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Actions, Reasons, and Intentions: Overcoming Davidson's Ontological Prejudice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 April 2009

John Michael McGuire
John Michael McGuire
Affiliation:
Hanyang University, South Korea
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Abstract

This article defends the idea that causal relations between reasons and actions are wholly irrelevant to the explanatory efficacy of reason-explanations. The analysis of reason-explanations provided in this article shows that the so-called “problem of explanatory force” is solved, not by putative causal relations between the reasons for which agents act and their actions, but rather by the intentions that agents necessarily have when they act for a reason. Additionally, the article provides a critique of the principal source of support for the thesis that reason-explanations are causal explanations, namely, Davidson's argument in “Actions, Reasons, and Causes.” It is shown that Davidson's argument for this thesis rests crucially on two mistakes: his definition of intentional action and his ontological prejudice against intentions.

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 46 , Issue 3 , Summer 2007 , pp. 459 - 479
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2007

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