The logical response to a noisy world
Keith Stenning, Michiel van Lambalgen · Oxford University Press eBooks · 2010
Interpretation processes are necessary, whether one then applies probability theory or some other logic in reasoning from the resulting interpretations. In the case of suppression, understood in probabilistic terms, interpretation shows up as the necessity to change one's probabilities in ways not sanctioned by Bayesianism. This chapter argues that a computational level analysis, in the sense of Marr, must also incorporate the interpretation process, not only the reasoning, once the interpretation is chosen. This is not to deny the role of Bayesian probability in a characterization of the computational level. If a subject construes the task as involving uncertain conditionals, in the sense of positive probability of exceptions, principles like Bayesian conditionalization may well form part of the computational level. In this case competence theory is needed of how judgements of probabilities can change in non-Bayesian ways. This is one of the most interesting technical challenges issuing from the present analysis.