Reflexive Rationality: A Theory of Dynamic Choice

• Antragsteller: Professor Dr. Wolfgang Spohn
• Fachliche Zuordnung: Theoretische Philosophie
• Förderung: Förderung von 2011 bis 2016
• Projektkennung: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Projektnummer 201261349

The problem of dynamic choice is the problem how to plan and to behave rationally when envisaging to get into decision situations in which one may have arbitrarily changed beliefs and desires and not only, as traditionally assumed, beliefs changed through information. My proposal will be to solve this very general problem by representing decision situations by socalled reflexive decision models that contain not only action (and chance) nodes, but also decision nodes and thus represent the agent’s thoughts about her possible future situations. The proposal will develop many intricate details of the appertaining theory. And it will argue that no less will do. Thereby it will integrate a wide variety of ideas, models, and literature into one unified account: on time preferences, endogenous preference change, sophisticated choice, (pre-)commitment, self-control, resolute choice, etc. And it will be applicable to new phenomena hitherto hardly considered. This theory of reflexive rationality will have consequences for social contexts as well, i.e. for game theory, where it leads to a new kind of equilibria, so-called dependency equilibria, and their appertaining theory. It will thus as well be able to lay foundations to an account of so-called joint or we-intentions.

• DFG-Verfahren: Schwerpunktprogramme
• Teilprojekt zu: SPP 1516: New Frameworks of Rationality