our key outcomes in public contexts. From a managerial viewpoint, these findings indicate that anxiously attached consumers constitute a potentially lucrative segment for companies seeking to expand their market share of sustainable and ethically produced products. (shrink)

Cosmopolitan critics attack the scope-limitation of justice of egalitarian liberal theorists to states. They treat justice as the production of a given set of outcomes for people regardless of location or relationship. However, in doing so they either ignore the relevant agent towards whom principles of justice are addressed or see the question of agency as a practical, derivative question, of a secondary character. This paper argues that a principle of justice without a clearly justified agent is not a genuine (...) principle at all. This is what writers like Rawls mean by the "subject" of justice (analogous to the grammatical subject of a sentence, i.e.,the agent). We should reflect on agents and why they would or would not justifiably carry certain burdens for others and what kind of benefits or goods they are able to secure. The answers to those questions explain why the idea of cosmopolitan global justice is incomplete, either requiring a global basic structural agency or not applying because no relevant agent is present that can create cooperative arrangements between individual persons across the globe. Other moral principles will still apply globally, but they will be distinct from those that apply to basic-structural agencies. This account is not a practice dependence account, as it bases the distinctness of moral and political principles on purely moral and value-based considerations. (shrink)

Intertemporal choice is the study of how people make choices about what and how much to do at various points in time, when choices at one time influence the possibilities available at other points in time. These choices are influenced by the relative value people assign to two or more payoffs at different points in time. Most choices require decision-makers to trade off costs and benefits at different points in time. These decisions may be about savings, work effort, education, nutrition, (...) exercise, health care and so forth. Since early in the twentieth century, economists have analyzed intertemporal decisions using the discounted utility model, which assumes that people evaluate the pleasures and pains resulting from a decision in much the same way that financial markets evaluate losses and gains, exponentially 'discounting' the value of outcomes according to how delayed they are in time. Discounted utility has been used to describe how people actually make intertemporal choices and it has been used as a tool for public policy. Policy decisions about how much to spend on research and development, health and education all depend on the discount rate used to analyze the decision. (shrink)

Discussion of the cognitive division of labor has usually made very little contact with relevant materials from other disciplines, including theoretical biology, management science, and design theory. This article draws on these materials to consider some unavoidable conundrums faced by any attempt to present a particular way of dividing tasks among a labor team as the uniquely rational way of doing this, given the interdependence of the underlying evaluative standards by which the products of a system of division of labor (...) will be judged. Divisions of labor will typically cut across these interdependencies in ways which leave the outcomes of a process of labor hostage to path dependencies and suboptimalities. Some attempts to avoid these results are shown to be unsuccessful. All these difficulties are compounded by the fact that, in many cases, the division of labor has to be constructed over a ground of values that is itself being constructed simultaneously with the products which they are invoked to assess. Key Words: risk spreading • interdependency • NK fitness landscapes • complexity • epistasis • Kuhn • modularity • path dependency. (shrink)

A variety of factors shape environmental policy and governance (EPG) processes, from perceptions of physical ecology and profit motives to social justice and concerns with landscape aesthetics. Many scholars have examined the role of values in EPG, and demonstrated that attempts to incorporate (especially) non-market values into EPG are loaded with both practical and conceptual challenges. Nevertheless, it is clear that non-market values of all types play a crucial role in shaping EPG outcomes. In this article we (...) explore the role of nostalgia as a factor in EPG. We examine literatures on environmental values, governance and affect in light of their relationships with environmental policymaking, first as a means to decide whether or not nostalgia can be rightly described as an 'environmental value'. We suggest that, from a philosophical perspective, nostalgia is by itself environmentally neutral, and is not usefully described as a 'value'. However, as an emotional state that longs to preserve or recover something of the past - whether fading or no longer present - that is fondly remembered, nostalgia does represent a potentially strong 'motivator' for EPG decisions. Despite this somewhat ambivalent assessment of nostalgia as an environmental value, we argue that nostalgia and nostalgic longing to return to 'better' or 'cleaner' environments can lead to potentially significant impacts on ecosystems and landscapes, both positive and negative depending on what it is that people want to preserve or restore. Thus we conclude that we neglect understanding the role of nostalgia in EPG at our peril: first, because preservationist goals have always been an important part of environmental responsibility; and second, because many people will be swayed regarding environmental action through a mobilisation of nostalgia by political leaders and interest groups alike. We end our article with suggestion of avenues for further empirical investigation. (shrink)

In order to claim that one has experimentally tested whether a noncontextual ontological model could underlie certain measurement statistics in quantum theory, it is necessary to have a notion of noncontextuality that applies to unsharp measurements, i.e., those that can only be represented by positive operator-valued measures rather than projection-valued measures. This is because any realistic measurement necessarily has some nonvanishing amount of noise and therefore never achieves the ideal of sharpness. Assuming a generalized notion of noncontextuality that applies to (...) arbitrary experimental procedures, it is shown that the outcome of a measurement depends deterministically on the ontic state of the system being measured if and only if the measurement is sharp. Hence for every unsharp measurement, its outcome necessarily has an indeterministic dependence on the ontic state. We defend this proposal against alternatives. In particular, we demonstrate why considerations parallel to Fine’s theorem do not challenge this conclusion. (shrink)

This paper discusses the so-called non-interference assumption (NIA) grounding causal inference in trials in both medicine and the social sciences. It states that for each participant in the experiment, the value of the potential outcome depends only upon whether she or he gets the treatment. Drawing on methodological discussion in clinical trials and laboratory experiments in economics, I defend the necessity of partial forms of blinding as a warrant of the NIA, to control the participants’ expectations and their strategic (...) interactions with the experimenter. (shrink)

Stress induction reduces people's ability to modify their instrumental choices following changes in the value of outcomes, but the mechanisms underpinning this effect have not been specified because previous studies have lacked crucial control conditions. To address this, the current study had participants learn two instrumental responses for food and water, respectively, before water was devalued by specific satiety. Choice between these two responses was then measured in extinction, reacquisition and Pavlovian to instrumental transfer tests. Concurrently during these tests, a (...) negative emotional appraisal group evaluated aversive images, whereas a control group evaluated neutral images, at the same time as choosing between the two instrumental responses. Negative emotional appraisal abolished the impact of water devaluation on instrumental choice in the extinction test, but did not affect instrumental choice in the reacquisition or PIT tests. These findings suggest that negative emotional appraisal selectively impaired participants’ ability to retrieve the expected value of outcomes required to make goal-directed instrumental choices in the extinction test, and that this effect was not due to task disengagement, nullification of the devaluation treatment or impaired knowledge of response-outcome relationships. (shrink)

Introduction: Public health ethics addresses moral dilemmas arising from balancing individual healthcare needs with societal interests. Ethical considerations in public health during pandemics and disasters aim to reduce mortality rates and minimize social injustice through fair principles. Objective: This paper analyzes public health ethics and ethical values in allocating resources during mass casualty incidents. The intersection of public health ethics, applied bioethics, and ethics of social consequences (through non-utilitarian consequentialism) guides addressing serious public health challenges in catastrophic scenarios. The (...) application of the given interaction is significant for professional medical ethics. Methodology: The paper employs inductive, deductive, and normative methods of bioethics and the methodology of ethics of social consequences. Conclusion: The paradigmatic disparity between the bioethics of pandemics and disaster bioethics lies in the fluid application of bioethical principles and the accentuation of utilitarian demands depending on the severity and scale of mass casualty incidents. Applied bioethics in crisis situations respects the approaches of public health ethics and attempts to increase positive social outcomes. The application of (scarce) resource allocation criteria and triage of patients is derived from ethical decisions beneficial to public health and lege artis approaches of medical bioethics. The paper presents professional and ethical criteria for medically inappropriate treatment within the framework of patient triage; we approach crisis ethics from the perspective of maximization of benefit. Age is not an exclusion criterion of acute healthcare provision in crisis situations. Ethics of social consequences as a form of non-utilitarian consequentialism allowing for social consequences bridges public health ethics and applied bioethics. (shrink)