Modeling Tolerance

Abstract

Decisions about intervention can be understood as decisions about tolerance, because an act of tolerance is an act of non-intervention, and, conversely, an act of intervention can be understood as an act of intolerance. But acts of tolerance, typically made under conditions of epistemic uncertainty, may turn out to have been mistaken, just as acts of intolerance, also typically made under conditions of epistemic uncertainty, may also turn out to have been mistaken. And thus we can see the decision to tolerate or not as a decision-theoretic problem, susceptible to modeling using familiar tools of decision theory.

Keywords: Toleration, Tolerance, Intervention, Paternalism, Liberty

JEL Classification: D8, K2, K4