Philosophy of Action

Cover
Half Title
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
1. Introduction: What Is the Philosophy of Action?
2. What Is the Problem of Action?
	2.1 Activity and Passivity
	2.2 Goal-Directedness
	2.3 Attributability
	2.4 “Actish” Phenomenal Quality
	2.5 Voluntary Action
	2.6 Rational Action, or Acting for Reasons
	2.7 Practical Knowledge
	2.8 Intentional Action
	2.9 Intention
	2.10 Autonomy, Identification, and Self-Governance
	2.11 Further Choice Points
		2.11a Which Cases Are Paradigmatic?
		2.11b Questions About Action: Conceptual or Ontological?
	2.12 Conclusion
	Suggested Reading
3. Action Explanation
	3.1 Guises of Rationalizing Explanation
	3.2 Reasons for Action: Motivating vs. Normative
	3.3 More on the “Why?” Question
	3.4 Action Explanation: Four Views
		3.4a The Rational Interpretation View
		3.4b The Causal Theory of Action Explanation
		3.4c Teleological Realism
		3.4d Naïve Action Theory
	3.5 Arational Action
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
4. The Ontology of Action
	4.1 Which Things in the World Can Be Actions?
	4.2 Under a Description
	4.3 Basic Actions
		4.3a Bodily Movements
		4.3b Volitions
		4.3c Beyond the Body
	4.4 The Accordion Effect
	4.5 How Many Actions?
	4.6 The Causal Theory of Action
		4.6a Objection 1: Deviant Causal Chains, Redux
		4.6b Objection 2: The Disappearing Agent
	4.7 Alternatives to the Causal Theory
		4.7a Quietism
		4.7b Agent-Causation and Causal Powers
		4.7c Formal Causation
		4.7d An “Actish” Phenomenal Quality
	4.8 Omissions
	4.9 Mental Actions
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
5. Intention
	5.1 Methodological Priority: Present or Future?
	5.2 Goal States and Plan States
	5.3 Reductive Accounts of Intention
		5.3a Predominant Desire
		5.3b Predominant Desire Plus Belief
		5.3c Evaluative Judgment
	5.4 Plan States and Plan Rationality
	5.5 Cognitivism About Intention
	5.6 A Distinctively Practical Attitude
	5.7 Intending and Intentional Action
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
6. Practical Knowledge
	6.1 What Do We Mean by “Practical Knowledge?”
		6.1a Knowledge Without Observation
		6.1b Knowledge Without Inference
		6.1c Mistakes Are in the Performance, Not the Judgment
		6.1d The Cause of What It Understands
		6.1e Contradicted by Interference
	6.2 The Scope and Object of Practical Knowledge
	6.3 Accounts of Practical Knowledge
		6.3a Cognitivism About Intention
		6.3b Imperfective Knowledge
		6.3c The Inferential Account
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
7. Does Action Have a Constitutive Aim?
	7.1 The Guise of the Good
	7.2 The Aim of Self-Understanding
	7.3 The Aim of Self-Constitution
	7.4 The Will to Power
	7.5 No Constitutive Aim
	7.6 Implications for Ethics and Metaethics
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
8. Identification and Self-Governance
	8.1 Frankfurt on Identification
	8.2 Watson’s Objection and Platonic Alternative
	8.3 Frankfurt Redux: Wholeheartedness
	8.4 Bratman on Self-governing Policies
	8.5 Skepticism About Self-Governance: A Genealogical Worry
	8.6 Self-Governance and Plan Rationality
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
9. Temptation, Weakness, and Strength of Will
	9.1 Is Synchronic Akrasia Even Possible?
	9.2 A Failure of Reasoning?
	9.3 A Divergence Between Evaluation and Motivation?
	9.4 Is Akrasia Necessarily Irrational?
	9.5 Weakness of Will Over Time
	9.6 Self-Control
	Summary
	Suggested Reading
10 Collective Agency
	10.1 Questions and Constraints
	10.2 Group Agents
	10.3 Collective Intentions
		10.3a Tuomela and Miller
		10.3b Searle
		10.3c Bratman
		10.3d Velleman
		10.3e Gilbert
	10.4 Acting Together
		Summary
		Suggested Reading
11 Concluding Thoughts
Bibliography
Index