Conditions for the Acceptance of Deontic Conditionals.

Recent psychological research has investigated how people assess the probability of an indicative conditional. Most people give the conditional probability of q given p as the probability of if p then q. Asking about the probability of an indicative conditional, one is in effect asking about its acceptability. But on what basis are deontic conditionals judged to be acceptable or unacceptable? Using a decision theoretic analysis, we argue that a deontic conditional, of the form if p then must q or if p then may q, will be judged acceptable to the extent that the p & q possibility is preferred to the p & not-q possibility. Two experiments are reported in which this prediction was upheld. There was also evidence that the pragmatic suitability of permission rules is partly determined by evaluations of the not-p & q possibility. Implications of these results for theories of deontic reasoning are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Acceptability Limit in Food Shelf Life Studies

Despite its apparently intuitive nature, the acceptability limit is probably the most difficult parameter to be defined when developing a shelf life test. Although it dramatically affects the final shelf life value, it is surprising that discussion on its nature has been largely neglected in the literature and only rare indications about the possible methodologies for its determination are available in the literature. This is due to the fact that the definition of this parameter is a consumer- and market-oriented issue, requiring a rational evaluation of the potential negative consequences of food unacceptability in the actual market scenario. This paper critically analyzes the features of the acceptability limit and the role of the decision maker. The methodologies supporting the choice of the acceptability limit as well as acceptability limit values proposed in the literature to calculate shelf life of different foods are reviewed.