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Teoria dei giochi ed evoluzione delle norme morali
Festa, Roberto
2007
Abstract
Mathematical game theory – developed starting from the publication of The Theory of
Games and Economic Behavior (1944), by John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern –
aims to outline an ideal model of behaviour of rational agents involved in some interaction
with other rational agents. For this reason, game theory has immediately attracted the
attention of philosophers dealing with practical rationality and, since the fifties, has been
applied to the analysis of several issues concerning ethics and philosophy of politics. Here
we will focus on one of the most interesting applications of game theory to ethical-political
inquiry, i.e., with the game theoretic analysis of some problems related to the evolution of
moral norms. Firstly, we will provide a short outline of the development of game theory,
which has lead to the formulation of a plurality of different game theories. It will be shown
that such theories can be classified in two main groups: rationalistic game theories –in two
different versions: classical and epistemic – and evolutionary game theories. Moreover,
some basic elements of classical game theory will be introduced and the key ideas of
epistemic and evolutionary game theories will be illustrated. Afterwards, the main
approaches developed within the ethical-political applications of game theory will be shortly
described. Finally, some results obtained in the last twenty years by the researchers who
have analysed the evolution of moral norms by the conceptual tools of evolutionary and
epistemic game theories, will be examined.
Series
Etica & Politica / Ethics & Politics
IX (2007) 2
Publisher
EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste
Source
Roberto Festa, "Teoria dei giochi ed evoluzione delle norme morali", in: Etica & Politica / Ethics & Politics, IX (2007) 2, pp. 148-181.
Languages
it
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