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On the Significance of Choice Sets with Incompatibilities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Vivian Charles Walsh
Vivian Charles Walsh*
Affiliation:
Sir George Williams University
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Abstract

The axiom of comparability has been a fundamental part of mathematical choice theory from its beginnings. This axiom was a natural first assumption for a theory of choice originally constructed to explain decision making where other assumptions such as continuous divisibility of choice spaces could legitimately also be made. Once the generality of application of formal choice theory becomes apparent, it also becomes apparent that both continuity assumptions and the axiom of comparability may be unduly restrictive and lead to the neglect of decision situations which are important and which can be handled on a modified axiom set. These considerations bear on the philosophical analysis of the concept of rational decision.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 34 , Issue 3 , September 1967 , pp. 243 - 250
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1967

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Footnotes

∗∗

The research involved in writing this paper was carried out under the graduate program in Economics of Sir George Williams University as part of research for a seminar given by me in that program in Axiomatic Choice Theory.

References

REFERENCES

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