David Hume and Rationality in Decision-Making: A Case Study on the Economic Reading of a Philosopher

André Lapidus (1)

1 PHARE - Philosophie, Histoire et Analyse des Représentations Économiques

This paper shows that Hume's theory of passion, such as elaborated mainly in book II of the Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40) and in the Dissertation on the Passions (1757), gives rise to a conception of the decision process which challenges the canonical approach to the rationality of decision, as rationality of preferences or rationality of choice. It shows that when adopting a Humean perspective, rationality is not embodied as consistency requirements of individual behaviour, but may emerge as a possible outcome of some dispositions of our mind, which make the world inhabited by our emotions.

Keywords: Hume; economic philosophy; rationality; decision; passion; emotion; desire; preference; will; choice

Domains: Economics and Finance

André Lapidus. David Hume and Rationality in Decision-Making: A Case Study on the Economic Reading of a Philosopher. R. Ege and H. Igersheim (eds), The Individual and the Other in Economic Thought, 2019. ⟨hal-01831901⟩