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"To a historian the most interesting thing about decisions is the fact that everyone talks about them. No one interested in social ideas can fail to notice how large a part the word "decision" has come to play in the vocabulary of moral and political discourse. It meets one on every page. Inevitably one asks, "Why?" Why is there so much talk of decisions and of those who are said to make them? Are there any ideological reasons for it?"--Provided by publisher.

Publisher's description: ``Describes basic concepts of rational decision making and decision analysis to the reader -- offers insights that help to systematically analyze decision making problems in professional and private life and helps the reader to come up with a problem solution based on a higher degree of rationality -- updating/inclusion of current research, in-depth discussion of selected topics, additional exercises/case studies. This textbook conveys methods that can improve decision making processes in various fields such as economics, politics, and medicine as well as in personal life. Areas of focus are decision making under conflicting objectives, decision making under risk and uncertainty, decision making with incomplete information about individual preferences or probabilities, and the consideration of time preferences. Special emphasis is placed on the procedures and concepts applicability. Explicit sample applications show the methods benefit for a wide area of decision making problems. Exercises from daily life make it easy for the reader to understand the key insights from decision analysis."" \par This English edition corresponds to the 5th German one. Hence this book is close to completeness. Yet in this reviewer's opinion there are two comments: First a section with hints on the problems for solution is needed. Second a comparison with decision making in animals may be useful since recently [{\it D. Sumpter}, Collective animal behavior. Princeton Univ. Press (2010)] it was shown that collective animal behavior is highly efficient.

Rules used to render decisions provide an unusually attractive research site. They allow empirical study of such global questions as how rational, active people & institutions are governed by forces they do not understand or control. Ultrarational, moderate rational, moderate nonrational, & ultranonrational positions are explored. Most rules seem to be quite nonrational, but most of the research on various kinds of rules, & systematic differences among those who apply them, has yet to be carried out. 37 References. HA

THIS PAPER INTRODUCES SOME DISTINCTIONS RELATED TO FACTS AND VALUES, INDICATES SOME OF THE USES AND MISUSES OF THESE DISTINCTIONS, AND DRAWS CONCLUSIONS FOR THE PROBLEM OF RATIONAL DECISION MAKING. A MAJOR CLAIM IS THAT EVERYONE EXCEPT METAPHYSICIANS SHOULD FORGET ABOUT THE FACT-VALUE DISTINCTION AND GET ON WITH THE PURSUIT OF TRUTH AND THE PERFORMANCE OF GOOD DEEDS.

ABSTRACTThis paper introduces some distinctions related to facts and values, indicates some of the uses and misuses of these distinctions, and draws conclusions for the problem of rational decision making. A major claim is that everyone but metaphysicians should forget about the fact‐value distinction and get on with the pursuit of truth and the performance of good deeds.