Dancy's main thesis is that the conclusion of practical reasoning is an action, and indeed that makes the reasoning practical. I trace his argument, suggest improvements to its superficial deficien...

The common-sense view that reasons guide us in thought and action and that humans are essentially reason-responsive animals is increasingly under attack by defenders of what one can call the Rationalisation View, which emphasises that we typically rationalise actions and judgements that are based on intuition rather than reasoning. This article defends the former view of human Reason, partly by replying to prominent advocates of the latter, partly by proposing accounts of reflective reasoning and rationalisation that bring to light a (...) common, underappreciated feature: they both involve the capacity to see considerations as reasons. This capacity, the author conjectures, should be the starting point for investigating the faculty we call ‘Reason’, its evolutionary origin, and the (ir)rationality of different kinds of thought associated with it. (shrink)

The main aim of this paper is to identify a type of fact-given warrant for action that is distinct from reason-based justification for action and defend the view that there are two types of practical warrant. The idea that there are two types of warrant is familiar in epistemology, but has not received much attention in debates on practical normativity. On the view that I will defend, normative facts, qua facts, give rise to entitlement warrant for action. But they do (...) not, qua facts, give rise to reason-based warrant. Normative practical reasons, I will argue, are true propositions that represent fact-based favouring and that are made true by normative facts. (shrink)

The paper argues for a version of the Guise of the Good thesis, namely the claim that if someone acts as the result of practical reasoning, then she takes her premises to jointly provide a sufficient and undefeated reason for her action. I argue for this by showing, first, that it is an application of Boghossian's Taking Condition on inference to practical reasoning and, second, that the motivations for the Taking Condition for theoretical reasoning carry over to practical reasoning. I (...) end by arguing that this version of the Guise of the Good withstands standard objections. (shrink)

According to the Aristotelian Thesis, the conclusion of practical reasoning is an action. Critics argue against it by pointing to cases in which some interference or inability prevents the production of action, yet in which that interference or inability doesn’t impugn the success of an agent’s reasoning. Some of those critics suggest instead that practical reasoning concludes in an intention, while others suggest it concludes in a belief with normative content, such as a belief about what one has conclusive, or (...) sufficient, reason to do. In this paper, I argue that we should allow that practical reasoning could conclude in either an intention or a belief with normative content. I begin by developing an objection to the Aristotelian Thesis, showing how the objection will not also undermine the possibility of practical reasoning concluding in an intention or a belief. I then respond to an argument from Joseph Raz designed to exclude the possibility of intentions as conclusions of practical reasoning. Lastly, I show how the worry that belief isn’t sufficiently “practical” to qualify as a conclusion of practical reasoning is misplaced. (shrink)

According to the Reasoning View, a normative reason to φ is a premise in a pattern of sound reasoning leading to the conclusion to φ. But how should the Reasoning View account for reasons that are outweighed? One very promising proposal is to appeal to defeasible reasoning. On this proposal, when a reason is outweighed, the associated pattern of sound reasoning is defeated. Both Jonathan Way and Sam Asarnow have recently developed this idea in different ways. I argue that this (...) appeal to defeasible reasoning faces a challenge, since reasons can be both outweighed and disabled. Way's view generates good predictions about outweighed reasons, but not about disabled reasons. Asarnow's view generates good predictions about disabled reasons, but not about outweighed reasons. We want a version of the Reasoning View that can generate good predictions about both. I present a version of the Reasoning View that can meet the challenge. (shrink)

In Intention, Anscombe says that practical reasoning is practical, not by virtue of its content, but rather by virtue of its form. But in her later essay ‘Practical Inference’, she seems to take this back, claiming instead that (1) the practicality of practical reasoning (or inference) resides in the distinctive use it makes of the premises, and (2) ‘it is a matter of indifference’ whether we say that it exemplifies a distinctive form. I aim to show that Anscombe is right (...) about (1) but wrong about (2): the distinctive use (or teleology) of practical reasoning explains its distinctive formal features, and when the former is thought through, the latter are revealed to be more numerous and significant than Anscombe seems to recognize. (shrink)