The Limits of Procedural Discretion

Federal Sentencing in the Wake of Guidelines: Unacceptable Limits on the Discretion of Sentencers

Implementation of a workplace smoking ban in bars: The limits of local discretion

BACKGROUND In January 1998, the California state legislature extended a workplace smoking ban to bars. The purpose of this study was to explore the conditions that facilitate or hinder compliance with a smoking ban in bars. METHODS We studied the implementation of the smoking ban in bars by interviewing three sets of policy participants: bar employers responsible for complying with the law; l...

The Illusion of Discretion

Discretion is the thesis that if one has sufficient evidence for p, it is epistemically permissible for one either to believe p or be agnostic on whether p. This paper argues that Discretion is not as obvious as many assume—indeed, that it is false. §1 observes that Discretion is not supported by the fact that we lack positive epistemic duties to take doxastic stances on propositions. §2 consid...

The Illusion of Discretion

Recent writers have invoked the idea that epistemic rationality gives us options in an attempt to show that we can exercise direct doxastic control without irrationality. Speci cally, they suggest that when the evidence for p is su cient but not conclusive, it would be rational either to believe p or to be agnostic on p, and they hold that we can in these cases e ectively decide to form either ...

The Dark Side of Discretion