ABSTRACT

Savage famously contravened his own theory when first confronting the Allais Paradox, but then convinced himself that he had made an error. We examine the formal structure of Savage’s ‘error-correcting’ reasoning in the light of (i) behavioural economists’ claims to identify the latent preferences of individuals who violate conventional rationality requirements and (ii) Broome’s critique of arguments which presuppose that rationality requirements can be achieved through reasoning. We argue that Savage’s reasoning is not vulnerable to Broome’s critique, but does not provide support for the view that behavioural scientists can identify and counteract errors in people’s choices or preferences.

摘要

野蛮人在第一次面对阿莱克斯悖论时就著名地违反了自己的理论，但随后说服自己自己犯了一个错误。我们根据（i）行为经济学家的主张来确定Savage的“纠错”推理的形式结构，以查明违反常规合理性要求的个人的潜在偏好，以及（ii）布鲁姆对以合理性要求为前提的论点的批评。通过推理来实现。我们认为，野蛮人的推理不容易受到布鲁姆批评的影响，但不能为行为科学家可以识别和抵消人们选择或偏好中的错误的观点提供支持。