Incommensurability and Vagueness – From Values to Probabilities

Abstract

Setting off from the Fitting-Attitudes analysis of value, according to which x is valuable if it is fitting to have a proattitude towards x, I will go through my account of different types of value relations. On this account, it is conceptually possible to possess in some cases normative freedom with respect to proattitudes. I will then suggest that a structurally analogous approach could be used to model probability. The suggestion is that to be probable is to be credible: roughly, x is probable if it is fitting (given evidence) to assign high credence to x. Here, again, normative freedom with respect to credences is conceptually possible. This yields a rich taxonomy of different types of qualitative probability relations.

• Professor Wlodek Rabinowicz's areas of research are moral philosophy, value theory, decision theory and philosophical logic.