Abstract
When I began to think about normative questions of rationality and morality, I soon became a consequentialist. This is the natural result of questioning socially established institutional and moral rules and their metaphysical underpinnings. A critical mind cannot accept a duty to do this or that just because it is told that this duty is implied by some general principle. The immediate question is: Where does this principle come from and how is it justified? And if this question cannot be answered satisfactorily, some critical minds become normative sceptics and others search for rational grounds. Those who search for rational grounds easily end up with one form or other of consequentialism. A rational person does not act by established convention or acquired habit but chooses her action as a means to cause the preferred effects. Thus it seems that the rational person tries to optimize, and this seems to imply that moral action as a variant of rational action should optimize results from a universal point of view, e. g. by maximizing the sum of individual utilities.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Jon Elster, Ulysses and the Sirens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1979.
Jon Elster, Sour Grapes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1983.
Jon Elster, Subversion der Rationalität. Frankfurt a. M./New York: Campus 1987.
Gertrude Ezorsky, “A Defense of Rule Utilitarianism”, in: Journal of Philosophy,65, 1968, pp.533–544.
David Gauthier, Morals by Agreement. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1986.
J.C. Harsanyi, “Rule Utilitarianism and Decision Theory”, in: Erkenntnis,11, 1977, pp.25–53.
J.C. Harsanyi, “Basic Moral Decision and Alternative Concepts of Rationality”, in: Social Theory and Practice,9, 1983, pp.231–244.
J.C. Harsanyi, “Does Reason tell us What Moral Code to Follow and, Indeed, to Follow any Moral Code at all?”, in: Ethics, 96, 1985, pp. 42–55.
Nigel Howard, Paradoxes of Rationality. Cambridge/Mass.: MIT Press 1971.
David Lyons, Forms and Limits of Utilitarianism. New York, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1965. John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern, Theory of Games and Economic Behavior. Princeton: Princeton University Press 1944.
Julian Nida-Rümelin, “Practical Reason or Metapreferences? An Undogmatic Defense of Kantian Morality”, in: Theory and Decision,30, 1991, pp.133–162.
Julian Nida-Rümelin, Kritik des Konsequentialismus. München: Oldenbourg 1993, 1995.
Julian Nida-Rümelin, Economic Rationality and Practical Reason. Dordrecht: Kluwer 1997 [in print]. Thomas C. Schelling, Micromotives and macrobehavior. New York: Norton 1978.
Reinhard Selten, “The Chain Store Paradox”, in: Theory and Decision,9, 1978, pp.127–159.
Amartya Sen, “Rational Fools: A Critique of the Behavioural Functions of Economic Theory”, in: Philosophy and Public Affairs,6, 1976/77, pp.317–344.
Raimo Tuomela, The Importance of Us. A Philosophical Study of Basic Social Motions. Stanford/Cal.: Stanford University Press 1995.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1998 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Nida-Rümelin, J. (1998). Structural Rationality in Game Theory. In: Leinfellner, W., Köhler, E. (eds) Game Theory, Experience, Rationality. Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook [1997], vol 5. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1654-3_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-1654-3_7
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-4992-6
Online ISBN: 978-94-017-1654-3
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive