Questions tagged [rationality]
Rationality is the use of reason to find the truth based on facts and to decide how to act to achieve desired goals. Also use this tag for questions regarding any view or intellectual movement which holds rationality in high regard and accepts it as the only legitimate way to get to the truth.
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Churchill said that democracy is the worst form of government - except for all the rest. So if democracy is the least worst, how can it be improved?
I was intrigued by a recent question about which forms of government are better or worse. If they are all bad, as Churchill said, but some are better than others, how do we improve his least worst - ...
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Justification for the Moral Ought
For this question, I would like to take the axiom of moral realism, as defined by SEP:
moral claims do purport to report facts and are true if they get the facts right. Moreover, they hold, at least ...
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Who‘s to say that beliefs held because of rational reasons are indeed more justified than beliefs held because of emotional ones
Sorry if this is unclear. I am having a bit of trouble formulating this question but I will try to make it more clear by use of an example.
Say for example, two people hold the belief that God (let’s ...
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Is free will skepticism self-refuting?
If humans are supposed to use reason to support their claims but lack free will then it seems like we don't exercise rational thought because we're not free to adjudicate from among the reasons. If ...
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Questions Regarding Rational Egoism
I was reading this article and I have many questions :
https://iep.utm.edu/egoism/
What does Rand mean by the concept of "selfless selfishness"?
What exactly does rational mean in rational ...
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Is it ever rational or justified to believe in a claim X based on eyewitness accounts if X seems to contradict mainstream scientific theories? [duplicate]
Can the testimony of multiple credible witnesses challenge the conventional understanding of the laws of physics? If several trustworthy individuals report events that appear to contradict well-...
user66156
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Why is the Newcomb problem confusing?
[Note: After I made this post, the title and the post have been criticised as badly phrased and/or opinionated. I partially agreed with that and made some initial modifications. However, after others ...
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Defending Pereboom's deliberation-compatibilism from Widerker's objections, conceptualizing "agents" as Turing machines
I am trying to overcome David Widerker's objection to Derk Pereboom's account of rational deliberation. I include both Pereboom's account and Widerker's objection as a reminder/introduction at the end ...
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A contradiction in Feldman's rule for suspension of judgment?
In Reasonable Religious Disagreements, Feldman argues for the following.
(#) On issues where there is widespread disagreement between epistemic peers, the rational approach is to suspend judgment.
I ...
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Does suspending judgment require judgment?
In Reasonable Religious Disagreements, Feldman argues that much of the time when there is widespread disagreement over some issue, the rational approach is to suspend judgment. I have a question about ...
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What are some cases in which we can use reason but not logic?
I am curious whether there have been philosophers arguing that there are contexts in which we can use reason, but not logic. For example, some authors might say that logic cannot be used in the very ...
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Are two persons equally rational in choosing different dogmatic stopping points in their chains of justification as per the Münchhausen trilemma?
In epistemology, the Münchhausen trilemma is a thought experiment
intended to demonstrate the theoretical impossibility of proving any
truth, even in the fields of logic and mathematics, without ...
user66156
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Simple question really: If pi is an irrational number, what does that say about circles and our measurements?
If we accept that pi is an irrational number and then we continue our discussion that pi is just described/accepted as the ratio of the circumference and diameter of the circle.
My question now poses, ...
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Shortcomings in the following definition of "rationality"?
I'm going to try to engage with the following Encyclopedia Britannica article on "rationality".
Rationality, the use of knowledge to attain goals.
I have a bigger personal project to ...
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Are there certain plausible assumptions, such as block or physical determinism, that lead us to conclude that everything we do is equally rational?
It seems that with certain assumptions about reality, everything we can do is equally rational.
Max Tegmark's theory of the multiverse, often referred to as the "mathematical universe hypothesis&...
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How many dimensions does time have?
As phrased in the title, How many dimensions does time have?
If one considers time by itself (in isolation from other putative phenomena such as space or spacetime), what can be said about the ...
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Do people who "withhold judgement" also have a burden of proof?
I will illustrate my question with several examples involving 3 individuals: A, B, C.
Example 1: The shape of the Earth
A defends the claim that the Earth is round.
B defends the claim that the Earth ...
user66156
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Is atheism a proposition?
Theism proposes the existence of God. Atheism makes no proposition, it is simply the absence of a belief in God. Theism is the proposition. Atheism is the negation. The negation is not a proposition. ...
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Who wrote this uncited quote?
The following uncited quotation appears in The Early Modern European Catachism by Joshua Gibbs. He includes many quotes from philosophy and literature but does not cite any of his sources. Would ...
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Is the reasonableness of a belief or moral claim relative?
Is the reasonableness of a belief or moral claim relative? I found some articles on the ethical word "reasonable", but lack access. Apparently it is key to "liberal" political ...
user66697
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Using 'love' to make sense of knowledge
I love my spouse, but I suspect (I think I believe the are) they are cheating on me, and I've even heard my friends gossip about my spouse's affairs etc.. But I love my spouse, so do not think I know -...
user66697
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Can the sexual double standard be justified according to this logic/reasoning? [closed]
The sexual double standard is a social phenomenon where the sexual value of males and females are evaluated differently, based on their sexual history with sexual partners of the opposite sex.
Given ...
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Is it ever rational to stumble onto the conjunction fallacy in probability?
The conjunction fallacy is the phenomenon where many people believe that the probability of the event (A AND B) is strictly greater than the probability of the event A. It is usually thought of as an ...
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Is desire closed under logical equivalence?
Suppose some person P desires a statement S to hold. Also, S is logically equivalent to S'. Does this mean that P desires S' also? Basically, is desire closed under logical equivalence?
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What is the basis of the sunk cost fallacy?
Is the so called sunk cost fallacy truly a total fallacy, or does it have some kernel of truth? Certainly it is a widespread instinctive/impulsive form of reasoning. Presumably it must then have had ...
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How does one test their credences of belief?
Suppose I feel that event A is more plausible than event B. How can I test, verify, or falsify this?
For example, suppose I have a belief that my partner is cheating on me. Suppose I have another ...
user62907
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How to rationally decide between two events A and B having happened
If someone listed you an event A and an event B, told you that only one of those events happened today, and then asked you which one would you bet on, how should one make this bet?
Initially, I was ...
user62907
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Which philosophers have considered irrational conviction
It seems a characteristic of humans to be convinced about a matter in the absence of overwhelming evidence, even where logic suggests that are other valid alternative positions to take. We see this in ...
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Does philosophy rely on intuitions? If so, does this mean all of philosophy is nothing more than hunches?
Does philosophy rely on intuitions? If so, and all of philosophy comes down to intuition, how can one person be deemed to be more rational than other? In this world, most would agree that you cannot ...
user62907
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Lumen naturale, Lumen gratiae, Lumen fidei, what are they?
Unfortunately, I'm unable to locate a good source to cite on these terms you see in the question title.
Below is a short abstract based on Google.
Natural light (lumen naturale), equivalent to lumen ...
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Is there a philosophy ideology that "whatever is beneficial to me, is the reasonable thing"?
I have run into such people more frequently, and it is: whatever that is beneficial to them, that's the correct thing. (or the reasonable thing).
Is there a philosophy explanation or term for this ...
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Can you lose something that you don't care about?
I'm new to philosophy and as of now, I don't have any knowledge related to what he said in order to properly redirect him to a source that mentions something similar. His philosophy goes like this:
If ...
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Is it irrational to care more about the last candy in the bag than the others, and if so, does the fallacy have a name?
I have a bag of candies. Someone else asks if they can have one. If the bag is still full, I have no issues, and tell them they are welcome to take one. If there is only one left in the bag, I am much ...
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Given a positive ontological claim X, is not-X the default position?
Given a positive ontological claim X, I see at least four different subjective positions one could adopt regarding X:
I believe that the evidence provides persuasive reason to believe that X is true (...
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Isn't it rationality circular reasoning?
Rationalists say that reason is the source of ultimate truth or logic. Reason is absolute but if reason is absolute then won't defending it through reason be a circular reasoning? Like you can't ...
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Can you help me understand Derek Parfit's thought experiment?
This is an excerpt from Parfit's Reasons and Persons. I can't totally wrap my head around it. Of course, I get the basic idea: Kate is a writer who works too hard. Her work makes her happy. But she ...
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Argument for a social conception of objective morality
What might some objections to this argument be?
By definition a rational agent is, when exercising their agency, evaluating different courses of action before deciding among them. The actions they ...
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Graham Priest's "escape from Hell" puzzle
The gist of the puzzle is that every day, the Devil offers to flip a coin to see if you escape; one loss and you're guaranteed to be stuck forever, but each day the probability of a winning toss ...
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Is a decision made before the rationalization?
Well, I was listening to a podcast in Spanish and a great scientist was saying that there are studies that are seeing that decision making is not as rational as we think it is. He says that the moment ...
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What is "rational"?
Rational = x
x = ?
I've been defining words for myself for a while and one that I haven't defined rational yet. Anyone have a good definition for one, on a basis of utilitarianism.
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Does Aumann's agreement theorem extend to moral propositions?
Aumann's agreement theorem says:
two perfectly rational agents with the same prior estimate of an event's probability and common knowledge of one another's posterior estimates cannot come to ...
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Does determinism prevent rationality?
If hard determinism is true, and our thoughts are merely the results of a causal chain of atomic interactions, are reason and logic illusory?
This matter has likely been discussed in another thread, ...
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Would it be fallacious to assume rationality presumes pre-emptive knowledge?
In short, would it be a fallacy to presume that rational thinking (as opposed to empirical thinking) leads to the conclusion that all knowledge is innately contained a priori?
In that sense, all ...
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How do Rational Egoists Respond to Psychology?
Rational egoism is the position that humans always act rationally and to further the actor's self-interest. But ever since Carl Jung psychologists have pretty much been in agreement that humans do not ...
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What is the distinguishing factor between convincing and threatening?
What is the distinguishing factor between convincing and threatening?
I want my friend to restrain from doing an action. I am showing him the bad consequences of the action thus, I am trying to ...
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What's the difference between morality and rationality?
What's the difference between morality and rationality?
Some of my friends argue with me saying,
What is rational is what is moral
I do not believe so because, I believe there are absolute moral ...
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Does Parfit's self-interest theory imply that you should be never self-denying?
In "Reasons and Persons", Derek Parfit introduces a "self-interest" theory of rationality, which says you should ensure that your life goes as well as possible. In §3 (p. 9 in my ...
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Is rational to logical as rectangle is to square?
That is, if X is logical, is it necessarily rational? What's an example of something that is rational, but not logical. If logical does not necessarily imply rational, what's an example of something ...
user50882
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Question about Cogito, ergo sum
As far as I know Decartes tried to prove that he existed from the fact that he was thinking.
And he thought this was only proof. My question is following:
-- why is the argument brought up above, ...
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How does Kant argue that all people have moral dignity
How does Kant argue that all people have moral dignity, the ability to conform to a moral law in which all people are ends only.
I have not substantially read Kant, but it occurred to me, suddenly / ...
user49534