>Sure, some important real world applications exist. But why is that
>interesting? I would think that the interesting question is: what's the
>*expected value* of the loss, averaging over situations of all
>importance levels?
So would you argue that the interesting question about government policies is whether
averaging over all of them net welfare effects are positive? Wouldn't you want to know
something about particular policies with an eye towards identifying which ones are
better or worse. Even if you thought that on average they were bad you probably
couldn't convince most people that they shouldn't be considered on a case by case
basis.
Similarly, if you can identify even one situation in which judgement can be shown to
fail and design an intervention to minimize the cost of that failure isn't that
interesting? -- Bill Dickens
William T. Dickens
The Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
Phone: (202) 797-6113
FAX: (202) 797-6181
E-MAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
AOL IM: wtdickens
