scholarly journals The limits of rational belief revision: A dilemma for the Darwinian debunker

Noûs ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katia Vavova
Keyword(s):  
Belief Revision ◽  
Rational Belief

On uniform belief revision

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (7) ◽  
pp. 1357-1376
Author(s):  
Theofanis Aravanis
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Belief Revision ◽  
Possible Worlds ◽  
Belief Change ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Iterated Revision ◽  
Interesting Class ◽  
Total Preorder ◽  
Revision Function

Abstract Rational belief-change policies are encoded in the so-called AGM revision functions, defined in the prominent work of Alchourrón, Gärdenfors and Makinson. The present article studies an interesting class of well-behaved AGM revision functions, called herein uniform-revision operators (or UR operators, for short). Each UR operator is uniquely defined by means of a single total preorder over all possible worlds, a fact that in turn entails a significantly lower representational cost, relative to an arbitrary AGM revision function, and an embedded solution to the iterated-revision problem, at no extra representational cost. Herein, we first demonstrate how weaker, more expressive—yet, more representationally expensive—types of uniform revision can be defined. Furthermore, we prove that UR operators, essentially, generalize a significant type of belief change, namely, parametrized-difference revision. Lastly, we show that they are (to some extent) relevance-sensitive, as well as that they respect the so-called principle of kinetic consistency.

scholarly journals Awareness Growth and Belief Revision

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joe Roussos
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Belief Revision ◽  
Algebra I ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Theoretic Model ◽  
Bayesian Approaches ◽  
Revision Procedure ◽  
New Information ◽  
The Face ◽  
Awareness Change

The problem of awareness growth, also known as the problem of new hypotheses, is a persistent challenge to Bayesian theories of rational belief and decision making. Cases of awareness growth include coming to consider a completely new possibility (called expansion), or coming to consider finer distinctions through the introduction of a new partition (called refinement). Recent work has centred on Reverse Bayesianism, a proposal for rational awareness growth due to Karni and Vierø. This essay develops a "Reserve Bayesian" position and defends it against two challenges. The first, due to Anna Mahtani, says that Reverse Bayesian approaches yield the wrong result in cases where the growth of awareness constitutes an expansion relative to one partition, but a refinement relative to a different partition. The second, due to Steele and Stefánsson, says that Reverse Bayesian approaches cannot deal with new propositions that are evidentially relevant to old propositions. I argue that these challenges confuse questions of belief revision with questions of awareness change. Mahtani’s cases reveal that the change of awareness itself requires a model which specifies how propositions in the agent’s old algebra are identified with propositions in the new algebra. I introduce a lattice-theoretic model for this purpose, which resolves Mahtani’s problem cases and some of Steele and Stefánsson’s cases. Applying my model of awareness change, then Reverse Bayesianism, and then a generalised belief revision procedure, resolves Steele and Stefánsson’s remaining cases. In demonstrating this, I introduce a simple and general model of belief revision in the face of new information about previously unknown propositions.

Rationality, Emotion, and Belief Revision

2002 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 16-33
Author(s):  
William Angelett ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Belief Revision ◽  
Belief System ◽  
System Change ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Alternative Strategy ◽  
Client Affect

Sarah Waller proposes that cognitive therapists and philosophical counselors ought to consider the feelings of the client of paramount importance in belief system change rather than the rationality of the belief system. I offer an alternative strategy of counseling that reinstates the place of rational belief revision while still respecting the importance of emotions. Waller claims that, because of the problem of under-determination, the counseling goal of rational belief revision can be trumped by the goal of improved client affect. I suggest that, if we consider a different ontology for the domain of counseling—one whose objects are dialogues (the goal of counseling becomes greater information of dialogues), we can accommodate a place for emotions in rational belief revision. I then note some limitations of the new proposal and the possibility of incommensurability in the comparison of our different views.

BELIEF-REVISION, THE RAMSEY TEST, MONOTONICITY, AND THE SO-CALLED IMPOSSIBILITY RESULTS

2008 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 402-423
Author(s):  
NEIL TENNANT
Keyword(s):  
Belief Revision ◽  
Impossibility Result ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Methodological Error ◽  
Ramsey Test ◽  
Impossibility Results ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
New Diagnosis ◽  
Made In ◽  
Monotonicity Principle

Peter Gärdenfors proved a theorem purporting to show that it is impossible to adjoin to the AGM-postulates for belief-revision a principle of monotonicity for revisions. The principle of monotonicity in question is implied by the Ramsey test for conditionals. So Gärdenfors’ result has been interpreted as demonstrating that it is impossible to combine the Ramsey test for conditionals with the basic postulates for rational belief-revision. It is shown here that this interpretation of Gärdenfors’ result is unwarranted. A new diagnosis is offered of a methodological error made in the statement of the key principle of monotonicity. Crucial applications of this principle in Gärdenfors’ proof require one to regard as revisions what are really expansions. If monotonicity is stated only for genuine revisions, then Gärdenfors’ proof does not go through. Nor can it; for, when the monotonicity principle for revisions is correctly formulated, one can actually establish a contrary consistency result. This requires only a slight adjustment to the postulates of AGM-theory, in order to ensure that the three operations of expansion, contraction, and revision trichotomize the domain of theory-changes. It is further shown that being careful in this way about the proper domains of definition of the three operations of expansion, contraction, and revision also disposes of another, more direct, impossibility result, due to Arló-Costa, that targets the Ramsey test.

scholarly journals A Note on the Epistemological Value of Pretense Imagination

Episteme ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Tom Schoonen
Keyword(s):  
Risk Assessment ◽  
General Theory ◽  
Belief Revision ◽  
Epistemic Logic ◽  
Pretend Play ◽  
Dynamic Epistemic Logic ◽  
Rational Belief

Abstract Pretense imagination is imagination understood as the ability to recreate rational belief revision. This kind of imagination is used in pretend-play, risk-assessment, etc. Some even claim that this kind of hypothetical belief revision can be grounds to justify new beliefs in conditionals, in particular conditionals that play a foundational role in the epistemology of modality. In this paper, I will argue that it cannot. I will first provide a very general theory of pretense imagination, which I formalise using tools from dynamic epistemic logic. As a result, we can clearly see that pretense imagination episodes are build up out of two kinds of imaginative stages, so I will present an argument by cases. This argument shows that pretense imagination might indeed provide us with justification for believing certain conditionals. Despite this, I will argue that these are not the kind of conditionals that allow pretense imagination to play a foundational role in the epistemology of modality.

The Road to Core Logic

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil Tennant
Keyword(s):  
Belief Revision ◽  
Classical Logic ◽  
Deductive Reasoning ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Truth Values ◽  
The Road ◽  
Working Out

We situate Core Logic and Classical Core Logic within a wider logical landscape. Core Logic lies at the intersection of two orthogonal lines of reform of Classical Logic—constructivization and relevantization. We explain the genesis of Core Logic and describe its carefully formulated rules of inference. We reveal how Core Logic arises as a smooth generalization of the proto-logic involved in working out the truth values of sentences under particular interpretations; and the case for the complete methodological adequacy of Core Logic for constructive deductive reasoning, and of Classical Core Logic for non-constructive deductive reasoning. Core Logic deserves the label ‘Core’, because it is both fully employed, and sufficient, as the metalogic involved in any process of rational belief revision. No rule of Core Logic can be surrendered. We end by speculating on two possible explanations—semantic and methodological—of how Core Logic might have been bloated to Classical Logic.

JuDAS: a theory of rational belief revision

Synthese ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 197 (11) ◽  
pp. 5027-5050
Author(s):  
Gordian Haas
Keyword(s):  
Belief Revision ◽  
Rational Belief

scholarly journals Conceptual Learning and Local Incommensurability: A Dynamic Logic Approach

Axiomathes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Corina Strößner
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Change ◽  
Belief Revision ◽  
Dynamic Logic ◽  
Expressive Power ◽  
Conceptual Learning ◽  
Rational Belief ◽  
Logical Analysis ◽  
Logical Reconstruction ◽  
Logical Study ◽  
Logic Approach

AbstractIn recent decades, the logical study of rational belief dynamics has played an increasingly important role in philosophy. However, the dynamics of concepts such as conceptual learning received comparatively little attention within this debate. This is problematic insofar as the occurrence of conceptual change (especially in the sciences) has been an influential argument against a merely logical analysis of beliefs. Especially Kuhn’s ideas about the incommensurability, i.e., untranslatability, of succeeding theories seem to stand in the way of logical reconstruction. This paper investigates conceptual change as model-changing operations similar to belief revision and relates it to the notion of incommensurability. I consider several versions of conceptual change and discuss their influences on the expressive power, translatability and the potential arising of incommensurability. The paper concludes with a discussion of animal taxonomy in Aristotle’s and Linnaeus’s work.

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