Kirsch’s, and everyone’s, bind: How to build models for the wild?

Abstract

Alexandra Kirsch proposed a general formal model of decision making. She proposed it as a model both of human psychology and of artificial intelligence. As one might expect, and as Don Ross explicated, this is a challenging, albeit fascinating, position to occupy. In this comment, I sketch my own view of the bind and speculate on how to get out of it. In one sentence, my description of the bind is: How to build models for the wild? By models, I mean formal (mathematical, computer-based, precise conceptual) models, and by the wild, I mean “large worlds,” which are situations where uncertainty cannot be meaningfully reduced to well-developed devices such as probability. I discuss solutions for getting out of the bind proposed in the cognitive science of decision making. And I discuss how another discipline, operations research, has attempted to get out of the bind.