Idealisations in normative models

Mark Colyvan

pp. 1337-1350

in: Stephan Hartmann, Chiara Lisciandra, Édouard Machery (eds), Formal epistemology meets experimental philosophy, Synthese 190 (8), 2013.

Abstract

In this paper I discuss the kinds of idealisations invoked in normative theories—logic, epistemology, and decision theory. I argue that very often the so-called norms of rationality are in fact mere idealisations invoked to make life easier. As such, these idealisations are not too different from various idealisations employed in scientific modelling. Examples of the latter include: fluids are incompressible (in fluid mechanics), growth rates are constant (in population ecology), and the gravitational influence of distant bodies can be ignored (in celestial mechanics). Thinking of logic, epistemology, and decision theory as normative models employing various idealisations of these kinds, changes the way we approach the justification of the models in question.