[Divulgacao] Confª. Prof. John Broome

Fri Nov 4 14:14:44 WET 2005

Integrado no CICLO DE CONFERÊNCIAS SOBRE DECISÃO, organizado pelo Instituto de Investigação Interdisciplinar da Universidade de Coimbra em associação com o INESC Coimbra e a Faculdade de Economia da Universidade de Coimbra vai realizar-se  a seguinte conferência:

Sexta-feira, 11 de Novembro de 2005, às 14h30
Prof. John Broome (University of Oxford, UK) 
Título: Deciding by practical reasoning
Comentador: Prof. Joaquim Feio  (FEUC)
Local: Sala Keynes (Entrada livre)

O Prof. John Broome é "White's Professor of Moral Philosophy" no Fellow of Corpus Christi College da Universidade de Oxford. Licenciou-se em Matemática e Economia pela Universidade de Cambridge e doutorou-se em Economia nos EUA pelo MIT. Possui ainda um Mestrado em Filosofia pela Universidade de Londres. Antes de se mudar para Oxford, leccionou nas universidades de Londres, Bristol e St. Andrews, entre outras actividades como professor visitante em variados países. Além da sua formação, a lista dos livros que publicou espelha bem o seu ecletismo: "The Microeconomics of Capitalism" (Academic Press), "Weighing Goods: Equality, Uncertainty and Time" (Blackwell), "Counting the Cost of Global Warming" (White Horse Press), "Ethics Out of Economics" (Cambridge University Press) e "Weighing Lives" (Oxford University Press).

Nesta conferência, John Broome falará  os processos de raciocínio associados à tomada de decisão. O resumo enviado pelo autor é o seguinte:

<<We acquire our intentions in various ways, and one of them is by making a decision. To decide is to form an intention deliberately - that is by a process of deliberation or, in other words, by reasoning. This talk will investigate processes of reasoning that conclude in an intention. This sort of reasoning is traditionally identified as practical reasoning, to distinguish it from theoretical reasoning, which is reasoning that concludes in a belief. Practical reasoning was studied by Aristotle, but David Hume denied it even exists; Hume thought all reasoning is theoretical. His scepticism about practical reasoning persists today. Many philosophers today think the nearest thing there is to practical reasoning is reasoning about what we ought to do. This sort of reasoning concludes in a belief about what we ought to do, not in an intention. So it is theoretical reasoning about normative matters, rather than genuinely practical reasoning. According to these philosophers, if we make decisions at all, we do not make them by reasoning.
One purpose of this talk will be to respond to Hume's scepticism. Ishall develop an account of reasoning in general that includes practical reasoning as one species. On my account, reasoning is an activity by means of which we can bring ourselves to satisfy some of the requirements of rationality. I shall explain how reasoning is a real activity - something we do rather than something that happens to us. So when we make a decision it is really we who decide. I shall also give an general account of the nature of requirements of 
rationality, and formulate some specific requirements. Some are theoretical requirements on the structure of our beliefs. For example, rationality requires us not to have beliefs that contradict each other. Others requirements are practical, by which I mean that they are requirements on our intentions. Among the practical requirements are requirements of instrumental rationality. One is the requirement that we intend whatever we believe to be a necessary means to an end that we intend. I shall explain how an activity of reasoning can bring us to satisfy this and other instrumental requirements. I shall also examine a non-instrumental requirement of rationality: that we intend to do whatever we believe we ought to do. This is the crucial link between theoretical rationality and practical rationality; it is through this requirement that theoretical reasoning about normative matters can become truly practical. I shall explain how reasoning can bring us to satisfy this practical requirement too.>>

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