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    Expected utility comparisons presuppose well-defined prob... — Carmelics
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    Challenges→It is better to evaluate a decision by comparing its expected utility to the expected utilities of rival decisions.

    Expected utility comparisons presuppose well-defined probability assignments over outcomes, which are unavailable in genuine Knightian uncertainty.

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    Reasons For

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    Reason for
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    • 1.Knightian uncertainty involves fundamentally unquantifiable risks where historical frequency data and theoretical models both fail to constrain probabilities.
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    • 2.Expected utility theory mathematically requires precise probability assignments; vague or range-based probabilities cannot satisfy its axiomatic structure.
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    • 3.When probabilities are unavailable, agents cannot compute expected values, rendering utility comparisons between acts formally indeterminate.
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    Reasons Against

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    • 1.Agents regularly make rational choices under Knightian uncertainty using heuristics, satisficing, and comparative preference orderings without precise probabilities.
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    • 2.Subjective probability assignments (credences) can represent genuine uncertainty through imprecise or set-valued probabilities, which EU theory can accommodate.
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    • 3.The claim conflates the impossibility of objective probability with the impossibility of rational choice, but uncertainty doesn't entail irrationality.
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    Related

    Agents regularly make rational choices under Knightian uncertainty using heurist...Expected utility theory mathematically requires precise probability assignments;...It is better to evaluate a decision by comparing its expected utility to the exp...Knightian uncertainty involves fundamentally unquantifiable risks where historic...
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    Subjective probability assignments (credences) can represent genuine uncertainty...The claim conflates the impossibility of objective probability with the impossib...When probabilities are unavailable, agents cannot compute expected values, rende...

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