Browse Papers

The event analysis seems to be at odds with plausible (Davidsonian) views about action. In response, I propose that action sortals like 'shooting' and 'pulling' apply to processes that have actions (and various effects of actions) as parts. Combining this (Thomson-style) view with certain facts about causative constructions, I then argue that paradigmatic actions are best viewed as tryings; where tryings are taken to be intentionally characterized events that typically cause bodily motions.

Compatibilists often think they can afford to be complacent with regard to scientific findings. But there are apparent threats to free will besides determinism. Robert Kane has recently claimed that if consciousness does not initiate action, all accounts of free will go down, compatibilist and incompatibilist. Some cognitive scientists argue that in fact consciousness does not initiate action. In this paper I argue that they are right (though not for the reasons they advance): as a matter of fact consciousness does not initiate action. But, I contend, Kane is wrong in thinking that it follows that we have no free will. I sketch how we might have free will in spite of the finding that consciousness does not initiate action, and remark on the implications for several well-known accounts of responsibility, include Clarke's agent-causal theory and Fischer and Ravizza's reasons-responsiveness account.

The paper has two main objectives: first, it presents a new argument against the so-called Anscombe Thesis (if x φ-s by ψ-ing, then x’s φ-ing = x’s ψ-ing). Second, it develops a proposal about the syntax and semantics of the ‘by’-locution.

I argue that participants in a virtual world such as "Second Life" exercise genuine agency via their avatars. Indeed, their avatars are fictional bodies with which they act in the virtual world, just as they act in the real world with their physical bodies. Hence their physical bodies can be regarded as their default avatars.

I also discuss recent research into "believable" software agents, which are designed on principles borrowed from the character-based arts, especially cinematic animation as practiced by the artists at Disney and Warner Brothers Studios. I claim that these agents exemplify a kind of autonomy that should be of greater interest to philosophers than that exemplified by the generic agent modeled in current philosophical theory. The latter agent is autonomous by virtue of being governed by itself; but a believable agent appears to be governed by a self, which is the anima by which it appears to be animated.

Putting these two discussions together, I suggest that philosophers of action should focus their attention on how we animate our bodies.

According to the "recognitional" view of practical reason, rational practical reasoning consists in trying to figure out which of the available options are good things to do, and then choosing accordingly. According to the rival "constructivist" view, rational practical reasoning consists in complying with certain conditions of purely formal coherence or procedural rationality. Christine Korsgaard objects that recognitional views cannot answer the "normative question". But constructivist views are vulnerable to the same objection. One version of the recognitional view is immune to this objection, and can also be defended against David Velleman's charge that it is empty and without content.

BAT - the belief in ability thesis - states, roughly, that for an agent to be able rationally to deliberate between two or more alternatives, she must believe that she is metaphysically free to perform each alternative. I show, by way of a counterexample, that BAT is false.

The paper discusses Peter van Inwagen’s Consequence Argument, which crucially employs the notion of rendering a proposition false. The main aim of the paper is to shed light on that notion. While the explications offered so far are based on modal concepts, it is argued that a stronger, hyper-intensional concept is needed, namely the concept expressed by the word ‘because’. An analysis is developed which is superior to the prior ones. On the basis of that analysis it is explained why van Inwagen’s argument fails.

Naturalistic theories of content and whether or not reason-giving explanations of human behavior are causal explanations have been central topics in recent philosophy of mind. Fred Dretske, in his book Explaining Behavior, attempts to construct a naturalistic theory of the contents of beliefs and desires that gives these mental states an important role in the causation of behavior. Even if Dretske is granted that the theory adequately accounts for individual behaviors the theory still faces problems in offering an adequate account of important features of extended sequences of behavior. Some sequences of behavior exhibit coherence in the sense that the elements of the sequence either contribute to the atttainment of a goal state or only make sense on the supposition that the goal state will be attained. Two ways of attaining coherence are distinguished. In chaining behavior coherence is guaranteed by the fit between the internal structure of the organism and the structure of the external environment. In other cases of coherence chaining is not available as an explanation. It is argued that Dretske’s theory stumbles in attempting to explain non-chaining examples of coherent behavior. Folk-psychological explanations of coherence appeal to intentions or plans, states with intentional content, which puts them within the intended scope of Dretske’s theory. It is argued that Dretske’s theory does not contain adequate resources to account for the content of these states while at the same time granting them their desired role in the causation of behavior.

I hope to show that, although belief is subject to two quite robust forms of agency, "believing at will" is impossible; one cannot believe in the way one ordinarily acts. Further, the same is true of intention: although intention is subject to two quite robust forms of agency, the features of belief that render believing less than voluntary are present for intention, as well. It turns out, perhaps surprisingly, that you can no more intend at will than believe at will.

By “deciding how to decide,” I mean using practical reasoning to regulate one's principles of practical reasoning. David Gauthier has suggested that deciding how to decide is something that every rational agent does. According to Gauthier, we assess rival principles of practical reasoning, which tell us how to choose among actions; and assessing how to choose among actions certainly sounds like deciding how to decide. One of my goals in this essay is to argue, in opposition to Gauthier, that assessing rival principles of practical reasoning is a job for theoretical rather than practical reasoning. How to decide is something that we discover rather than decide. The idea that our principles of practical reasoning can be regulated by practical reasoning is essential to Gauthier's defence of his own, somewhat unorthodox conception of those principles. And although I do not endorse the specifics of Gauthier's conception, I do endorse its spirit. There is a flaw in the orthodox conception of practical reasoning, and Gauthier has put his finger on it. Unfortunately, Gauthier's account of why it is a flaw, and how it should be fixed, ultimately rests on practical considerations, whose relevance is open to question if, as I believe, practical reasoning cannot regulate itself. This essay therefore has a second goal, which complicates matters considerably. Although I want to reject Gauthier's notion that we decide how to decide, I also want to preserve what rests upon that notion, in Gauthier's view: I want to resettle Gauthier's critique of the orthodoxy on a new foundation.