In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Rationality, Irrationality, and Depathologizing OCDBrent Kious, MD, PhD (bio)Pablo Hubacher argues that some persons with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) do not, in virtue of OCD itself, exhibit what he calls “epistemic irrationality,” which is a matter of violating rational norms related to belief and inquiry (Hubacher, 2023). The argument is complex and meticulous, but ultimately not persuasive. I outline the argument, show how it is unsound, and (...) articulate its most troubling consequences. I end by inquiring about the goal of projects like this, which, I believe, is to examine the rationality of mental illnesses in order to show that they are or are not illnesses.Hubacher starts by noting that (some) persons with OCD appear “doxastically irrational”: when they exhibit obsessions, they err in how they form beliefs. Specifically, they seem to “jump to conclusions,” inferring that a feared outcome is probable or certain from scant evidence. However, psychological research shows that persons with OCD are not more likely to jump to conclusions than others. Hubacher also observes that jumping to conclusions involves the inference, “possibly P, therefore definitely P.” This inference is irrational but not specific to people with OCD, because many of us do it, and an account of the irrationality of OCD should identify OCD-specific deviations. Hubacher concludes that persons with OCD are not doxastically irrational. He next considers whether they exhibit “zetetic” irrationality, which involves violating epistemic norms of inquiry. This might identify the irrationality of OCD, since compulsions like repeatedly checking the stove are basically ways of getting evidence. But Hubacher introduces the phenomenon of sexually focused OCD, or S-OCD. Persons with S-OCD worry about whether they have sexual desires they regard as inappropriate—for instance, incestuous desires or homosexual desires. Hubacher does not think people with S-OCD are zetetically irrational, however. Their endless doubts are actually reasonable, since it is possible—even common—for people to have repressed sexual desires when those desires are stigmatized. If a person with S-OCD worries about having incestuous desires, the bare fact that he does not feel those desires in the usual way should not be reassuring to him: those desires could simply be repressed. Hubacher adds that [End Page 151] people with OCD have high intolerance of uncertainty, which he takes to mean that they approach inquiries with high standards for confirmation; they are not satisfied with evidence others would see as compelling. He concludes that people with S-OCD are neither zetetically nor doxastically irrational, and so not epistemically irrational.This is a surprising conclusion, but it results from an unsound argument. An initial problem is his assumption that the only way persons with OCD can be doxastically irrational is by jumping to conclusions. This ignores other possible ways of being doxastically irrational. For instance, it would be irrational to retain beliefs that have been disconfirmed by evidence (Hubacher might call this zetetic irrationality, but surely, my beliefs can be disconfirmed without active inquiry). Irrationally retaining disconfirmed beliefs might even capture what happens in OCD: the person with OCD thinks something awful is likely to be true, even though she gets copious disconfirming evidence.A second problem is in Hubacher’s interpretation of the psychological evidence about whether persons with OCD jump to conclusions. He cites two studies involving a very specific psychological test, the bead task, wherein a subject is asked to determine whether a random sequence of colored beads have been drawn from a jar with a preponderance of one color or another. A “jumping to conclusions bias” is taken to be an inclination to guess the jar after no more than two beads are revealed (Huq & Garety et al., 1988). Although a few studies have shown that persons with OCD do not have this jumping to conclusions bias, we cannot conclude that they do not often jump to conclusions in real life. One might imagine, for instance, that people with OCD are still quite likely to jump to conclusions with respect to their obsessions (i.e., things that are highly anxiety-provoking, where the anxiety affects the conclusions drawn). And most people with OCD are not obsessed about the colors of beads.A third... (shrink)

Belief polarization is said to occur when two people respond to the same evidence by updating their beliefs in opposite directions. This response is considered to be “irrational” because it involves contrary updating, a form of belief updating that appears to violate normatively optimal responding, as for example dictated by Bayes' theorem. In light of much evidence that people are capable of normatively optimal behavior, belief polarization presents a puzzling exception. We show that Bayesian networks, or Bayes nets, can simulate (...) rational belief updating. When fit to experimental data, Bayes nets can help identify the factors that contribute to polarization. We present a study into belief updating concerning the reality of climate change in response to information about the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming. The study used representative samples of Australian and U.S. participants. Among Australians, consensus information partially neutralized the influence of worldview, with free-market supporters showing a greater increase in acceptance of human-caused global warming relative to free-market opponents. In contrast, while consensus information overall had a positive effect on perceived consensus among U.S. participants, there was a reduction in perceived consensus and acceptance of human-caused global warming for strong supporters of unregulated free markets. Fitting a Bayes net model to the data indicated that under a Bayesian framework, free-market support is a significant driver of beliefs about climate change and trust in climate scientists. Further, active distrust of climate scientists among a small number of U.S. conservatives drives contrary updating in response to consensus information among this particular group. (shrink)

Notes that much debate in contemporary psychology has been centered on the nature and scope of rationality and rational discourse. This paper seeks to elucidate 2 philosophical approaches that have come to occupy a central position in this debate: modernism and postmodernism. It will be argued that, although proceeding from antithetical assumptions concerning the proper grounding for philosophical and psychological endeavor, both modernism and postmodernism ultimately fall prey to epistemological skepticism and moral nihilism. The work of the French phenomenologist (...) E. Levinas is offered as a possible alternative to this problem, an alternative that seeks to ground rationality in ethical obligation. 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)

Alfred Mele argues we shouldn't try to rid to rid ourselves of all delusions.

I am interested in the “rational irrationality hypothesis” about voter behavior. According to this hypothesis, voters regularly vote for policies that are contrary to their interests because the act of voting for them isn’t. Gathering political information is time-consuming and inconvenient. Doing so is unlikely to lead to positive results since one's vote is unlikely to be decisive. However, we have preferences over our political beliefs. We like to see ourselves as members of certain groups (e.g. “rugged individualists”) (...) and being part of those groups depends on having certain beliefs (e.g. about welfare spending). Even if a decrease in welfare spending would be bad for me, I might still benefit by believing in and, consequently, voting for a decrease since my vote is unlikely to make a difference but getting to see myself as a rugged individualist will make a noticeable difference to my wellbeing. It is sometimes argued that this hypothesis fails for empirical reasons. I will argue that things are worse: it is conceptually incoherent. I will do so by first showing that it is a rationalizing explanation and then argue that rationalizing explanations must be reflectively stable from the agent's perspective. The rational irrationality hypothesis is not. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIlya Somin's Democracy and Political Ignorance uses a by-now familiar rational-choice lens with which to explain and analyze Americans’ widespread political ignorance. Unlike some scholars who tout rational choice on purely predictive or heuristic grounds, Somin claims that it also offers a more accurate description of reality, in this case better explaining the findings of empirical public-opinion research. In this essay, I compare Somin's central concept of rational ignorance and the related concept of “rational irrationality” (...) with the earlier explanatory approach taken by Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter in his classic study, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy. While Schumpeter developed his description of the mass democratic citizenry over 70 years ago—prior to any of the significant empirical studies of American public opinion—its broad approach remains at least as persuasive as Somin's. (shrink)

Although irrationality always presupposes rationality, I think there are good arguments to claim that sometimes rationality presupposes irrationality.This paper tries to show how irrational action can support rationality in two ways: it can develop and preserve rationality. I also argue that sometimes the development and the conservation of rationality can only be realized by irrational action.

David Charles; XII*—Rationality and Irrationality, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 83, Issue 1, 1 June 1983, Pages 191–212, https://doi.org/10.1.

There is a long tradition in philosophy of blaming passions for our unhappiness. If only we were more rational, it is claimed, we would live happier lives. I argue that such optimism is misguided and that, paradoxically, people with desires, like us, cannot be both happy and rational. More precisely, if someone rational has desires he will not be fully happy, and if he has some desires that are rational and – in a yet-to-be-specified sense – (...) demanding, he will be frankly unhappy. Call this claim Rational Pessimism. The argument for Rational Pessimism can be considered as a variation on a Schopenhauerian argument that bluntly claims that, because desires involve lack and suffering, desiring souls like us cannot be happy. I argue that, even if Schopenhauer’s argument escapes most attacks that have been targeted against it, it faces decisive empirical objections. I argue that Schopenhauer’s argument can, however, be rescued if it is assumed that we are rational. (shrink)

Current incentive structures are more favorably aligned with the world’s problems than with their solutions. We conceptualize this as the paradox of incentives to argue the need for new thinking and restructuring of incentives to break the paradox during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond, and create new opportunities for societal transformation.

Economists typically assume that preferences are fixed-that people know what they like and how much they like it relative to all other things, and that this rank-ordering is stable over time. But this assumption has never been accepted by any other discipline. Economists are increasingly having difficulty arguing that the assumption is true enough to generate useful predictions and explanations. Indeed, law and economics scholars increasingly acknowledge that preferences are constructed, and that the law itself can help construct preferences. Still, (...) fixed preferences are often treated as a normative ideal: Even if people don't have fixed preferences, they should. Behavioral law and economics scholars offer approaches to deal with this normative shortcoming. My article argues that preference construction, properly understood, is not normatively undesirable. Having fixed preferences means having a complete and stable rank ordering of what we want that dictates our choices. But we often do not have such an ordering, and rationally so. My article argues instead for an alternative process-based, account of preference construction. Rather than having a complete rank ordering, we have ways of making choices. We construct narratives, using evaluative criteria against a backdrop of wants, desires and inclinations, some of which we rank order and some of which we do not. The evaluative criteria embed a consideration of transaction costs: critically, where a decision is not very consequential, a formulaic decision rule that permits a ready choice among roughly comparable alternatives may serve our purposes better than a more considered alternative-by-alternative assessment. Our wants, desires and inclinations are for both traditional objects of choice and higher order values and desires; they are both previously constructed and constructed and elicited in the choice-making process. My article makes the case for such an account's potential explanatory power, as well as its tractability. (shrink)

According to a classic position in analytic philosophy of mind, we must interpret agents as largely rational in order to be able to attribute intentional mental states to them. However, adopting this position requires clarifying in what way and by which criteria agents can still be irrational. In this paper I will offer one such criterion. More specifically, I argue that the kind of rationality methodologically required by intentional interpretation is to be specified in terms of psychological efficacy. Thereby, (...) this notion can be distinguished from a more commonly used notion of rationality and hence cannot be shown to be undermined by the potential prevalence of a corresponding kind of irrationality. (shrink)

In his featured article, Makins suggests that healthcare professionals ought to defer to patients’ higher-order attitudes towards their risk attitudes when making medical decisions under uncertainty.1 He contends that this deferential approach is consistent with widely held antipaternalistic views about medicine. While Makins offers novel, insightful and provocative perspectives, we illustrate in this commentary that the theory suffers from some weaknesses and shortcomings that limit its persuasiveness and applicability and professionals should take a cautious approach when applying it to their (...) healthcare practice. While Makins does not provide a clear and consistent definition of higher-order risk attitudes, in mathematics, higher-order attitudes should be defined by the sign and shape of the derivatives of the utility or value function beyond the second order. Prudence is defined by a positive third derivative (convex marginal utility), while temperance is defined by a negative fourth derivative (concave second derivative).2 It is worth noting that higher-order attitudes are domain-specific, context-dependent and situation-sensitive. They vary depending on the framing, wording, format or presentation of the choice problem, …. (shrink)

This article is dedicated to investigating rationality as one of the key characteristics of Michel Foucault's concept of governmentality and to related contradictions inside and outside Foucauldian theory. Using risk theory, the author explores the possibility of the existence of multiple rationalities in governmentalities and offers a solution to the contradiction within Foucauldian theory. The article focuses on the question of how it is possible to resolve both methodological, practical, as well as theoretical, contradictions in the theory of governmentality, keeping (...) its main characteristics, such as population-centeredness, intact. The author concludes that diversification is more effective within the framework of multiple rationalities, which is most consistent with the understanding of the governmentality of the population as a goal, as a mechanism of risk management. The article makes a significant contribution to the understanding of the relationship between rationality and irrationality in the theory of governmentality, putting forward new ideas for the research and development of effective forms of public administration. The author also suggests ways to solve the paradox of regulated freedom, which has practical implications for modern methods of governance and regulation in society. This more detailed analysis clarifies how Foucault's concept of governmentality can be applied in a contemporary context, and how the limitations of rationality can be overcome to achieve more flexible and adaptive forms of governance. (shrink)

The separation view of the mind, advanced by Davidson in order to face the problem of irrationality, is criticized. Against it, I argue that it is not consistent with Davidson's holism.

It is argued that one answer to the question of the rationality of emotion hinges on the different roles in action selection played by emotions when one is aware of them versus when one is not aware of them . When unaware of one’s emotions, they are: not able to enter into one’s deliberations about what to do, and more likely to be automatically acted out. This is a problem for rationality because emotional action urges are often “false positives”. In (...) contrast, awareness of emotions crucially allows emotional responses to be inhibited: such inhibition is necessary for truly rational action selection. Furthermore, awareness enables Reflective Revision—the modification of one’s theories and action plans as a result of awareness of inconsistencies between theories and data, and action plans and goals. (shrink)

We talk about irrationality when behaviour defies explanation or prediction, when decisions are driven by emotions or instinct rather than by reflection, when reasoning fails to conform to basic principles of logic and probability, and when beliefs lack coherence or empirical support. Depending on the context, agents exhibiting irrational behaviour may be described as foolish, ignorant, unwise or even insane. -/- In this clear and engaging introduction to current debates on irrationality, Lisa Bortolotti presents the many facets of (...) the concept and offers an original account of the importance of judgements of irrationality as value judgements. The book examines the standards against which we measure human behaviour, and reviews the often serious implications of judgements of irrationality for ethics and policy. Bortolotti argues that we should adopt a more critical stance towards accepted standards of rationality in the light of the often surprising outcomes of philosophical inquiry and cognitive science research into decision making. -/- Irrationality is an accessible guide to the concept and will be essential reading for students and scholars interested in the limitations of human cognition and human agency. (shrink)

* [Irrationality]: ___ Irrationality, like rationality, is a normative concept. Someone who acts or reasons irrationally, or whose beliefs or emotions are irrational, has departed from a standard.

A large body of research in cognitive psychology and neuroscience draws on Bayesian statistics to model information processing within the brain. Many theorists have noted that this research seems to be in tension with a large body of experimental results purportedly documenting systematic deviations from Bayesian updating in human belief formation. In response, proponents of the Bayesian brain hypothesis contend that Bayesian models can accommodate such results by making suitable assumptions about model parameters. To make progress in this debate, I (...) argue that it is fruitful to focus not on specific experimental results but rather on what I call the ‘sources of epistemic irrationality’ in human cognition. I identify four such sources and I explore whether and, if so, how Bayesian models can be reconciled with them: processing costs, evolutionary suboptimality, motivated cognition, and error management. 1 Introduction 2 The Bayesian Brain 3 The Problem of Epistemic Irrationality 3.1 Bayesian inference and rationality 3.2 Intuitive Bayesian inference 4 Sources of Epistemic Irrationality 4.1 Processing costs 4.2 Evolutionary suboptimality 4.3 Motivational influences 4.4 Error management 5 Conclusion. (shrink)

A recalcitrant emotion is one which conflicts with evaluative judgement. (A standard example is where someone is afraid of flying despite believing that it poses little or no danger.) The phenomenon of emotional recalcitrance raises an important problem for theories of emotion, namely to explain the sense in which recalcitrant emotions involve rational conflict. In this paper I argue that existing ‘neojudgementalist’ accounts of emotions fail to provide plausible explanations of the irrationality of recalcitrant emotions, and develop and (...) defend my own neojudgementalist account. On my view, recalcitrant emotions are irrational insofar as they incline the subject to accept an evaluative construal that the subject has already rejected. (shrink)

People tend to be biased and irrational about politics. Should this constrain what our normative theories of democracy can require? David Estlund argues that the answer is ‘no’. He contends that even if such facts show that the requirements of a normative theory are very unlikely to be met, this need not imply that the theory is unduly unrealistic. I argue that the application of Estlund’s argument to political irrationality depends on a false presupposition: mainly, that being rational (...) about politics is something people could easily do if they tried. Since the empirical evidence shows that being rational about politics is actually quite difficult, Estlund’s argument comes up short. Moreover, I argue that the argument cannot plausibly be extended to insulate normative theories of democracy from facts about political irrationality because of the need for constraints of realism to explain the crucial role that appeals to (reasonable) disagreement play within such theories. (shrink)

Abstract Studies of irrationality in cognitive psychology have usually looked at areas where humans might be expected to be rational, yet appear not to be. In this paper the other extreme of human irrationality is examined: the delusion as it occurs in psychiatric illness. A parallel is suggested between the delusion as an aberration of cognition and some illusions which result from aberrations within optics. It is argued that, because delusions are found predominantly within certain limited areas (...) of cognitive functioning, they may represent a form of mental aberration which may tell us something about the abstract properties of mind. Possible implications of this model for several areas of cognitive science are discussed. (shrink)

This book, first published in 1979, is composed of studies in a descending sequence from perfect rationality, through imperfect and problematical rationality, to irrationality. Specifically human rationality is characterized by its capacity to relate strategically to the future, in contrast to the myopic 'gradient climbing' of natural selection.

Transhumanists and their fellow travelers urge humanity to prioritize the development of biotechnologies that would eliminate aging, delivering ‘an endless summer of literally perpetual youth.’ Aspiring not to age instantiates what philosopher Martha Nussbaum calls the yearning for ‘external transcendence,’ or the fundamental surpassing of human bounds due to confidence that life without them would be better. Based on Immanuel Kant’s account of the parameters of human understanding, I argue that engineering agelessness could not be a rational priority for (...) humanity on the level of public policy. This stance is complemented by an argument focused on individual decision-making in liberal-democratic milieus, where no governing conception of the good is presumed and the first-personal level matters greatly. Here, drawing on philosopher and cognitive scientist Laurie Ann Paul’s concept of ‘transformative experience,’ I maintain that individuals could not ‘rationally,’ meaning, here, ‘prudentially,’ say ‘yes’ to agelessness. Absorbing the irrationality of human zeal to eliminate aging, based on assurance that an ageless existence would be better, should spur a redoubled dedication to human flourishing. (shrink)

Jon Stewart's continued criticism of the inconsistency and irrationality of the American media, the notion of truthiness has relevance for any fan of The Daily Show. This chapter looks a little bit more closely at two notions of truthiness. Focusing on the first sense, it draws some parallels between truthiness and paradigm cases of motivated epistemic irrationality like wishful thinking and self‐deception. Then, it turns to the second sense to see if relying on our guts in the way (...) Colbert suggests might sometimes be rational. (shrink)

This paper introduces a model for evidence denial that explains this behavior as a manifestation of rationality and it is based on the contention that social values (measurable as utilities) often underwrite these sorts of responses. Moreover, it is contended that the value associated with group membership in particular can override epistemic reason when the expected utility of a belief or belief system is great. However, it is also true that it appears to be the case that it is still (...) possible for such unreasonable believers to reverse this sort of dogmatism and to change their beliefs in a way that is epistemically rational. The conjecture made here is that we should expect this to happen only when the expected utility of the beliefs in question dips below a threshold where the utility value of continued dogmatism and the associated group membership is no longer sufficient to motivate defusing the counter-evidence that tells against such epistemically irrational beliefs. (shrink)

This volume consists of the invited papers presented at the 23rd International Wittgenstein Conference held in Kirchberg, Austria in August 2000. Among the topics treated are: truth, psychologism, science, the nature of rational discourse, practical reason, contextualism, vagueness, types of rationality, the rationality of religious belief, and Wittgenstein. Questions addressed include: Is rationality tied to special sorts of contexts? ls rationality tied to language? Is scientific rationality the only kind of rationality? Is there something like a Western rationality? and: (...) Could we genetically engineer human beings to be less wicked? (shrink)

The strategy of this paper is to throw light on rational cognition and epistemic justification by examining irrationality. Epistemic irrationality is possible because we are reflexive cognizers, able to reason about and redirect some aspects of our own cognition. One consequence of this is that one cannot give a theory of epistemic rationality or epistemic justification without simultaneously giving a theory of practical rationality. A further consequence is that practical irrationality can affect our epistemic cognition. I (...) argue that practical irrationality derives from a general difficulty we have in overriding built-in shortcut modules aimed at making cognition more efficient, and all epistemic irrationality can be traced to this same source. A consequence of this account is that a theory of rationality is a descriptive theory, describing contingent features of a cognitive architecture, and it forms the core of a general theory of “voluntary” cognition — those aspects of cognition that are under voluntary control. It also follows that most of the so-called “rules for rationality” that philosophers have proposed are really just rules describing default (non- reflexive) cognition. It can be perfectly rational for a reflexive cognizer to break these rules. The “normativity” of rationality is a reflection of a built-in feature of reflexive cognition — when we detect violations of rationality, we have a tendency to desire to correct them. This is just another part of the descriptive theory of rationality. Although theories of rationality are descriptive, the structure of reflexive cognition gives philosophers, as human cognizers, privileged access to certain aspects of rational cognition. Philosophical theories of rationality are really scientific theories, based on inference to the best explanation, that take contingent introspective data as the evidence to be explained. (shrink)

The strategy of this paper is to throw light on rational cognition and epistemic justification by examining irrationality. Epistemic irrationality is possible because we are reflexive cognizers, able to reason about and redirect some aspects of our own cognition. One consequence of this is that one cannot give a theory of epistemic rationality or epistemic justification without simultaneously giving a theory of practical rationality. A further consequence is that practical irrationality can affect our epistemic cognition. I (...) argue that practical irrationality derives from a general difficulty we have in overriding built-in shortcut modules aimed at making cognition more efficient, and all epistemic irrationality can be traced to this same source. A consequence of this account is that a theory of rationality is a descriptive theory, describing contingent features of a cognitive architecture, and it forms the core of a general theory of “voluntary” cognition — those aspects of cognition that are under voluntary control. It also follows that most of the so-called “rules for rationality” that philosophers have proposed are really just rules describing default (non- reflexive) cognition. It can be perfectly rational for a reflexive cognizer to break these rules. The “normativity” of rationality is a reflection of a built-in feature of reflexive cognition — when we detect violations of rationality, we have a tendency to desire to correct them. This is just another part of the descriptive theory of rationality. Although theories of rationality are descriptive, the structure of reflexive cognition gives philosophers, as human cognizers, privileged access to certain aspects of rational cognition. Philosophical theories of rationality are really scientific theories, based on inference to the best explanation, that take contingent introspective data as the evidence to be explained. (shrink)

The literature on motivated irrationality has two primary foci: action and belief. This article explores two of the central topics falling under this rubric: akratic action (action exhibiting so-called weakness of will or deficient self-control) and motivationally biased belief (including self-deception). Among other matters, this article offers a resolution of Donald Davidson's worry about the explanation of irrationality. When agents act akratically, they act for reasons, and in central cases, they make rational judgments about what it is (...) best to do. The rationality required for that is in place. However, to the extent to which their actions are at odds with these judgments, they act irrationally. Motivationally biased believers test hypotheses and believe on the basis of evidence. Again there is a background of rationality. But owing to the influence of motivation, they violate general standards of epistemic rationality. (shrink)

Tieu, Matthew When we speak of rationality we generally speak of logic and reason in an abstract sense. However, one can also think of rationality in a practical sense. Practical rationality is our capacity to use reason and logic to form beliefs, arrive at decisions, and act in accordance with those beliefs and decisions. If we believe that we ought to do X then, all things being equal, we will do X. If we believe that we ought to refrain from (...) smoking, or drinking or having that extra serving of dessert, then all things being equal, the rational outcome from our subjective point of view is that we are moved to act in accordance with those beliefs. This is what defines humankind as rational agents. (shrink)

Summary The question of rationality and irrationality — conceived as characteristics of human behaviour — can be discussed either in empirical or in transcendental terms. In empirical terms political behaviour is called “irrational” when it is predictably counterproductive, i.e. when the agents are able, but fail to calculate the outcome of their actions. This is a “Machiavellian” concept of rationality and it involves no moral judgement. In transcendental terms rationality or irrationality are measured by standards of the “ (...) class='Hi'>rational human nature” as defined in Platonic, Kantian or Husserlian manner. These two perspectives are mutually exclusive and irreducible, as they involve philosophical options.RésuméRationalité ou irrationalité — considérées comme des caractéristiques du comportement humain — peuvent ětre discutées soit en termes empiriques, soit en termes transcendentaux. En termes empiriques, une conduite politique est qualifiée d'irrationnelle lorsqu'on peut prévoir qu'elle n'atteindra pas ses buts, c'est‐à‐dire lorsque les agents pourraient calculer l'effet de leurs actions, mais omettent de le faire. Il s'agit là d'un concept “machiavellien” de rationalité, qui n'implique pas de jugement moral. En termes transcendentaux, la rationalité ou l'irrationalité sont mesurées à l'aune de la “nature humaine rationnelle” telle qu'elle a été définie à la manière de Platon, de Kant ou de Husserl. Ces deux perspectives s'excluent mutuellement et sont irréductibles l'une à l'autre, car elles reposent sur des options philosophiques.ZusammenfassungDie Frage der Rationalität und Irrationalität — betrachtet als charakteristische Züge des menschlichen Verhaltens — kann auf entweder empirische oder transzendentale Art diskutiert werden. Empirisch wird politisches Verhalten »irrational« genannt, wenn es voraussagbar unzweckmässig ist, d.h. wenn die Handelnden zwar fähig sind, die Folgen ihrer Handlungen zu berechnen, es aber unterlassen. Das ist ein Machiavellischer Begriff von Rationalität, der kein moralisches Urteil involviert. Im transzendentalen Sinne werden Rationalität oder Irrationalität am Massstab »der rationalen menschlichen Natur« gemessen, wie dieser etwa durch Platon, Kant oder Husserl bestimmt worden ist. Diese zwei Perspektiven schliessen sich gegenseitig aus, da sie auf verschiedenen philosophischen Standpunkten beruhen. (shrink)

Rational analysis (Anderson 1990, 1991a) is an empiricalprogram of attempting to explain why the cognitive system isadaptive, with respect to its goals and the structure of itsenvironment. We argue that rational analysis has two importantimplications for philosophical debate concerning rationality. First,rational analysis provides a model for the relationship betweenformal principles of rationality (such as probability or decisiontheory) and everyday rationality, in the sense of successfulthought and action in daily life. Second, applying the program ofrational analysis to research (...) on human reasoning leads to a radicalreinterpretation of empirical results which are typically viewed asdemonstrating human irrationality. (shrink)

To secure cooperative opportunities people align their beliefs with the normative expectations of their social environment. These expectations are continuously managed by interactive reasoning, a process that results in dynamical pools of reasons. When people are more concerned about their social standing and reputation than truth, pools of reasons give rise to collective irrationalities. They determine what people should believe if they want to be known as a reliable group member. This account has implications for our understanding of human (...) class='Hi'>irrationality and how to deal with it. (shrink)

Many interpreters argue that irrational acts of exchange can count as rational and civic-minded for Hegel—even though, admittedly, the persons who are exchanging their property are usually unaware of this fact. While I do not want to deny that property exchange can count as rational in terms of ‘mutual recognition’ as interpreters claim, this proposition raises an important question: What about the irrationality and arbitrariness that individuals as property owners and persons consciously enjoy? Are they mere vestiges (...) of nature in Hegel’s system, or do they constitute a simple yet valid form of freedom that is not only a part of Hegel’s rational system of right, but its necessary starting point? I will argue the latter: The arbitrary, purely egoist self-definition of property owners is the simplest possible type of freedom for Hegel, which he dissects in order to show how the very arbitrary self-definition implicitly relies on an identity between persons, and hence foreshadows the more social forms of freedom Hegel will discuss later in his book. I make this argument by highlighting Hegel’s references to his discussion of atoms and freedom in his Logic of Being. (shrink)