Abstract
The concept of transformative decision rules provides auseful tool for analyzing what is often referred to as the`framing', or `problem specification', or `editing' phase ofdecision making. In the present study we analyze a fundamentalaspect of transformative decision rules, viz. permutability. A setof transformative decision rules is, roughly put, permutable justin case it does not matter in which order the rules are applied.It is argued that in order to be normatively reasonable, sets oftransformative decision rules have to satisfy a number ofstructural conditions that together imply permutability. Thisformal result gives support to a non-sequential theory of framing,i.e., a theory which prescribes no uniform order in which differentsteps in the framing process have to be performed.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
Brim, O. G.: 1962, Personality and Decision Processes, Studies in the Social Psychology of Thinking, Stanford.
Gärdenfors, P. and N. E. Sahlin: 1982, in P. Gärdenfors and N. E. Sahlin (1988), Unreliable Probabilities, Risk Taking, and Decision Making, pp. 323–334.
Gärdenfors, P. and N. E. Sahlin (eds.): 1988, Decision, Probability, and Utility, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Hansson, S. O.: 2001, The Structure of Values and Norms, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Levi, I.: 1980, The Enterprise of Knowledge, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA.
Luce, D. and H. Raiffa: 1957, Games and Decisions: Introduction and Critical Survey, Wiley and Sons, New York.
Peterson, M.: 2003, ‘Transformative Decision Rules', Erkenntnis 58(1), 71–85.
Quine, W. V. O.: 1992, Pursuit of Truth, Harvard University Press, Boston, MA.
Resnik, M.: 1993, Choices. An Introduction to Decision Theory, University of Minnesota Press.
Savage, L. J.: 1954, The Foundations of Statistics, 2nd ed., Wiley and Sons, Dover (1972).
Whipple, C. (ed.): 1987, De Minimis Risk, Plenum Press, New York.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Peterson, M. Transformative Decision Rules, Permutability, and Non-Sequential Framing of Decision Problems. Synthese 139, 387–403 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:SYNT.0000024885.09894.ba
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:SYNT.0000024885.09894.ba