Which worlds are possible? A judgment aggregation problem


Συγγραφέας: Christian List


Christian List: Which worlds are possible? A judgment aggregation problem (pdf, 8 pages)
Suppose the members of a group (e.g., committee, jury, expert panel) each form a judgment on which worlds in a given set are possible, subject to the constraint that at least one world is possible but not all are. The group seeks to aggregate these individual judgments into a collective judgment, subject to the same constraint. I show that no judgment aggregation rule can solve this problem in accordance with three conditions: "unanimity", "independence" and "non-dictatorship". Although the result is a variant of an existing theorem on "group identi…cation" (Kasher and Rubinstein 1997), the aggregation of judgments on which worlds are possible (or permissible, desirable, etc.) appears not to have been studied yet. The result challenges us to take a stance on which of its conditions to relax.