Course Description

01 (M. Bialek) Formalizing the processes by which we make decisions can do a lot of good compared to, say, making all of our decisions arbitrarily or based merely on a whim. But there are fundamental issues with how such formalizations can be applied that prevent them from being a cure-all against less structured decision making processes. This course will examine formal theories relevant to decision making—such as those of preferences, utilities, decisions, games, social choice, probability, and statistics—with a focus on the circumstances under which they seem to fail.