Explain how rationality is both subjective and bounded.

What will be an ideal response?


Rationality is both subjective and bounded, and unwanted outcomes can be produced by rational strategies. We do not all make the same calculations or arrive at the same plan when pursuing the same goals, for we contemplate our anticipated actions with less than perfect knowledge, with different mindsets, and with different reasoning abilities. Our social emotions (guilt, shame, anxiety, etc.) also function to keep our temptations in check by overriding purely rational calculations of immediate gain (Mealey, 1995). We do the best we can to order our decisions relating to our self-interest with the knowledge and understanding we have about the possible outcomes of a particular course of action. All people have mental models of the world and behave rationally with respect to them, even if others might consider our behavior to be irrational. Criminals behave rationally from their private models of reality, but their rationality is constrained, as is everyone’s, by ability, knowledge, emotional input, and time.

Criminal Justice

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What will be an ideal response?

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Criminal Justice