In Defence of Objective Bayesianism (Hardcover)

Hardcover. How strongly should you believe the various propositions that you can express?That is the key question facing Bayesian epistemology. Subjective Bayesians hold that it is largely (though not entirely) up to the agent as to which degrees of belief to adopt. Objective Bayesians, on the other hand, maintain that appropriate degrees of belief are largely (though not entirely) determined by the agent's evidence. This book states and defends a versionof objective Bayesian epistemology. According to this version, objective Bayesianism is characterized by three norms: Probability - degrees of belief should be probabilities Calibration - they should be calibrated with evidence Equivocation - they should otherwise equivocate between basic outcomesObjective Bayesianism has been challenged on a number of different fronts. For example, some claim it is poorly motivated, or fails to handle qualitative evidence, or yields counter-intuitive degrees of belief after updating, or suffers from a failure to learn from experience. It has also been accused of beingcomputationally intractable, susceptible to paradox, language dependent, and of not being objective enough.Especially suitable for graduates or researchers in philosophy of science, foundationsof statistics and artificial intelligence, the book argues that these criticisms can be met and that objective Bayesianism is a promising theory with an exciting agenda for further research. Objective Bayesianism is a methodological theory that is currently applied in statistics, philosophy, artificial intelligence, physics and other sciences. This book develops the formal and philosophical foundations of the theory, at a level accessible to a graduate student with some familiarity with mathematical notation. This item is printed on demand. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.…