Self-regulation, precaution and collective decision

University Of Utah, Salt Lake City UT

Investigators

Abstract

The PI plans to develop an alternative to the theory of expected utility (cost/benefit analysis), which is pervasively used in making decisions. She aims to use the following as inspiration for the alternative theory: The capacity of biological organisms to avoid catastrophe through the use of triggers or reference points. The project will explore how regulation by reference points could be used to generate decision theory principles. Cost-benefit analysis grew out of 20th century British moral theory, especially Utilitarianism, culminating in the publication of von Neumann and Morgenstern?s seminal doctrine, the theory of expected utility (EU). According to EU, to be rational in practical matters is simply to maximize expected utility. But EU treats risk evenly wherever it finds it: increments of hangnail risk are treated on a par with same-size increments of catastrophic risk. This seems to be irrational, especially if the catastrophic outcome in question is irreversible. This leads to the question as to whether there is a better, more precautionary, model of approaching catastrophic risk. Physiology suggests such a model of caution by way of organic systems that organize their activities around reference points or triggers. When an approaches a reference point, a self-regulatory mechanisms triggers the damping of further activities in the direction of catastrophe. That is to say, physiological systems possess cautionary mechanisms designed explicitly for "putting on the brakes." As a result, organisms are enormously stable, capable of regulating internal environments to within very narrow tolerances of ideal values for temperatures and toxicity. This project will study the theoretical foundations of regulating social and decisional systems (either individual or communal) via reference points. Although the core of this project is philosophical, the results of it will be significant to a broad range of researchers pursuing theoretical inquiries on risk and the conduct of ordinary life in the face of risk, such as risk analysts, decision theorists, economists, philosophers of economics, motivation psychologists, and philosophers of practical reason. The study will also promote interdisciplinarity (joining risk analysis with physiology, for instance). The findings of this project will be broadly disseminated to scholars, activists and policy-makers.