Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T07:59:42.829Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

On is an ought: Levels of analysis and the descriptive versus normative analysis of human reasoning

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2009

Walter Schroyens
Walter Schroyens
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Gent, B-1000 Gent, Belgium. Walter.Schroyens@Ugent.behttp://ppw.kuleuven.be/reason/schroyens
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Algorithmic-level specifications carry part of the explanatory burden in most psychological theories. It is, thus, inappropriate to limit a comparison and evaluation of theories to the computational level. A rational analysis considers people's goal-directed and environmentally adaptive rationality; it is not normative. Adaptive rationality is by definition non-absolute; hence, neither deductive logic nor Bayesian probability theory has absolute normative status.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , February 2009 , pp. 101 - 102
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, J. R. (1990) The adaptive character of thought. Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Chater, N., Oaksford, M., Nakisa, R. & Redington, M. (2003) Fast, frugal and rational: How rational norms explain behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 90:63–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Damer, E. T. (2005) Attacking faulty reasoning: A practical guide to fallacy-free arguments, 5th edition.Thomson Wadsworth.Google Scholar
Dennett, D. (1987) The intentional stance. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Franks, B. (1995) On explanation in the cognitive sciences: Competence, idealization, and the failure of the classical cascade. British Journal of the Philosophy of Science 46(4):475–502.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franks, B. (1999) Idealizations, competence and explanation: A response to Patterson. British Journal of the Philosophy of Science 50:735–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oaksford, M. & Chater, N. (1998a) Rationality in an uncertain world. Psychology Press.Google Scholar
Oaksford, M. & Chater, N. (2007) Bayesian rationality: The probabilistic approach to human reasoning. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rips, L. J. (2002) Reasoning imperialism. In: Common sense, reasoning, and rationality, ed. Elio, R., pp. 215–35. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schroyens, W. (in press) Logic and/in psychology: The paradoxes of material implication and psychologism in the cognitive science of human reasoning. In: Cognition and conditionals: Probability and logic in human thoughts, eds. Oaksford, M. & Chater, N.. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar