Rationality and Decision
Research Network

A research initiative
funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research

2009 - 2012
University of Groningen, The Netherlands

INTRODUCTION

Formal models of theoretical rationality have seen major recent changes. The consequences for practical rationality have yet to be worked out. Over the years 2009 to 2012 a network of experts has held a series of targeted research meetings to address this question.

R&D RESEARCH NETWORK

The research network for rationality and decision was led by Jan-Willem Romeijn and Olivier Roy. Members were: Johan van Benthem, Luc Bovens, Richard Bradley, Jacob Chandler, Michael Cozic, Franz Dietrich, Richard Dietz, Igor Douven, Stephan Hartmann, Martin van Hees, Conrad Heilman, Brian Hill, Barteld Kooi, Hannes Leitgeb, Christian List, Eric Pacuit, Jeanne Peijnenburg, Wlodek Rabinowicz, Sonja Smets, Kai Spiekermann, Jan Sprenger, Katie Steele, Annika Wallin, and Jon Williamson.

Over the years we have extended the network with a number of people: Alexandru Baltag, Seamus Bradley, Mareille Drechsler, Catarina Dutilh-Novaes, Patryk Dziurosz-Serafinowicz, Conrad Heilmann, Ronnie Hermens, Soroush Raffee Rad, and Rory Smead.

MEETINGS

The following meetings were held by the research network.

• A launch meeting was held at the University of Groningen, in tandem with Progic 2009. Guests were Jim Joyce and Teddy Seidenfeld.
• A second meeting was organised at the University of Leuven, where Didier Dubois, Alan Hajek, Hans Rott, and Vladimir Vovk were our guests. This orientation meeting led to two focused research meetings.
• The third meeting was on deliberation at the London School of Economics, with Brian Skyrms, and Henry Prakken as guests.
• The fourth meeting was on radical uncertainty at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. Guests were Kevin Kelly and Leonard Smith.
• A final meeting was held again at theFaculty of Philosophy in Groningen. A more detailed report of this last meeting can be found further down this page.

SPECIAL ISSUES

We are producing two special issues reporting the results of the focused meetings. Both will most likely appear in early 2015.

• The journal Erkenntnis will publish a special issue on "Radical Uncertainty".
• The journal Economics and Philosophy is going to publish a symposium on "Deliberation".

FRONTIERS OF RATIONALITY AND DECISION 2012

In our final meeting, organised with local support from Patryk Dziurosz-Serafinowicz and Ronnie Hermens, we looked beyond the frontiers of research on formal philosophical approaches to reasoning and decision making. We had five guests: Branden Fitelson, Jeff Helzner, Simon Huttegger, Katya Tentori, and Kevin Zollman.

Furthermore there were presentations by contributing speakers and by a number of network participants: Johan van Benthem, Richard Bradley, Luc Bovens, Catarina Dutilh-Novaes, Martin van Hees, Conrad Heilman, Eric Pacuit, Wlodek Rabinowicz, Annika Wallin, and Rory Smead. Here is a document with programme and abstracts.

All the talks during the event were filmed. They can be viewed here:

Wednesday August 29, 2012

• Opening words and talk by Branden Fitelson - Accuracy, Coherence, and Evidence
• Johan van Benthem, Eric Pacuit, Branden Fitelson - Discussion session on formal epistemology
• Martin Rechenauer, Peter Broessel, Alexandra Hill - Contributed papers I
• Jason Konek, Hanti Lin, Erik Quaeghebeur - Contributed papers II

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We are very grateful to the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research NWO for providing financial support.