WHICH WORLDS ARE POSSIBLE?

A JUDGMENT AGGREGATION PROBLEM Author(s): CHRISTIAN LIST Reviewed work(s): Source: Journal of Philosophical Logic, Vol. 37, No. 1 (February 2008), pp. 57-65 Published by: Springer Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41217822 . Accessed: 30/11/2012 16:07
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of Philosophical Journal Logic (2008) 37:57-65 DOI: 10.1007/sl0992-007-9058-y CHRISTIAN LIST

Springer 2008

WHICH WORLDS ARE POSSIBLE? A JUDGMENT AGGREGATION PROBLEM

2006 Received20 August

of a group(e.g., committee, ABSTRACT.Suppose the members jury,expert on which worldsin a given set are possible, each form a panel) judgment thatat leastone worldis possiblebutnotall are. The subjectto theconstraint intoa collective theseindividual seeks to judgments judgment, group aggregate I that no rule can to the same constraint. show judgment aggregation subject solve this problem in accordance with three conditions: "unanimity," is a variant of an theresult and "non-dictatorship," Although "independence" on identification" and theorem Rubinstein, (Kasher Logique et existing "group on worlds the of which are Analyse160:385-395,1997), aggregation judgments not to studied have been desirable, etc.) appears yet. possible(or permissible, to relax. The result us to takea stanceon whichof itsconditions challenges
KEY WORDS: judgment possibleworlds, propositions aggregation, 1. Introduction

How can a group of individuals (e.g., committee,jury, expert panel) make collective judgments (true/false) on some propositionsbased on the group members' individualjudgments on these propositions?This task - "judgment aggregation" - becomes non-trivial when the propositions are interconnected,as shown in a growing literature. Suppose a three-member group seeks to make collective judgments on p, q, and p q9 where one memberjudges all threepropositionsto be true,a second judges p to be truebut q and p q to be false, and a third judges q to be truebutp and p q to be false. Then majoritiesjudge p q to be false, an inconsistent and q to be trueand yet/? set of majority judgments. This problem has been called the "discursive dilemma" (Pettit 2001 extending Kornhauser and Sager 1986) and shown to illustrate a more generalimpossibility result(List and Pettit 2002; 2004). Several extensionsand generalizationshave been given (e.g., Pauly and van Hees 2006; Dietrich2006, 2007; Nehringand Puppe 2005; Bovens and Rabinowicz 2006; Pauly 2007; van Hees 2007). Crucially, in the

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on judgmentaggregation, are modelled as existingliterature propositions sentencesof a formallanguage, not as sets of possible worlds. In this shortpaper, I want to draw attention to a different judgment in not discussed that which arises when literature, aggregationproblem propositionsare modelled as sets of possible worlds. Here each group member's judgment consists in the acceptance of a single nonand non-tautologicalproposition,represented by a set of contradictory worldsdeemed possible by thatindividual.The groupthenseeks to make a collectivejudgment,which also consists in the acceptance of a single and non-tautological proposition, represented non-contradictory by a set of worlds deemed possible by the group. Thus the problem is to of non-contradictory and non-tautological aggregatean /z-tuple proposin into a and nontions (across individuals) single non-contradictory tautologicalproposition(for the group as a whole). I want to put on the table fordiscussion shows thatit is The theorem mild to solve thisproblemin accordancewithsome seemingly impossible Matheconditions: "unanimity," "independence,"and "non-dictatorship." matically,this resultis a variantof an existingtheoremon the so-called (1997), butto the problem by Kasherand Rubinstein "groupidentification" best of my knowledge the interpretation proposed here - i.e., the applicationto judgmentson which worlds are possible - is new. Here I in the derivethetheorem froma recenttheorem on judgmentaggregation standardsense (Dietrich and List 2007a; Dokow and Holzman 2005), which, in turn,has precursorsin abstractaggregationtheory(Wilson and Fishburn1986; Nehringand Puppe 2002). 1975; Rubinstein As the difficulties withjudgment aggregationare usually thought to it stem fromthe presence of multiple,interconnected propositions, is when individualand an result can arise even that impossibility surprising collective judgments consist only in the acceptance of a single proposition.It is also worthnoting that the result applies not only to judgmentson which worlds are possible, but also to judgmentson which worlds are permissible,or desirable, etc. In each of these cases, the theoremposes interesting questions.

2. Theorem Let Q = {cc>i, ...,uJk}be a finiteset of worlds, assuming > 2; and let = N {1,...,} be a finitegroup of individuals,assuming n > 1. Each individual i G N makes a judgment on which of the worlds G are of evidence, but various interpretations possible (e.g., relativeto his/her

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is a subsetJ CO.. a judgment can be given).Formally, theformalism ifJ Q. Making a ifJ 0 and informative We say that J is consistent in a nonthus consists consistent and informative accepting judgment Let J be the set of all and non-tautological proposition. contradictory and informative consistent judgments. each -tuple ofconsistent a method ofaggregating The group requires into a consistent individual and informative G Jn judgments (J',...,Jn) J e J. Call such a methodan collectivejudgment and informative as a function/ : Jn - J' rule,defined aggregation rulethat meetssomeminimal conditions? an aggregation Can we find Let me introducethree conditions.The firstrequires that if all thisjudgment shouldalso be submitthe same judgment, individuals thatthecollective on one. The secondrequires thecollective judgment whether a givenworlduj is possibleshoulddependonlyon individual on on whether is possible,not on individual judgments judgments that the whether otherworldsJ are possible.The third requires should notalwaysbe determined collective byan antecedently judgment fixeddictator. For all J G 3,f(J, ...,J) = J. Unanimity. For all (Ju ...,), {J',~.,J'n)G J" and all G Q, Independence. g n)(lj e J& l e j)] = [ujg f(ju ...,) e> oj ef(j'X ...,^)]. [(V/ forall (J', ...,) G Jn, Thereis no /G N such that, Non-dictatorship. f(Ju...,Jn)=Jh three conditions cannot be satisfied these simultaneously. Surprisingly, rule/ : J" -> J satisfying THEOREM 1. There is no aggregation and independence non-dictatorship. unanimity, A proofis givenin theAppendix. In the case n = k, theorem 1 is to a theorem Kasher and Rubinstein on the (1997) equivalent by problem of "groupidentification." Here then members of a groupeach makea havea certain on which members ofthatgroup judgment property (e.g., or to a true scientist a being having particular religious identity), subject the constraint thatat least one individual has the property but not all individuals do. The group then seeks to aggregate the n individual on who has the given property into a resulting collective judgments no can rule Here, too, judgment. aggregation simultaneously satisfy and non-dictatorship. independence unanimity,

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3. Illustration

While the full proof of theorem 1 is somewhattechnical,the intuition behind it can be conveyed by consideringa more restrictive class of aggregationrules and showing that this class is empty. Consider an independenceand a aggregationrule that satisfiesnot only unanimity, version of non-dictatorship, namely "anonymity"(i.e., all strengthened individuals have equal weightin determining thecollectivejudgment), but also "monotonicity" (i.e., ifmoreindividuals judge thata givenworld is a collectivejudgment that is possible intoone possible,thiscannotturn fordetermining that is impossible) and "neutrality" (i.e., the criterion thecollectivejudgmenton whether a givenworld is possible is thesame for all worlds a;). (In standardjudgment aggregation,various general theseconditions characterizations of aggregation rules satisfying are given in Nehringand Puppe 2005 and Dietrich and List 2007b.) A necessary conditionforan aggregation rule to meet all theseconditionsis thatit is a follows. For all (Ji,...,yw) G *7,/(^1,...,) is the set of all worlds judged possible by at least t individuals,formally f(J] ,...,y) = {weu: number of ieN with ueJi>t}.
threshold rule with some acceptance threshold te {l,2,...,/i}9 defined as

rules are the unionrulef(J' , ...,) = J' U ... Examples of threshold the intersection rule f(J', ...,) =J' ... HJn (here (here i=l), t = ), and simple majorityrule (here t is the smallest integergreater than/2). Can we find an acceptance thresholdsuch that the corresponding thresholdrule assigns to every -tuple of consistentand informative and informative collectivejudgment?It individual judgmentsa consistent the threshold must not be too to to ensure is easy see that, consistency, high, i.e., it must not happen that no world is deemed possible. A e.g., the union rule necessary and sufficientcondition is /<|+1; the thresholdmust To ensure informativeness, guaranteesconsistency. notbe too low, i.e., itmustnothappenthat all worldsare deemedpossible.A rule conditionis t > ^-' e.g., the intersection necessaryand sufficient and informaof consistency informativeness. So theconjunction guarantees n ^p <t < | + 1. If there theacceptancethreshold to satisfy tiveness requires are n > 1 individuals and > 2 possible worlds, as assumed, this case can easily be seen to have no solution.(In the degenerate inequality = of 2 possible worlds and an odd numberof individualsw, simple rules theclass of aggregation rulemeetsall conditions.) Therefore majority with and 1 the conditions of theorem monotonicity together satisfying

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to anonymity) is emptywhen (and non-dictatorship neutrality strengthened n > 1 and > 2. The fullproofshows thatthisimpossibility continues to hold even withoutmonotonicity, or the of nonneutrality strengthening to anonymity. dictatorship

4. Avoiding the Impossibility

- notably, As withother results of social choice theory Arrow's impossibility on preference of theorem1 (1951) theorem aggregation the significance lies not primarily in establishing the impossibility of solving a particular which conditionsmust be aggregation problem,but ratherin indicating relaxedin order to finda solution. The following are available: escape routes If unanimity is dropped,a constantaggregationrule Relaxing unanimity. satisfies all other conditions. Such a rule assigns to every -tuple (/i,...,) Jn the same fixed collective judgmentJ G J. This is not an attractive to thejudgmentssubmitted solution,as it pays no attention the individuals. by is dropped, a distance-based Relaxing independence.Ifindependence aggrerule can be constructed the in gation (inspiredby approach Pigozzi 2006), which satisfiesall otherconditions.For each -tuple(J' , ...,Jn) G Jn, we here compare each "candidate" collective judgment J e J with each submitted individualjudgmentJi9using the followingmethod. We say thatJ agrees withJi on a given world if [u e J if and only if a; G //]. For each individual i G N, we now count the total number of worlds G Q on which J agrees with J and consider the sum-totalof these counts across individualsi G N. The collectivejudgmentJ e J is then chosen so as to maximize thissum-total (with some additionalprovisions forbreakingties). Undersuch an aggregation rule,thecollectivejudgment on whethera given world is possible depends not only on individual thatworldbutalso on individual judgments regarding judgmentsregarding otherworlds.If thisimplication is accepted,a distance-basedaggregation rulemay be a satisfactory solutionto thepresent aggregation problem. If non-dictatorship is dropped, a dictatorial Relaxing non-dictatorship. aggregation rule satisfies all other conditions. Such a rule assigns to each -tuple (J', ..., Jn) G Jn the judgmentJ of the same antecedently fixed individual i e N. For obvious reasons, this is not generally an attractive solution.

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the domain of admissible inputs. If the aggregationrule is Restricting of individualjudgments requiredto work not forevery possible w-tuple but only forthose thatmeet some additionalconstraints, thenunanimity, and can be satisfied For non-dictatorship independence simultaneously. example, if only -tuples (J',...,Jn) satisfyingJ' ... 0 are ruleas defined above meetsall conditions. admissible,thentheintersection are Likewise, if only -tuples (J',...,Jn) satisfyingJ''J ...UJn^Q. them. A then the union rule as defined above meets domain admissible, in individual restriction of thiskindis feasiblein cases wherethediversity the knowledge judgmentsis limited.If, forexample,judgmentsrepresent thenitmay seem reasonableto (as opposed to merebeliefs)of individuals, intersection assume thatonly -tuples(J' , ...,) witha non-empty occur, and the intersection rule may seem plausible. Extendingthe range of admissible outputs. If the aggregationrule is to generate collective judgments that violate consistencyor permitted informativeness,then it is possible to satisfy all other conditions simultaneously. For example, if judgments representthe beliefs of individuals(ratherthan theirknowledge),thenperhapsthe requirements of consistency or informativeness are too strong at thecollectivelevel. As the union rule (but not informativealreadynoted, guarantees consistency (but not ness), and the intersectionrule guarantees informativeness and nonwhile both rules satisfyunanimity, independence consistency), collective More one dictatorship. radically, mightpermit judgmentsthat take the form of continuousprobabilityassignmentsacross worlds as butprobability of possibility or impossibility; opposed to binary judgments its to well-known of own. rise some problems aggregation gives resultof In conclusion,I have shown that a non-trivial impossibility aggregationarises not only for judgments on multiple,interconnected "discursivedilemma,"but also for as in the much-discussed propositions, in that each consist the acceptanceof only a singleproposition, judgments or not we findthis result modelled as a set of possible worlds. Whether torelax. itchallenges us totakea stanceon whichofitsconditions compelling, Acknowledgements This work was presentedat the Formal EpistemologyWorkshop2006, UC Berkeley,5/2006 and at the 2006 Conferenceof the Philosophyof was done Science Association,Vancouver, 11/2006.Much of thewriting at the Australian National University,7/2006. I am gratefiilfor the and discussions I enjoyed in all threeplaces. For comments hospitality

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I thankRichardBradley,Franz Dietrich,BrandenFitelson, and criticism, Robert Goodin, Alan Hayek, Marc Pauly, David Schmeidler and TimothyWilliamson. Appendix
I derive theorem 1 froma result in Dietrich and List (2007a), embedding the present aggregationproblem into the standardjudgment aggregation model (in Dietrich's 2007 "general logics" version), where propositions are modelled as sentences of a formal but mathematically different, equivalent derivationcan be given language. A notationally fromDokow and Holzman's (2005) theoremor fromRubinsteinand Fishburn's (1986) results,on which Kasher and Rubinstein's (1997) theoremon "group identification"is based. The present proof invokes the concept of "total blockedness" introduced by Nehringand Puppe (2002), whose main theoremis a precursorto the resultsin Dietrich and List (2007a) and Dokow and Holzman (2005). It is interestingto note that the general result from which theorem 1 follows also has Arrow's (1951) impossibility theoremon preferenceaggregationas a corollary. Let L be a simple sentential language, with atomic sentences a', ..., and to connectives -,, V. To each world ujj G , therecorrespondsa sentence , interpreted mean thatworld Uj is possible. For any 5L and any p G L, writeS (= p if and only if the set S UZ U {-/?} is inconsistentin the standard sense of sentential logic, where S '= p means thatS entails/?relative to Z = {a' V ... Vfl*,-(i - *)}- Informally, the constraint thatthe disjunctionof a', ..., a* is true(consistency) and theirconjunction a set S L is called inconsistent(in L) if S '= p and false (informativeness).Further, S'=-p for some p G L, and consistentotherwise. The logic given by the pair (L, '=) captures the consistency and informativenessconstraintson the present aggregation problem and satisfiesaxioms L1-L3 in Dietrich's (2007) general logics model. Define the agenda of sentences on whichjudgments (in the standardsense) are to be made asX = {a', ...,*,-1,...-*}. A judgment G J as definedabove correspondsto a maximal consistentsubset A X9 where, foreach uj G , a G A if and only if ujj G J and -4ij G A if and only if u>jJ. An aggregation rule / : J" - J as defined above corresponds to a judgment aggregation rule F for the agenda X in the standard sense i.e., a function (which, in addition,satisfiesuniversal domain and collective rationality), F thatmaps each -tuple of maximal consistentsubsets of A' (individualjudgmentsets in the standardsense) to a maximal consistentsubset of X (collective judgment set in the and independence standardsense). It is easy to see thatF satisfiesthe standardunanimity and independenceas definedhere. conditionsif and only if/ satisfiesunanimity One of the two main theorems in Dietrich and List (2007a) states that, when the agenda X satisfiesthe richnessconditionof "strongconnectedness" (as definedby claims 1 to 3 below), a judgment aggregation rule F satisfies independence and unanimity (togetherwith universal domain and collective rationality)if and only if it is dictatorial. In order to see that the presenttheorem 1 follows fromthis result,it remains to be shown that the agenda X as defined here is "stronglyconnected." To show this, the followingmust be established, where (in)consistency means (in)consistency in L: Claim 1. There exists a minimal inconsistentsubset Y X with || > 3. such that Claim 2. There exists a minimal inconsistent subset YX Y z subset Z of even size. : is consistent for some U G (Y'Z) Z} {-z

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Claim3. Foranyp,q eX, there exist X (with p' ,p2>--,Pk p = p' andq= Pk) such thatp' =*/?2, 2^*,-> Pk-'t*Pk, wherePjt*Ph is definedto mean that forsome Y X consistent andwith ->/? 'Pji ~Ph} U is inconsistent with/?, 3 states that the has the of "total as blockedness," (claim agenda property defined and Puppe,2002). by Nehring To proveclaims1 and 2, notice since > 3, Y = {a', ...,*} has theproperties that, Z = {a',ai). by claims 1 and 2, with required To proveclaim 3, pick any pair of propositions p,q eX. Considerthe following exhaustive listof cases: p = q: trivially, p*q (withY = 0); h: here^*-^ (withY = {a : /^,}); p = uj and q = -*withy h: here-*/1=* (withY = {-a/: /^y,A}); p = -,and q = ah withy = = forsome /}, h (by b) and -^a^*ah t A: hereo,l=*-a/ p a, and # withy (by c); and<7= - >withy (e) /?= - t : here-^ajt*aforsomel ]^ (by c) and^*-> (by b); here^* forsome 7^ (by d) and a^*-^aj (by b); (f) /?= /and <7= ->/. and q = a/,here-ay^a/, forsomeA ^y (by c) and 1=* (g) p = - (by d). (a) (b) (c) (d) This completes theproof.

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A CharacterizaK. and Puppe,: 2005, Consistent Judgement Aggregation: Nehring, of Karlsruhe. tion,Working paper,University collective sets in a minimal judgment logical language, Pauly,M.: 2007, Axiomatizing in press. Synthese onjudgment Journal M. andvanHees, M.: 2006,Logicalconstraints aggregation, Pauly, ofPhilosophical Logic 35, 569-585. and the discursive P.: 2001, Deliberative dilemma,Philosophical Pettit, democracy Issues 11, 268-299. and the discursive dilemma:An argument-based Pigozzi, G.: 2006, Belief merging to paradoxes ofjudgment account 152, 285-298. Synthese aggregation, Journalof A. and Fishburn, P.: 1986, Algebraic aggregation Rubinstein, theory, EconomicTheory 38, 63-77. of epistemic Social Choiceand Welfare van Hees, M.: 2007,The limits 28, democracy, 649-666. R.: 1975,On thetheory of aggregation, Journal 10, 89-99. Wilson, ofEconomicTheory

Department of Government, LondonSchool ofEconomics, LondonWC2 A2AE.UK E-mail: List@lse. ac.uk

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