Monologues, dialogues, and common priors

Di Tillio, A.; Lehrer, E.; Samet, D.

Abstract

The main purpose of this paper is to provide a simple criterion enabling to conclude that two agents do not share a common prior. The criterion is simple, as it does not require information about the agents' knowledge and beliefs, but rather only the record of a dialogue between the agents. In each stage of the dialogue the agents tell each other the probability they ascribe to a fixed event and update their beliefs about the event. To characterize dialogues consistent with a common prior, we first study monologues, which are sequences of probabilities assigned by a single agent to a given event in an exogenous learning process. A dialogue is consistent with a common prior if and only if each selection sequence from the two monologues comprising the dialogue is itself a monologue.

Citation

Di Tillio, A., Lehrer, E., & Samet, D. (2022). Monologues, dialogues, and common priors. Theoretical Economics, 17(2), 587-615. https://doi.org/10.3982/te4508

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jan 1, 2022
• Publication Date: 2022
• Deposit Date: Aug 16, 2023
• Journal: Theoretical Economics
• Print ISSN: 1933-6837
• Electronic ISSN: 1555-7561
• Publisher: Econometric Society
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 17
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 587-615
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.3982/te4508
• Keywords: General Economics, Econometrics and Finance
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1719664