The basic subject matter of the philosophy of action is a pair of questions: (1) What are actions? (2) How are actions to be explained? The questions call, respectively, for a theory of the nature of action and a theory of the explanation of actions. Donald Davidson has articulated and defended influential answers to both questions. Those answers are the primary focus of this chapter.

ACTIONS AND INDIVIDUATION

Actions, as Davidson understands them, are analogous to money and sunburns in one noteworthy respect. The piece of paper with which I just purchased a drink is a genuine U. S. dollar bill partly in virtue of its having been produced (in the right way) by the U. S. Treasury Department. The burn on my back is a sunburn partly in virtue of its having been produced by exposure to the sun's rays. A duplicate bill produced with plates and paper stolen from the Treasury Department is a counterfeit dollar bill, not a genuine one. A burn that looks and feels just like the one on my back is not a sunburn if it was produced by exposure to a heat lamp rather than to the sun. Similarly, on Davidson's view of action, a certain event is my buying a drink – an action – partly in virtue of its having been appropriately produced by reasons that I had for buying one, reasons being understood as complexes of beliefs and desires (Davidson 1980 [1963]; 1980a [1971]; 1980a [1973]; 1987b).