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The Aim of Rationality
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It is proposed that rationality has an external goal—thinking as correctly as possible. (For example, perhaps believing as correctly as possible is being maximally confident of the truth, and choosing as correctly as possible is choosing something feasible and optimally choiceworthy.) If your thinking is irrational, that is bad news about your thinking’s degree of correctness; the more irrational your thinking is, the worse the news is about your thinking’s degree of correctness. This idea is interpreted in probabilistic terms. There is a probability function, fixed by the mental states and events present in your mind, such that the degree to which your thinking is ‘good news’ about correctness is determined by how your thinking compares to alternative ways of thinking in terms of its expected degree of correctness according to that probability function. This proposal can explain the normativity of the requirements of rational coherence.
Title: The Aim of Rationality
Description:
It is proposed that rationality has an external goal—thinking as correctly as possible.
(For example, perhaps believing as correctly as possible is being maximally confident of the truth, and choosing as correctly as possible is choosing something feasible and optimally choiceworthy.
) If your thinking is irrational, that is bad news about your thinking’s degree of correctness; the more irrational your thinking is, the worse the news is about your thinking’s degree of correctness.
This idea is interpreted in probabilistic terms.
There is a probability function, fixed by the mental states and events present in your mind, such that the degree to which your thinking is ‘good news’ about correctness is determined by how your thinking compares to alternative ways of thinking in terms of its expected degree of correctness according to that probability function.
This proposal can explain the normativity of the requirements of rational coherence.
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