Abstract

Several issues about the concept of preferences, and its role in practical reasoning, are analysed in the essays collected in "Preferences" (edited by C. Fehige and U. Wessels, Berlin, Walter de Gruyter, 1998). In this paper, the author discusses some of the views expressed in the book, by focusing on the role of preferences in the theory of rational decisions and in the analysis of the format, the content and the foundations of morality. The concluding remarks are devoted to the possibility of extending the "preferentialist view" of practical rationality to the analysis of theoretical rationality and its relations with practical rationality.