The Allais paradox is a choice problem designed by Maurice Allais (1953) to show an inconsistency of actual observed choices with the predictions of expected utility theory. The Allais paradox demonstrates that individuals rarely make rational decisions consistently when required to do so immediately.
Arrow's impossibility theorem is a key result in social choice theory showing that no ranked-choice procedure for group decision-making can satisfy the requirements of rational choice. Specifically, American economist Kenneth Arrow showed no such rule can satisfy independence of irrelevant alternatives, the principle that a choice between two alternatives A and B should not depend on the quality of some third, unrela
The chain store paradox is a game theory problem that challenges conventional rational choice assumptions about strategic behavior in sequential games. It describes a scenario where an incumbent chain store faces sequential entry threats from multiple potential competitors in different markets.
In social choice theory, Condorcet's voting paradox (also called Condorcet's paradox or the Condorcet paradox) is a fundamental discovery by the Marquis de Condorcet that majority rule is inherently self-contradictory. The result implies that it is logically impossible for any voting system to guarantee that a winner will have support from a majority of voters; for example, there can be rock-paper-scissors scenarios
The experience machine or pleasure machine is a thought experiment put forward by philosopher Robert Nozick in his 1974 book Anarchy, State, and Utopia. It is an attempt to refute ethical hedonism by imagining a choice between everyday reality and an apparently preferable simulated reality.
Fredkin's paradox reads 'The more equally attractive two alternatives seem, the harder it can be to choose between them—no matter that, to the same degree, the choice can only matter less.' Thus, a decision-making agent might spend the most time on the least important decisions. It was proposed by American physicist Edward Fredkin.
The gender-equality paradox is the disputed finding that various gender differences in personality and occupational choice are larger in more gender equal countries. Larger differences are found in Big Five personality traits, Dark Triad traits, self-esteem, depression, personal values, occupational and educational choices.
The lek paradox is a conundrum in evolutionary biology that addresses the persistence of genetic variation in male traits within lek mating systems, despite strong sexual selection through female choice. This paradox arises from the expectation that consistent female preference for particular male traits should erode genetic diversity, theoretically leading to a loss of the benefits of choice.
The liberal paradox, also Sen paradox or Sen's paradox, is a logical paradox proposed by Amartya Sen which shows that no means of aggregating individual preferences into a single, social choice, can simultaneously fulfill the following, seemingly mild conditions: The unrestrictedness condition, or U: every possible ranking of each individual's preferences and all outcomes of every possible voting rule will be conside
Lindley's paradox is a counterintuitive situation in statistics in which the Bayesian and frequentist approaches to a hypothesis testing problem give different results for certain choices of the prior distribution. The problem of the disagreement between the two approaches was discussed in Harold Jeffreys' 1939 textbook; it became known as Lindley's paradox after Dennis Lindley called the disagreement a paradox in a
In philosophy, an ethical dilemma, also called an ethical paradox or moral dilemma, is a situation in which two or more conflicting moral imperatives, none of which overrides the other, confront an agent. A closely related definition characterizes an ethical dilemma as a situation in which every available choice is wrong.
In philosophy and mathematics, Newcomb's problem, also known as Newcomb's paradox, is a thought experiment involving a decision problem where a player must decide whether to take one or two boxes in conditions where a being, often called the 'predictor', is able to predict his choices with near-certainty. Newcomb's paradox was created by William Newcomb of the University of California's Lawrence Livermore Laboratory.
In philosophy and mathematics, Newcomb's problem, also known as Newcomb's paradox, is a thought experiment involving a decision problem where a player must decide whether to take one or two boxes in conditions where a being, often called the 'predictor', is able to predict his choices with near-certainty. Newcomb's paradox was created by William Newcomb of the University of California's Lawrence Livermore Laboratory.
Free choice is a phenomenon in natural language where a linguistic disjunction appears to receive a logical conjunctive interpretation when it interacts with a modal operator. For example, the following English sentences can be interpreted to mean that the addressee can watch a movie and that they can also play video games, depending on their preference: You can watch a movie or play video games.
The Paradox of Choice – Why More Is Less is a book about overchoice written by American psychologist Barry Schwartz and first published in 2004 by Harper Perennial. In the book, Schwartz argues that eliminating consumer choices can greatly reduce anxiety for shoppers.
In mathematics, the von Neumann paradox, named after John von Neumann, is the idea that one can break a planar figure such as the unit square into sets of points and subject each set to an area-preserving affine transformation such that the result is two planar figures of the same size as the original. This was proved in 1929 by John von Neumann, assuming the axiom of choice.
In social choice theory, Condorcet's voting paradox (also called Condorcet's paradox or the Condorcet paradox) is a fundamental discovery by the Marquis de Condorcet that majority rule is inherently self-contradictory. The result implies that it is logically impossible for any voting system to guarantee that a winner will have support from a majority of voters; for example, there can be rock-paper-scissors scenarios
Wheeler's delayed-choice experiment describes a family of thought experiments in quantum physics proposed by John Archibald Wheeler, with the most prominent among them appearing in 1978 and 1984. These experiments illustrate the central point of quantum theory: 'It is wrong to attribute a tangibility to the photon in all its travel from the point of entry to its last instant of flight.' These experiments close a loop