The Second International Conference on Foundations of Utility and Risk Theory was held in Venice, June 1984. This volume presents some of the papers delivered at FUR-84. (The First International Conference, FUR-82, was held in Oslo and some of the papers presented on that occasion were published by Reidel in the volume Foundations of Utility and Risk Theory with Applications, edited by Bernt P. Stigum and Fred Wenst~p). The theory of choice under uncertainty involves a vast range of controversial issues in many fields like economics, philosophy, psychology, mathematics and statistics. The idea of discussing these problems in international conferences has been successful: two conferences have been held and others will follow. The climate of the debate has changed in the meantime, partly as a result of these conferences. It is no more only a question of attacking or defending the neo-Bernoullian assumptions, but also of proposing wider generalizations and including new elements in the analysis of the decision process. For instance Amartya Sen - comparing the two current notions of rationality, internal consistency and self-interest pursuit introduces the concept of reasoning and considers the irrationality which may result from the failure of a positive correspondence between reasoning and choice or from a limited capacity of reasoning. Rationality is also considered with respect to the controversial axiom of strong independence. John C. Harsanyi introduces the concept of practical certainty, i. e.

In this volume we present some of the papers delivered at FUR-IV - the Fourth International Conference on Founda tions and Applications of Utility, Risk and Decision Theory in Budapest, June 1988. The FUR Conferences have provided an appreciated forum every two years since 1982 within which scientists can report recent issues and prospective applications of decision theory, and exchange ideas about controversial questions of this field. Focal points of the presented papers are: expected utility versus alterna tive utility models, concepts of risk and uncertainty, developments of game theory, and investigations of real decision making behaviour under uncertainty and/or in risky situations. We hope that this sample of papers will appeal to a wide spectrum of readers who are interested in and fami liar with this interesting and exciting issues of decision theory. A wide range of theoretical and practical questions is considered in papers included in this volume, and many of them closely related to economics. In fact, there were two Nobel-Laureates in economics among the participants: I. Herbert A. Simon (1978) and Maurice Allais (1988), who won the prize just after the conference. His paper deals with problems of cardinal utility. After a concise overview of the history and theory of cardinal utility he gives an estimate of the invariant cardinal utility function for its whole domain of variation (i. e.

This collection of articles contains contributions from a few of Werner Leinfellner's many friends and colleagues. Some of them are former students of Werner's. Others were colleagues of his at various American and European universities. Further, some have come to know Werner through his research, his long-standing editorship of Theory and Deci sion and his extensive participation in international conferences and congresses. The following articles are new to this volume. The areas covered are those in which Werner continues to play an active professional role. We offer them as a tribute to the many and multi-faceted contributions to the scientific enterprise for which Werner Leinfellner is so widely known. We believe such a festschrift to be fitting and long overdue. Because of the breadth of Werner's professional associations, it was difficult to select representatives from among his many spheres of influence. We apologize to the many scholars who could not be in cluded because of time and space considerations. Finally, we wish to express appreciation to Dean John Guilds of the University of Arkansas for providing financial support early on in the evolution of this project, to Jennifer Bauman for her bravura performance in copy-editing the manuscripts, and to our publisher at Reidel for bringing this volume to press.

Each volume in this series includes a collection of authoritative essays from the New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics, selected by the Editors to illustrate the range and diversity of economic thought on a particular topic.

JOHANN GOTSCHL Over the last decades, social philosophers, economists. sociologists, utility and game theorists, biologists, mathematicians, moral philosophers and philosophers have created totally new concepts and methods of understanding the function and role of humans in their modern societies. The years between 1953 and 1990 brought drastic changes in the scientific foundations and dynamic of today's society. A burst of entirely new, revolutionary ideas, similar to those which heralded the beginning of the twentieth century in physics, dominates the picture. This book also discusses the ongoing refutation of old concepts in the social sciences. Some of them are: the traditional concepts ofrationality, for example, based on maximization of interests, the linearity of axiomatic methods, methodological individualism, and the concept of a static society. Today the revolutionary change from a static view of our society to an evolutionary one reverberates through all social sciences and will dominate the twenty-first century. In an uncertain and risky world where cooperation and teamwork is getting more and more important, one cannot any longer call the maximization of one's own expectations of utility or interests "rational" .

Notions of probability and uncertainty have been increasingly prominant in modern economics. This book considers the philosophical and practical difficulties inherent in integrating these concepts into realistic economic situations. It outlines and evaluates the major developments, indicating where further work is needed. This book addresses: * probability, utility and rationality within current economic thought and practice * concepts of ignorance and indeterminancy * experimental economics * econometrics, with particular reference inference and estimation.

This Festschrift in honor ofChristian Seidl combines a group of prominent authors who are experts in areas like public economics, welfare economic, decision theory, and experimental economics in a unique volume. Christian Seidl who has edited together with Salvador Barber` a ` and Peter Hammond the Handbook of Utility Theory (appearing at Kluwer Academic Publishers/Springer Economics), has dedicated most of his research to utility and decision theory, social choice theory, welfare economics, and public economics. During the last decade, he has turned part of his attention to a research tool that is increasingly gaining in importance in economics: the laboratory experiment. This volume is an attempt to illuminate all facets of Christian Seidl’s ambitious research agenda by presenting a collection of both theoretical and expe- mental papers on Utility,Choice,andWelfare written by his closest friends, former students, and much valued colleagues. Christian Seidl was born on August 5, 1940, in Vienna, Austria. Beginning Winter term 1962/63, he studied Economics and Business Administration at the Vienna School of Economics (then “Hochschule fff ̈ ur ̈ Welthandel”). 1966 he was awarded an MBA by the Vienna School of Economics and 1969 a doctoral degree in Economics. In October 1968 Christian became a research assistant at the Institute of Economics at the University of Vienna. 1973 he acquired his habilitation (right to teach) in Economics — supervised by Wilhelm Weber — from the Department of Law and Economics of the University of Vienna. He was awarded the Dr.