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Can we prove the necessity of our best physical theories by rational means, without appeal to experience? This book recounts a few ingenious attempts to derive physical theories by reason only, beginning with Descartes' geometric construction of the world, and finishing with recent derivations of quantum mechanics from natural axioms. Deductions based on theological, metaphysical, or transcendental arguments are worth remembering for the ways they motivated and structured physical theory, even though we would now criticize their excessive confidence in the power of the mind. Other deductions more modestly relied on criteria for the comprehensibility of nature, including forms of measurability, causality, homogeneity, and correspondence. The central thesis of this book is that such criteria, when properly applied to idealized systems, effectively determine some of our most important theories as well as the mathematical character of the laws of physics. The relevant arguments are not purely rational, because only experience can tell us to which extent nature is comprehensible in a given way. Nor do they block the possibility of ever more varied forms of comprehensibility. They nonetheless suggest the inevitability of much of our theoretical physics.

Physics --- Practical reason --- Practical rationality --- Practical reasoning --- Rationality, Practical --- Reasoning, Practical --- Reason --- Philosophy --- History --- History. --- Methodology.

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Game theory is central to understanding human behavior and relevant to all of the behavioral sciences-from biology and economics, to anthropology and political science. However, as The Bounds of Reason demonstrates, game theory alone cannot fully explain human behavior and should instead complement other key concepts championed by the behavioral disciplines. Herbert Gintis shows that just as game theory without broader social theory is merely technical bravado, so social theory without game theory is a handicapped enterprise. This edition has been thoroughly revised and updated.Reinvigorating game theory, The Bounds of Reason offers innovative thinking for the behavioral sciences.

Practical reason --- Human behavior --- Social sciences --- Psychology --- Game theory --- Methodology --- Behavioral sciences --- Mental philosophy --- Mind --- Science, Mental --- Human biology --- Philosophy --- Soul --- Mental health --- Games, Theory of --- Theory of games --- Mathematical models --- Mathematics --- Action, Human --- Behavior, Human --- Ethology --- Human action --- Human beings --- Physical anthropology --- Psychology, Comparative --- Practical rationality --- Practical reasoning --- Rationality, Practical --- Reasoning, Practical --- Reason --- Behavior --- #SBIB:303H64 --- Speltheorie --- Game theory. --- Human behavior. --- Practical reason. --- Psychology. --- BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Economics / General. --- Methodology. --- Social sciences - Methodology