Hi all,

Our VSS this Thursday will be

Date: 3 April

Location: Pathfoot C22

Time: 3:15 pm

(Please note that we are aiming to have the refreshments arrive 3:00 so that we can informally gather before the talk begins)

Speaker: Hayden Wilkinson (Oxford)

Title: Regret aversion: A new consideration for rational choice

Abstract:

In this paper, I discuss preferences over gambles that seem intuitive, and that many real-world agents seem to hold, but that deviate from orthodox normative decision theory. These preferences even deviate from the various less orthodox decision theories designed to accommodate risk aversion. This is because such preferences exhibit not risk aversion, but instead regret aversion: a preference for one’s chosen option to be more likely to turn out better (or perhaps a lot better) than the alternatives. Is regret aversion rational? Plausibly, yes. Beyond mere intuitions about cases, I offer two further motivations for regret aversion being rational. The first is that it is needed to reflect at least some concern for doing what is objectively best, and it is plausible that such a concern is rational, especially in moral decision-making. The second motivation is that regret aversion correctly diagnoses and treats what’s wrong with the so-called ‘fanatical’ verdicts that orthodox decision theory gives us in cases of extremely low probabilities and extremely high stakes. But there are also reasons to think regret aversion irrational: it leads to violations of several widely-held and seemingly plausible principles of rationality. Perhaps these violations constitute a decisive objection to regret aversion. Or, if not, perhaps regret aversion constitutes a decisive objection to all normative decision theories so far proposed.

Bio:

Hayden is a Research Fellow at the Global Priorities Institute at the University of Oxford, as well as a Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College. Prior to Oxford, he earned his PhD from the Australian National University and held a visiting fellowship at Princeton University as a Fulbright Scholar. His research addresses a variety of questions that arise in high-stakes moral decision-making, particularly those that fall within decision theory, normative ethics, and applied ethics. His recent work has appeared in journals such as Ethics, the Australasian Journal of Philosophy, Philosophy & Public Affairs, and Noûs.

Zoom link for online participation: https://stir-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/98191793530?pwd=vluwk1X1iJoanRDkqtLnbvIcZCNL1J.1

Please join us for drinks and dinner at the Meadowlark after the talk.

Regards,

Ten