Paul Anand – författare

The author describes and evaluates a number of existing criticisms of the formal theory of rationality and subjective expected utility theory. The latter rests on axioms that are usually regarded as principles of rationality; that is, principles that a rational person would never want to violate. The author claims that these axioms cannot be shown to be principles of rationality in this sense and provides his own axiomatic alternative account of rational choice. He finds that rationality is not a behavioural entity, but rather has to do with the relation between an agent's preferences and his or her behaviour. The book rejuvenates the old risk uncertainty distinction and draws together many of the critiques of the standard axioms such as transitivity and independence.

What is human happiness and how can we promote it? These questions are central to human existence and Happiness Explained draws on scientific research from economics, psychology, and philosophy, as well as a range of other disciplines, to outline a new paradigm in which human flourishing plays a central role in the assessment of national and global progress. It shows why the traditional national income approach is limited as a measure of human wellbeing and demonstrates how the contributors to happiness, wellbeing, and quality of life can be measured and understood across the human life course. Discussing wide-ranging aspects, from parenting, decent employment, friendship, education, and health in old age, through to money, autonomy, and fairness, as well as personal strategies and governmental polices used in the pursuit of happiness, it offers a science-based understanding of human flourishing.Written by an economist involved in helping governmental organisations move 'beyond GDP', Happiness Explained shows how a wide range of factors that contribute to better and happier lives and how, together, they provide a new blueprint for the assessment of progress in terms of personal wellbeing.

In this book, Paul Anand examines the normative interpretation of Subjective Expected Utility (SEU). He tests the philosophical and logical basis for associating SEU with rational choice. Decision theorists have increasingly come to accept the experimental evidence that subjects systematically violate the axiomatic assumptions of SEU, and as a result the past decade has witnessed an explosion of mathematical models that seek to capture this behaviour. A current issue is whether axioms of SEU really are canons of rationality. Anand discusses whether the new decision-theoretic models are more than just accounts of irrational behaviour. The main themes of the book are that, empirically, SEU is false, and that normatively it imposes unnecessary constraints on rational agency. Problems with Bayesianism are introduced and it is shown that useful distinctions between risk and uncertainty (in a Keynesian sense) can be made. Some of the radical methodological changes in economics that underpin theoretical developments in decision theory and economics are also discussed.

The Handbook of Rational and Social Choice provides an overview of issues arising in work on the foundations of decision theory and social choice over the past three decades. Drawing on work by economic theorists mainly, but also with contributions from political science, philosophy and psychology, the collection shows how the related areas of decision theory and social choice have developed in their applications and moved well beyond the basic models of expected utility and utilitarian approaches to welfare economics.Containing twenty-three contributions, in many cases by leading figures in their fields, the handbook shows how the normative foundations of economics have changed dramatically as more general and explicit models of utility and group choice have been developed. This is perhaps the first time these developments have been brought together in a manner that seeks to identify and make accessible the recent themes and developments that have been of particular interest to researchers in recent years. The collection will be of particular value to researchers in economics with interests in utility or welfare but it will also be of interest to any social scientist or philosopher interested in theories of rationality or group decision-making.