Researcher ORCID Identifier

0009-0008-0321-9725

Graduation Year

2025

Date of Submission

12-2024

Document Type

Open Access Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Philosophy

Reader 1

Dustin Locke

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Rights Information

2024 Carlos A Hernandez

Abstract

For moral skeptics and self-interested individuals, it is difficult for them to recognize the need and benefit for cooperation. That is, there is an intrinsic conflict in claiming that constraining one’s self-interest when cooperating with others serves to promote an individual’s self-interest. Even so, David Gauthier provides constrained maximization as a rational choice theory that addresses this conflict and balances the concepts of rationality and morality. Constrained maximization demonstrates to the moral skeptics and self-interested individuals that cooperation is in their self-interest when using the situation of the Prisoner’s Dilemma. Yet, as Holly Smith highlights, constrained maximization does not provide a strong enough reason to explain why a rational agent must comply with their intention to cooperate. Thus, this thesis aims to defend David Gauthier’s constrained maximization by providing an improved Rationality of Perseverance Principle (RPP*) that can address the compliancy problem that Holly Smith emphasizes. All in all, this thesis provides an argument against moral skeptics and self-interested individuals for the rationality of cooperation in one-shot Prisoner’s Dilemmas.

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